Especially with the rise of “ghost postings” so quantity over quality is greater than ever these days
Spray and prey?
Applying to every available posting even loosely matching what you’re looking for, and hoping something sticks.
I read the title, salary, if it’s remote and maybe skim the “what we’re looking for” section. Maybe. Me personally, will also skip any posting that has an application that’ll take me longer than like 20 seconds to complete. So basically a resume upload and basic info form only. Registration? Skipped. Cover letter? Gone.
In an average search, in about a month I can have hundreds of applications in
Cover latter? Is it the 50ties? If a company wants a cover letter, I ain’t applying. You got my CV. Need more info? Call me, the number is on the CV.
Cover letter requirement makes no sense in this day and age. We have access to thousands of job openings on the palm of our hands, why the fuck would I pause on one random job just to lie about why I want to work at that specific company.
This is what AI is for. If they’re going to use it for screening applications, I’m going to use it to write my cover letter.
Their robots can talk to my robots.
Hard agree.
I guess this depends where you live and what professions your are applying for. In my region and field, a cover letter goes with saying. It always has been like that, ever since I was looking for summer jobs, and continues to be the standard.
As someone from outside the US, I have no clue wtf is a cover letter, this isn’t a thing in Brazil, you just send your resume.
I’m Australian and was always told the cover letter was unnecessary, especially if your CV has a bio.
The cover letter was for additional information not covered by the resume - name dropping the manager at the company you know who inspired you to apply, explaining why it appears your changing industries, justifying “overqualifications”, mentioning a personal hobby that’s relevant to the industry and isn’t technical work experience.
Basically the things you plan to bring up in the interview to wow them, you can introduce them while introducing yourself in a cover letter.
But if your resume lines up with the position description, you don’t need a cover letter.
Basically I was told a cover letter is necessary when you’re a burnt out nurse or teacher applying to be a cashier at kmart to avoid having your resume immediately thrown out.
That said. I’ve literally never written one, even as a serial industry hopper. If there’s no email address to send my resume too, then the system is too auto for a cover letter and they don’t want to read it anyway, if there is an email address, just include a few lines of a short cover letter in the body text of the email before attaching your resume.
It’s totally a thing here too. I’ve been asked for one when I apply for a job.
It isn’t a thing in the US anymore either.
I think cover letters are still absolutely relevant to the job process.
I liken cover letters to cheat sheets that you prepare for an exam. You may not need to make one to be successful, but can be very helpful.
Usually with cover letters, I try to make the argument that I’m good for the company, and the company is good for me. This usually allows me to frame the way I look a new job as a business agreement where both parties can benefit, and that I’m not a parasite taking from them and not giving.
I don’t make cover letters for each and every position I apply to or look into, but for those ones i think I have a good chance of landing and those companies I believe in, I’ll absolutely put in more effort with cover letters.
I couldn’t count the number of people I’ve interviewed, but I can tell you that I’ve read exactly zero cover letters.
Again, part of my argument in favor of cover letters is that they help the candidate better prepare for the (sometimes multiple) interview process. They can help a candidate distill the main reasons as to why they want the job, which can make conversation easier if you’re more comfortable speaking to those more personal things.
Again, the candidate can keep that to themselves.
I think cover letters are still absolutely relevant to the job process.
Nope.
Great dialogue!
You’re welcome.
Nobody in my industry bothers to read them. You’d be lucky if they spend more than a minute on the resume so they’re a waste of time.
Some organizations in my industry require them, so guess it depends.
Regardless of if it’s required, however, I would still argue that it’s good even if you don’t have to send it to the company. To me, it helps me put my head in the right mindspace to argue for myself and make a case that I’m the person for them.
Is your industry the 1950s?
My industry is STEM?
Why are you asking me? Also, that’s not an industry.
Interesting. I’m a hiring manager, and I’ve seen many cover letters that actually hurt the candidate because they have typographical errors, poor grammar, or are addressed to a different organization entirely. Probably 85% of cover letters I see do no harm; most of the rest hurt the candidate. The way you’re describing a cover letter sounds like it would be beneficial, but I don’t see ones like that very often. I definitely would appreciate that you took the time to tailor it to us.
