![]() “It’s a terrible form of communication,” said Shea. For example, James Shea, a freelance writer who has consulted clients on using ChatGPT, doesn’t think that a cover letter, with its formulaic structure and braggy nature, is a good way of showcasing his writing talent. “To use TikTok parlance: Yes, they understood the assignment.”įor the occasions when hiring managers do want to know if an applicant is good at making a persuasive argument or linking their skills to the job description, it’s also not clear cover letters do a good job of these things. “Most employers don’t really put a lot of stock in what goes into the cover letter other than to demonstrate that the person understood that they should have one,” Alonso said. Rather, most hiring managers - two-thirds, he estimates - are simply checking whether or not you included the cover letter they asked for, rather than judging the erudition of your prose. While a cover letter can be a place for applicants to explain why they might be good for a role they aren’t quite qualified for, or to explain away a work gap or career change, it’s not likely many get to those details in that amount of time. ![]() ![]() Alonso says that hiring managers spend very little time, a couple minutes at most, reviewing an applicant’s qualifications before deciding whether or not to disqualify them. What we do know is that many hiring managers are not actually reading cover letters. Data from Indeed, which hosts job listings for job listings that traditionally require cover letters and those that don’t, shows that just 2 percent mentioned a cover letter. Recruiters we spoke to pegged that rate at closer to 10 or 20 percent. Alex Alonso, chief knowledge officer at the Society for Human Resource Management, says that “most” professional jobs still ask for a cover letter. The extent to which employers are asking for cover letters these days is unclear. I wrote a very basic prompt for ChatGPT and got back a not terrible cover letter. And now that AI can make a pretty decent cover letter with the right prompts and a bit of editing, the exercise of writing one by hand can feel more pointless than ever. The main point of cover letters is to explain why your experience would make you a good fit for a position, but that’s also information hiring managers can glean from your resume or a phone call. It also forces people to ask if cover letters are even important these days, and if there might be better ways to design the application process so that job seekers don’t have to resort to an AI to write one in the first place. Consumer AI software can let job seekers feel like they’re fighting bot to bot. The hiring process, in general, is getting longer and longer, and companies themselves are using software to screen out employees - a process that feels like a black box. But job seekers see it as a necessary step toward getting ahead in a job application process that’s fraught with inefficiencies and unfairness. Using technology like ChatGPT to apply for a job raises some thorny ethical questions, like whether you’re misrepresenting yourself to a potential employer. LinkedIn, TikTok, and media outlets abound with info on the best ways to get a decent cover letter from the software. A recent online survey from job service site Resume Builder found that nearly half of current and recent job seekers were using ChatGPT to write their resumes or cover letters. ![]() Grace is one of a growing number of job seekers turning to AI to complete what can be one of the more arduous - and arguably unnecessary - steps in the hiring process. “I think they just looked at my resume,” she said. She ended up getting the job but she doesn’t think it was because of her cover letter. ChatGPT spat out an “adequate” cover letter that she gave a quick edit. Grace, who asked that we leave out her last name so as not to jeopardize her employment, gave the AI the job description and fed it some qualifications she wanted to highlight. Instead, she took a friend’s advice and used ChatGPT, the text-generating AI software that’s gone viral in recent months. “It’s not plucky ‘You should hire me because I’m amazing but my weakness is I’m extra amazing.’” And although her job as a land-use planner does require some writing, she felt a cover letter wouldn’t actually do a good job of showcasing it. Grace wanted a better-paid job based closer to where she lived, but she dreaded writing another cover letter. ![]()
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