so once again my name is Craig Jones and I'm the Career Education Associate for Cornell career services and today's summer career chat series topic is on resume and cover letters so throughout the whole process when you're applying for jobs in internships we'd like to incorporate the career development model so as you can see it's a wheel so the 1st phase is understand yourself your interest your values your strengths and your goals. And the next phase is explore options so your resources your networking activities your internship experiences and then the Take Action part so the applications,  the cover letters and the resumes and interviews. so today's workshop is on the taking action part. as you see this is circular so you can start anywhere on this wheel and just keep going around a circle you can start explore options then you can take action I think you really need to understand yourself before you can really go to the next phase so today's agenda is the career management process, how to focus your strengths some resume and cover letter tips how to tailor your resume and cover letter, your next steps and then once again I answer any questions that you might have at the end of the presentation so employers want applicants who understand their strengths and specific goals know why they want to work a specific position for a particular office and or division and can explain why they're the right candidate for the position I think that's the most important segment is you need to really be able to articulate not only in your resume but in your cover letter as well why you feel you're the right candidate for this position and the way to do that is to create effective bullet points so you want to use succinct strong language begin with action verbs that match the job description not "I" or adjectives and the content you want to quantify your accomplishments when you can I think there's a lot of stress put on students you really make sure that you quantify show a lot of numbers in your accomplishments and sometimes you can you can easily but sometimes you can't so it's better to really kind of be strategic in what you quantify so you want to emphasize a level responsibilities your interactions and you want to try to eliminate any extraneous material that's on your resume. And don't forget to stay within one page so it's 2 or more pages is Ok for a Master's or graduate student so you really want to make sure you optimize readability and be consistent with all the font spacing and headers Once again,  your focus you want to know your target learn about the organization or industry that you're applying to do so keep in mind understand why you're preparing these materials so you really need to know yourself some resume pointers so choose a style chronological function or a combination that best represents your strengths for your target use heading strategically to highlight your qualifications based on your experiences and the job requirements so many times when I am reviewing a resume for student they put all their experiences in one category called professional experience right so you want to take the time to really tailor your sections according to types of opportunities that you're applying to and once again you want to create those effective bullet points that are relevant to the position. You want to be consistent throughout use appropriate tense so past for previous experiences and present tense for current roles and you want to be able to be prepared to discuss confidently any experience or skill that is on your resume soon if you're a senior and you put a course you took in freshman year on your resume you might want to go back and review the curriculum in order to be able to articulate that During the interview if you put a foreign language skill or a computer skill on your resume one make sure that you list proficiency level right you don't want to misrepresent yourself. So resume tips so you want to make sure that it's error free so there are 2 most common misspelled words believe or not are the words relevant and Power Point so relevant most spell it with E.V.E.N.T. as opposed to the proper way of spelling it which is Relevant. And then PowerPoint is actually a capital P for points and when you use all caps for your section categories it's going to be hard for you to know not a typo right so once again make sure that Your resume is error free and another concern is you want to be consistent with your period placement so if you're putting a period at the end of your statements for your bullet points you want to make sure that you consistent all the way through right so if you have periods on some lines and not on the others then that's going to convey that you're not detail oriented right and artificial intelligence when they're screening resumes you can say that there is an error and another common mistake is the dashes and the spaces between your dates sometimes you might use a short dash sometimes you might use a long dash and if you look at example below you can see the 1st one is the short dash and then there's a space before the 1st dash. And then when it's next to the word may there is no space and if you look the example next to it there's a space in for an after the dash and it's a long dash so whatever size dash you use make sure they consistent all the way through and the same  with spacing before and after I feel it's always better to get used a lot dash and has a space before and after as I mentioned previously you want to list your proficiency levels for computer technical and foreign language skills. So improving bullet points so you can start with this supervise and evaluate other staff budget management or work in conjunction with leadership teams so you want to kind of work on to improve that so it's more obvious to the reader what you're responsibilities actually were and some ways to improve your bullet points you want to choose your crack verb forms you want increase activeness of your verbs consider how did I do that how often did I do it and what impact did I make I think that's a most important tip you really want to convey because your actions this is what happens a kind of like the cause and effect right what did you personally do so going back to those previous statements right so instead of this supervising the building other staff supervise and provide regular feedback to 7 student staff members, Budget Management Manage discretionary budget of 25000 and then work in conjunction with leadership team collaborate with 3 members a leadership team to sure smooth daily operations of departments so once again you giving them more clarification right some more specifics what you did and sits on this page and want to also mention like numbers right so when you using numbers between one and 10 you need to spell it out right but if it's over 10 and you can use the numerical form for the number. Tailoring your resume right so demonstrating your strengths what is your evidence identify your relevant skills and abilities so competent in handling market data Ok How can you make it more impactful right so completed courses in statistics and Survey Research enjoy