My advice for everyone is, if you’re going to write a cover letter, proofread it just like the resume. If you’re short on time, focus on the resume and skip the cover letter (if you can - they might be required for some applications). I definitely notice a sloppy cover letter, so not having a cover letter will hurt far, far less than a sloppy one.
I wouldn’t toss someone’s application just because their cover letter had a typographical error in it, especially if the candidate is otherwise well qualified. But, if I’m borderline on whether I want to interview someone, and the cover letter is sloppy, I’m probably going to pass. We’re pretty detail-oriented, and a sloppy cover letter makes me worry about the details.
To me, I don’t understand why someone would proofread their resume but not their cover letter.
Then again, I’d be someone that would put in the same degree of effort to the resume as the cover letter. Not everyone is like that.
Guess it just depends on if you find it worthwhile or not. If you can’t seem to land jobs following interview after interview, it might be worthwhile to look into cover letters if only to help you orient yourself better to the job and company.
To me, I don’t understand why someone would proofread their resume but not their cover letter.
Yeah, I hear that…but you’d be surprised at how often I see perfectly-rendered resumes, and then multiple obvious issues in a cover letter.
The cover letter helps you get the interview - after I make the decision (offer or not), I pretty much forget about the cover letter.
Just use a cover letter template with changeable placeholders
Plot twist: make a one size fits all resume, but have AI tailor it and transmit it everywhere.
Double twist:
Just go work for the AI
AI works just like intended,
Soon we’ll work for it instead.
Triple twist: Be the AI
Don’t use the sword. Be the sword.
You rang?
Is there a Lemmy equivalent to /r/beetlejuicing yet?
Leetlejuicing
Hello? It is me Danny Barcelona
Are you sure you’re not Linux?
Maybe it’s the shit market that I’m applying to, but when I apply for a retail job, they want a fully filled out application (that auto fill always Borks, so I have to type everything in manually) as well as a cover sheet and some places want you to take a personality quiz that you have to pass for hr to even see your application. I couldn’t imagine applying to 4 jobs a day, let alone 40.
I imagine we are talking about corporate postings where you just paste a link to LinkedIn and that does most of the work?
Lol holy shit I forgot about those “personality tests.” They are (well, were at least, I imagine its still like this) basically just a way to filter out people too stupid to not know what answers they want to hear. Questions like, “You see a coworker stealing money from the register, do you: a) pretend you didn’t see anything, b) join them and start a gang, or c) tell the manager on duty”
Shit is so laughably stupid.
Jesus that sounds so demeaning. I haven’t had to apply for a job in about 15 years now. All networking, and I was poached and offered my current job. Union now, so I’m set. I don’t remember having to jump through so many hoops when I was younger and applying for a job, but recently I passed by a Wendy’s and there must have been 50 people lined up outside with resumes because there was a job posting. That many people for one burger job, that’s hard times.
if indeed doesn’t allow me to quick apply, it’s gotta be a dream job to even want to go to their site and do even more work.
Yeah, about that cover sheet. Did you not get the memo? We’re putting new cover sheets on all the applications now, mmmkay? If you could just do that from now, that’d be great.
I’ve worked for several big corps have never seen anything like that.
lucky you, it’s becoming more common.
Unless something really good comes up yeah. Also most of the time I just put my generic CV up and get calls from recruiters. So the actual people hiring don’t even see my CV
Had one guy apply for a job in my field saying “My experiences in different field> will help me as <job title>.”
There is very little overlap in hard skills (soft ones obviously do help). Not like that matters a whole lot - their actual list of past jobs and skills would have landed them an interview at least, because we already expect it to be a learn-as-you-go type of deal. Bro would have been better off leaving it out and I would have just assumed they’re trying to strike out in a different direction.
(I told HR to invite them for an interview anyway, because fuck cover letters - I’m not gonna hold anyone to a higher standard there than I’d like to be held to)
Tried both, tried a normal resume and a resume with an ATS-focused layout, tried AI-based tools meant to help you improve your resume, and a few other things, and after more than forty applications in six months, what finally got me an interview and then very quickly an offer was an internal referral from a friend/ex-coworker. For context, I am a software engineer.
