Policy Jobs

The covering letter is the first impression you give to an employer. It personalises your CV and provides you the opportunity to express your enthusiasm and suitability for a specific job. The quality of your covering letter can determine whether an employer will even read your CV!

Every job application that you make should include a covering letter, even if it is not explicitly asked for by the advert. Many organisations have a standard application form and a covering letter should be prepared in addition to this.

Covering letters are still important when you apply by e-mail. Employers have commented that candidates often become "lazy" when they apply by e-mail and don't take the time to send a covering e-mail. When applying by e-mail you can include a covering letter either as part of the text of your e-mail, or as a separate Word attachment. Make sure any attachments you send are clearly named and refer to them in the text of your e-mail.

Customise
Each letter you send should be written for the specific role that you are applying for. By customising your application you give an employer the impression that you really want to work for their organisation.

Avoid the temptation to recycle the same basic covering letter for multiple organisations. Such letters make a bad impression. If your covering letter simply looks like a generic letter with their name added into it, employers will reason that you can't be bothered to take half an hour to write a specific letter for them, so therefore you aren't genuinely enthusiastic about the job on offer.

Find a name
Always try to address your letter to a specific person. If you are unable to find the name of a contact person, address the letter as "Dear Sir/Madam". If you address your letter in this manner you should close it with a "Yours faithfully", if your letter is addressed to a specific person then you should close it "Yours sincerely".

Get their attention
While you need to inform the reader as to the purpose of the letter, try to do so in an interesting and appropriately creative way. If the employer is receiving a large number of applicants it helps if your opening paragraph immediately gains their interest.

One way to do this might be to add a line above your salutation that details the position you are applying for. This frees up your opening paragraph to immediately start to highlight the best parts of your application or to write something that is attention grabbing.

Overall, your letter should make you sound like a person that the employer would benefit from considering from the position and would enjoy meeting in an interview setting.

Address the selection criteria
In the main body of your letter you should address the criteria identified by the employer in the job advertisement, focus on the benefits that you would bring to the employer, and convince them of your ability to do the specific tasks that they are recruiting for.

Highlight the most relevant parts of your CV without duplicating the entire content - as a rule of thumb a covering letter should not be longer than one A4 page using single line spacing.

No mistakes!
Proof read, proof read, proof read! Don't rely only on your spell checker as it won't always pick up on errors such as correctly spelt words used in an incorrect context. Also ask a friend or a flatmate to check your letter for you.

Spelling and grammatical mistakes indicate a lack of attention to detail to your prospective employer, and gives them grounds to immediately dismiss your application - they are looking for any excuse to do this, especially if you are one of a large pile of covering letters and CV's!