speaking before groups provide a campus tours and information sessions to prospective students and parents so keep in mind back each one up with clear specific examples and facts so demonstrating your strengths so instead of this I worked on a bank project that was running over budget I found cost savings on materials for some internal spaces my recommendations lower the cost to initial budget levels I received a commendation from the clients so this would be stronger right analyze expenditures on a 40 story bank building identify source of 10 percent cost overruns recommended material substitutions to project manager resulting in cost savings that brought the project in on budget and earn commendation from clients. Put it all together so how can you target your skills and abilities to the position. so here's an example. For McKinsey and Company for a business analyst right so it's always helpful to look at the posting in hand shape and see what the qualifications are but also it's good to go to the employer website because typically there is additional information on the employer Web Site that's not listed on the posting in hand shake.  So here's some qualifications right undergraduate or master's degree outstanding record of academic achievements exceptional analytical and quantitative problem solving skills ability to work effectively with people at all levels ability to work collaboratively in a team environment advancement proficiency with Excel and Access and then sometimes there's a preferred qualifications for this position proven record of leadership in a work setting and or through extracurricular activities willingness to travel ability to communicate complex ideas effectively both verbally and writing in English and the local office language so it's really interesting under the prefer that you're looking for somebody who's leadership not only in a work or internship environment but also through extra curricular activities so many times students have great experience but they list at the bottom of the page of the resume an extra curricular So it's actually relevant to the position then you can certainly move that towards the top of the page and list it under the relevant experience section. So once again looking at this listing there's not really a lot of content here so then I went to the employer websites and they gave some additional information so while there's no exact template for success at McKinsey our people share some qualities that help make us successful and that making work met fun working here fun so they're looking for something with personal impact right so interact with people in tough situations your entrepreneurial drive so your entrepreneurial spirit's innovative problem solving ability so strong intellectual abilities and then once again the leadership abilities so you want they're looking for candidates that can lead themselves their teams their communities so once again take the extra time to go to the employer website just to see if there's additional information that the employer's looking for in applicants. Now keep put this all together. So the section g.p.a. honors awards and relevant courses right so maybe you don't have a lot of direct experience in this area but you could kind of highlight it through these sections right so they were looking for as you remember someone with strong intellectual abilities so yes that could be your g.p.a. And then if you also notice the placement of the g.p.a. a lot of times when I'm reviewing a student's resume they tend to put it on the same line as their college right so here Bachelor of Science in industrial labor relations usually the g.p.a. will go all the way on the right side of the page when I'm standing down the resumes I don't see it initially so I assume it must be below a 3.0 I don't see it listed right so I always recommend putting it on the left side of the page and I also recommend listing the number 1st right so some is getting down this could make more of an impact so let's say. Your g.p.a. isn't really important for the position that you're applying to so yes they can go on the right side of the page right. If you look at the difference between the 1st listing and the 2nd one it makes more impact because it's easier read and another way to show your strong intellectual abilities to have the honors and awards section but I think it's also good. Depending if you have space kind of give some clarification and how competitive these honors Awards that you receive some put some kind of context now they're also looking for remember exceptional analytical quantitative and problem solving skills. So that could also be conveyed in the coursework section right so international financial management quantitative biology from electro  biology and genetics right advancement vision see with Excel and Access just listing it and still section if you took a course advanced desktop applications right so you support the claim that you have those skills in qualities that they're looking for and then teams is another right to build and work in teams so team leadership fundamentals too right so once again highlighting these qualities and skills into looking for not only in your experience but your honors in awards and your relevant courses section and also something keep in mind so if applicable to the opportunities you're applying to, You could also include class projects and then list them in the relevant experience section so it's great that you listed the courses here but if you actually get a project that would be really applicable to the opportunities you are applying to that could be listed in the relevant experience section so when you say relevant experience it can be paid a class project, an extracurricular it does not have to be paid experiences so keep that in mind and another way to kind of show these skills and qualities that maybe you don't have direct work or volunteer experience is to highlight them in the skills activities and interests section right so strong intellectual abilities maybe have some laboratory skills right maintaining purifying stone tissue cultures. Exceptional analytical skills maybe your interest is rock climbing chess waterpolo right willingness to travel so I was recommend this to students who do little traveling right to have a subcategory in your skills section called cross cultural So here's an example extensive travel in eastern and western Europe South Pacific and the Far East. Innovative self starting entrepreneur spirit right so you play the violin for 11 years cross-country running 8 years you're interested in the stock market and then your ability to lead yourself teams and communities so instead of having a community service subcategory you can have a section that's called Community Relations right so new student orientation counselor player project team right so you also want to make sure that you list the date you're involved with some of the activities as well and some skills don't you don't want to just list Microsoft Office sometimes they could do a keyword search like Excel Powerpoint and then it's not going to come up right so you want to make sure that you list