What to include in your covering letter
Covering letters come in all styles and lengths, from a simple note saying ‘please find enclosed my CV’ to several pages of writing. These are two extremes and a good covering letter would fall somewhere inbetween – ideally one to two sides of A4.
Covering letters show:
your writing ability;
your ability to select facts and use them in a reasoned argument;
your understanding of the company and the job which you’re applying for.
It’s a chance to go into detail about certain bits of your CV to explain why you want the job and why you’d be good at it, but make sure you don’t re-write the whole thing! You’re just looking for the main parts that you want to tell them more about (make sure they are relevant to the job that you’re applying for).
Explain your current situation
If you are working, say what your job is, who the company is and explain what it does.
Make it clear what your career aims are and why you are applying for the job.
You should show why your past and current work experience and skills match the post you’re applying for. To do this, read the job description, pick out the skills/experience the company is especially interested in and show where you have relevant experience or skills. If you haven’t had a job before, so can’t write about your experience, you should concentrate on your willingness and ability to train. Also, if you have a particular interest in the company/job, mention this.
Sometimes, job adverts ask questions like when will you be available for an interview. Make sure you answer any questions like these in your covering letter. If you don’t answer basic questions like these, however good the rest of your application is, you won’t get the job because it shows your lack of care over details.
Top tips:
Although it’s tempting, you shouldn’t use the same covering letter for every application. You should be writing about skills and experience which are specific to a particular job, so you would need to write a different letter for each one. You could keep a copy of your letter and re-use paragraphs which are relevant to save yourself time.
It might be helpful to make a note of which letters got you an interview and then keep working on these ones – they’re obviously on the right track.
When you’ve written your letter take some time to go and do other things and then come back and read it with a fresh mind – you’ll probably spot things that you can improve on.
What not to include!
Don’t ramble – it needs to be clear and to the point. The people reading this will have had others (it would be strange that you’re the only one applying for the job) you need yours to stand out.
Don’t repeat your CV – just pick out certain bits which link to why you’re perfect for the job!
Don’t go into too much detail about your education or previous jobs.
Don’t write bad things about your last employer/job no matter how much you hated working there!.......you might be seen as a troublemaker.
Don’t include things like – I don’t want to work on Fridays and before 10am is a non-starter!.....enough said!