Writing Cover Letters: Why We Should Use Professional and Formal Language

In these trying economic times, lay-offs and unemployment are taking the centre stage. This article is written to help those struggling to secure an interview. 

If you know anyone that needs help with their CLs and Résumé, please pass on my email [email protected] so that they may have an avenue for professional assistance. 

Do People Actually Read Cover Letters?

Before we address the issues of writing Cover Letters (CLs), we need to ask a more important question: Are they still relevant? 

Surprisingly, a research article published in 2009 said that only 56% of Cover Letters are preferred by U.S. employers. In 2017, Zogby Analytics conducted a nationwide survey of 2,287 U.S. adults and found that only 26% of employers consider Cover Letters important. While the survey is not statistically significant or accurate, it does however indicate a trajectory of job review preferences. 

But the fine line must be read and we need to compare these results to real world situations. First, while the majority of employers may not prefer to read a Cover Letter, it does not mean it is not read or required. And the reason for this hesitance is partly due to the applicant’s poor grammar and inappropriate tones. The CL may also have caused emotional discomfort (anger, irritation, or annoyance) in the reader.

Second, who are these “employers” that don’t like to read CLs? A lackadaisical recruiting agent or staff in the company is not representative of the hiring process. The main hiring personnel could be anyone in the chain of command, be it the HR Director or C-Level officer. Do they read CLs? According to Business Insider interviews with top-level executives, “the concept of introducing oneself and setting oneself apart will never go by the wayside”. And while Résumés may do the job, hiring managers know that CLs do it better.

Cover Letters may be on the wane, but they are not leaving the scene - yet. This means that it is still necessary and important to write it. But “how” to write a good CL is the question we need to address and we begin this lesson with how we shouldn’t write it.

Narrative Writing and Emotive Language in Cover Letters

I will start this section with a Forbes article written in 2016. The title reads, “I've Read More Than 300 Cover Letters, And This Is How I Decide If They're Good Or Bad Within Three Minutes”. I am sure that many of you would have come across this article while doing your research. How do I know this? Because the majority of my students and clients try to replicate the advice from that article (and similar blog posts) to disastrous effect. I’m here to explain why the article’s views are problematic and to debunk the value of descriptive writing for Cover Letters. 

In the article, the writer states that “If your first line reads: ‘I am writing to apply for [job] at [company],’ I will delete it and suggest a swap every time. (Yes, every single time.) When a hiring manager sees that, she won’t think, “How thoughtful of the applicant to remind me what I’m reading!” Her reaction will be much closer to, ‘boring,’ ‘meh' or even ‘next!’” 

This statement is an egotistical expression of predisposition and personal prejudice. HR managers are not trained to be biased or self-serving. What makes you happy or excited as a recruiter is insignificant compared to what the company needs in an employee. To discern a person’s ability and psychological profile within 3 minutes is already a worrying idiosyncrasy. To insist that the applicant ditch objectivity for creative writing is an unprincipled advice. 

In the article, the writer said that she would prefer opening sentences that started with:

• “I’ve wanted to work in education ever since my third grade teacher, Mrs. Dorchester, helped me discover a love of reading”, or 
• “My approach to management is simple: I strive to be the kind of leader I’d want to work for.”

These are typically known as creative or narrative writing, and the point is to induce an emotional response from the reader. This method works only under two conditions: 1) You know your recruiter prefers storytelling; 2) You know that your reader will not misinterpret your self-narrative as self-aggrandisement. 

Yes, make no mistake that objective and formal writing is, as the writer reminds us, “boring” and “meh”. But which HR school teaches their students to accept applicants only if they write in a “non-boring” manner? None that I know of.

Using emotive language such as “love”, “superb”, or “super excited” in Cover Letters may land us a job if that’s what our employers are looking for. But how do we know if our employer has an excitable personality? If we cannot definitely answer that question, then the lowest risk is to employ objectivity and formality in our writing. In this situation, the safest possible route has the greatest possible opportunities. 

The Perception of Applicants using Narrative Writing

Unless we’re great writers or have an impressive command of the language, any use of descriptive writing will open our text for unintended meanings. As Roland Barthes once very famously said, “the author is dead”. 

Barthes' intention was to caution us that once the author has completed a manuscript, he/she no longer owns the interpretation and meaning of the words. That power now belongs solely to the reader. Formal writing was developed partly to address this problem. It was meant to minimise any unintentional, wayward interpretation of the author’s meaning. 

Narrative and informal writing, on the other hand, has the opposite effect. It allows our imagination freedom and, at the same time, loosens the hold on the writer’s intention. But this is a dangerous writing style if it is used for professional purposes. In the Forbes article previously mentioned, the writer provided an excerpt of her own CL: “If I’m in a conference room and the video isn’t working, I’m not the sort to simply call IT and wait. I’ll also (gracefully) crawl under the table and check that everything is properly plugged in.”

This is a great example of storytelling/narrative writing; one that can cause humour or consternation. In 3 sentences, which is precious space for a one-page cover letter, she has provided neither information on her ability to meet the job criteria nor addressed the job description. She has implied to the reader her character traits, but a job application is not a personality contest. It is a skill competition. You may be the most likeable individual on Earth and yet fail to land an interview if you do not meet the required expertise. 

In that same example, an employer could have multiple reactions to that written statement. One, she is a proactive person who likes to get the job done; two, she is a joker and has no skills to show for it; three, the applicant does not like to follow protocols. Also, depending on the mood of the recruiter at that time, one’s “jokes” may not be as funny as one intends it to be. 

Allow me to caution that this is a skilled writer who wrote these statements. The vast majority of job applicants are not linguists or storytellers. Thus, following such advice has adverse repercussions, especially when the CL starts off with, “I’ve loved Disney movies since I was a kid and I’ve always wanted to work for Disney because your company is just amazing!” A possible interpretation of that personality is enthusiasm; the other is fan-fuelled neuroticism. 

What To Do Now? 

There’s a reason why formal and professional writing was invented. It was to avoid complications and unintended interpretations of one’s meaning. When bloggers online say that we should market our abilities to potential employers, they do not mean self-aggrandisement. We can safely market our abilities using formal language that explains our skills and experiences in an objective manner. Conversely, we may also be a creative writer but take all the risks that follows it. Remember that you’ve only got that one small window of opportunity for each job application. You can’t apply twice and hope for two different reviews.

If you’ve been having trouble trying to land an interview after sending out more than 20 applications, it is time to seek professional help. Each application takes about 3 hours to complete. That means you’ve spent 60 hours working on it. If you earn, on average, $20 an hour in a full time job, it means you’ve just lost $1200 dollars in pay. 

There must be ROI in your labours for employment. If, after 20 applications, you’re still back at square one, you must seek help or else continue losing precious opportunities.