What I look for in cover letters

I just finished looking at more than 100 cover letters. Here are a few thoughts for those of you in the job market:

1. Make your first paragraph work. “I am thrilled to apply for ….” “Enclosed please find ….” “I noticed your posting ….” Will blend right in with about 95 percent of the letters. Start by saying why you want this job, or what you think you will bring to the table. Here’s one that I liked:

How many times have you attended an event and wished you could get those 60 plus minutes of your life back? Many I bet. I’m here to help.

2. Follow the marketing mantra: Talk about the benefits you bring, not your features. Forget about sentence after sentence of traits and skill sets “attention to detail … people-person … budget management … vendor relations … passion.” Tell me what you can do for me. Such as:

To this position, I will be bringing established relationships with

vendors, caterers, printers, entertainers.

3. Tell stories, but be short and to the point. Think very hard about that list of traits and skill sets and come up with stories that illustrate them. Descdribe the situation, what you did, and how it all turned out. Like this:

I single-handedly coordinated a party in Montréal, Canada for the company’s affiliates. Challenges included selecting a venue without an in-person visit, communicating with restaurant owners in French and negotiating cost in another currency. (The company’s) president and managers told me it was the best party in company history.

4. Cut the jargon. It’s great that you worked hard on the letter, but work harder on distilling the wording — reduce the sauce. Instead of “well-versed in conducting business in a university setting,” just say “I know how to do business at a university.”

5. Know something about the organization. There’s no excuse for not visiting the organization’s Web site and finding out what their mission and vision statements are, what their current advertising campaign is, what they’re putting in their news releases. Use this information to write a great first paragraph and to convert your “features” into “benefits.”

6. Edit the darn thing. You don’t get a second chance at making a first impression. The cover letter colors my perception before I open up your resume. The worst thing that can happen is you clearly demonstrate that you don’t have “attention to detail.” The second worst thing is that I close the thing without any sense of why you want to work in my organization and what you might bring to it.

There were a couple of interesting variations of note:

Two or three letter-writers had a short intro, then tabulated the job requirements on the left and their qualifications on the right. Not very engaging, but it sure made for a quick and easy scan. I can’t say any of these made my finalists list, though.

A couple of letter writers were clever. One wrote the “top 10 reasons why I am right for this job.” Another had a list of things about herself that indicated what a “event planner wonk” she is. They gave me an indication that these are outside-the-box people, and probably have nice personalities. But I don’t think the gimmicks are as good as well-tuned, specific stories.

Coincidentally, my favorite applied storytelling blogger, Kathy Hansen, last week released a book, Tell Me About Yourself, with advice on using stories to get jobs and advance your career. It’s in the mail from Amazon (if it were on Kindle, I’d have it already!).

I have thoughts on resumes, but that will be another posting.