Fun fact: the average response time after submitting an application was 48 days.
Same here. I changed my LinkedIn status and a former coworker pinged me and said he set up a Discord for other job seekers. I joined and posted my skills and desired role and he forwarded my resume to his employer because they were in the early stages of finding someone for that role.
After a week of interviews I had a new job. Of the 60 or so applications I sent to similar roles during that week only about half replied, and all of those were rejections.
Yeah, as I’m going to move across my country I’m basically calling on everyone I know to give me references there. I figure it’s time that my extroversion help me instead of hurting me like usual
and after more than forty applications in six months
That’s not “spray and pray”
I just started a job search yesterday and I’m already at about 40 applications. My job search before this one I went from search start to offer in ~2 weeks w/ ~200 applications in, all manual. Though my industry is IT, so I do have a bit of flexibility as far as roles go, but still 6 applications/month is a bit on the low side IMO
It really depends what job it is.
Yeah usually I send like 40 or applications each week. I imagine if you are in a specific field then it’s a lot harder to do the spray and pray method tho
Never have done a cover letter. Just seems like pandering pretentious tripe
This may be Australia specific, but do job postings not spell out what they want in other countries?
Like, job postings in Australia (these days) are: this is the job, here are the key selection criteria, please provide us a resume and cover letter (or just a resume, or cover letter optional, etc). Even down to maximum number of pages sometimes.
They just tell you, and part of the way they weed people out is if they fail to follow what’s written (simple way to weed out anyone paying no attention).
Do other countries just have to GUESS what the recruitment managers want at each company?
Only about 3 out of 10 jobs I have applied for stipulated a cover letter and those 3 were trying to appear bigger than they were in other ways
I don’t think I’ve crafted a cover letter since we stopped sending resumes via snail mail.
I always thought of a cover letter for clarifying something on your resume. Ex: you’re changing careers or industries and out want to clarify why your experience is relevant. So, I don’t do them for every application but in certain situations.
Originally it was to introduce yourself and why you’re sending them a resume in the mail. A really good cover letter will get you past HR send your letter and resume to the hiring team. Thst function has largely been replaced by resume scanning tools.
When I get them from new grads I delete them. Experienced people or weird resumes I might read if borderline.
Sometimes it is interesting reading the bad ones. They can’t spell or use proper grammar apparently
Same. They already have my resume and application for the job, I’m not writing a whole page groveling and begging them to hire me.
It’s worth writing a generic one.
Depends on the job, for engineering…nah
I’ve had multiple recruiters tell me they like mine. It doesn’t hurt. More space for buzzwords for the AI to read.
I just got an AI to write a cover letter for me highlighting specific skjlls, and then just edited those skills to fit the job I was applying to. Wasn’t really that much effort, and I did land a job in about 2 weeks of searching.
Never worked with a recruiter
Had enough bad experience from one half to know I don’t want to be on the other half
Often times recruiters are hired by companies to go find suitable candidates.
So how is that working out for you? Genuinely curious.
It worked fine for me, I’ve landed three jobs that way. That was a while ago though, the last time was in 2017. My last two jobs I took because I had some connections call out of the blue. I’ve been very fortunate in that regard. I can’t imagine that would happen again, most of my connections are getting close to retirement age at this point.
For my industry, IT, pretty well. A nice upward career trajectory and an average of about a month from search start to offer over the past couple of jobs
That’s how plants do it. For a billion years. Must be the best strategy.
Also semen
Spray and pray baby. Getting the recruiter or HR department to like you only gets you in the door. You can’t shortcut actual connections with your actual coworkers.
Right. When I was interviewing people, I honestly couldn’t care less about the CV. I’m an engineer, words are hard. I want a list of your skills, your software proficiencies, and a run-down of your previous jobs along with your responsibilities. When you get here, I’m going to care about finding out how much you know about designing and cad. Then we’ll take a tour of the shop to see if the machinery we build is in your comfort zone. We’ll have some small talk to get a feel for if you’d fit in with the group, and off you’ll go. All said and done, it should be under 45 minutes.
Bcc everyone