them out and once again you want to list the more relevant or applicable skills to the left so you probably want to list Excel are point and then word towards the end and there's no need to list Microsoft Word Microsoft Excel Microsoft it's perfectly fine to say Powerpoint and words and once again so the computer skills Excel advanced So you want to make sure that you listed out right and then for this person their access they had more a basic ability so I think it's always better to list your your proficiency level because there's no disclaimer there and somebody could make the assumption the student must be proficient in both Excel and Access right so you want to make sure it's clear to the reader what you're proficiency level. Nothing to keep in mind too is athletics right so innovative so starting apply to athletics right so making sure that you list on the team the dates of your involved the team also I think for athletes to kind of list how many hours a week time commitment because it's really impressive. The amount of time required to to be an athlete. Right now we're going to get into some cover letter tips so you want to make sure you attrack attention with a strong 1st paragraph I think that's the most important advice that I can give you in regards to your cover letter you really want to draw the reader's attention in the beginning there you don't want to convey that this is the template that you're sending to any and all positions. You want to convey that you took the time to tailor it accordingly so draw attention to the evidence presented in your resume that you fit the job requirements a lot of students are under the impression that if you're already listed on my resume I don't need to list it on my cover letter but sometimes 2 different people look at you application materials so they both need to stand independently so it's perfectly Ok to repeat information that's already listed on your resume and less step will be make it easy for the reader to imagine that you're the right candidate for the position so here's some examples for how to set up your cover letter right so I always recommend that you have the same header that you have on your resume on your cover letter so that way you're kind of branding your materials and you want your name to be the largest font size on both your resume and your cover letter I always recommend putting in all caps bold that you really want to make sure that it stands out in a pile of resumes and cover letters I would also recommend to add your LinkedIn profile url too not only on your resume but on your cover letter as well and take the extra step to customize your so it has your name in it right so it's easy for potential employer to locate you. And then you can list the contact name their title the company name address city state zip code and employer that you're sending to and then how you address your cover letter you could dress it dear Mrs or Mr and the contact's name you don't want to assume gender right so keeping that in mind and a lot of times there's no specific contact listed and what you should address your cover letter to is Dear selection committee or Dear Sir or Madam So making sure that you take the time to do some research to see you know who should send it to or if it's in the posting there is no specific context and you could certainly just address it dear selection committee with a colon and in the introductory paragraph it needs to tell the reader why you contacted them so how did you find out about the posting this is where you mention your mutual acquaintances So if you had an informational interview or you've been networking to find out about this opportunity you can list your name there to make sure you check with the person you have been networking with if that's Ok. to include their name in your cover letter and you might get some specific examples what interests you about this employer or the specific position why do you want to work there. you can also provide some concise overview of the skills and experience you have to offer the employer and you need to elaborate on these skills in the following body of the paragraph so you make a statement towards the end of the opening paragraph according to the job description and you're looking for a candidate who has strong analytical, communication and leadership skills so then the reader knows that you look at job description and you could be able to support those claims in the body of your cover letter. So the body paragraph so this section allows you to elaborate on what you have to offer the employer your skills your experience your knowledge your expertise your work characteristics and qualities etc. Prior to writing the body of paragraphs consider the following so what is needed to accomplish the job identify 2 or 3 qualifications or skills position requires Use a job description or information obtained through your career research for this so once again if you have some of those preferred qualifications I think it's really important to kind of highlight some of those because not everyone is going to have those preferred qualifications then how do your strengths match the job requirements brainstorm those experience to think about as I mentioned your classes your employment your extracurricular activities your balance your experience your community service and I think if you would relate well to the job requirements and then illustrate your skills and background in each area consider closing the paragraph or paragraphs with conclusion sentences focus on how your skills what impact the employer once again the cause and effect right what kind of impact could you do personally and once again I want to stress there's a lot of questions coming in so I'm going to wait till the end and then I will address your questions. So the closing paragraph so you want to reiterate your interest in the opportunity thank the reader for their time and acknowledge that you look forward to hearing from or meeting with the employer so you can state. If appropriate this is a great place to mention your call to action in your next I'm very excited with the position of with the company looks forward to beginning the interview process or contact you the week of to discuss my application and to learn about your recruiting procedures so something keep in mind sometimes students list the employer name in the introductory paragraph and then the body progress and the closing paragraph and what happens is you forget to change one of them if you are sending the same template to employers so I think it's always better to just list the employer name in the opening paragraph so that way you don't forget to change one of those employer names throughout the rest of your cover letter and then sincerely and then the signature and then your type name so I think a lot of students also worry about do I need to scan my signature in to put it on my cover letter you can but it's not important so you can just type your name there you don't need to scan your signature in and once again it's important to member that. You need to put your contact information and your signature right so you would already have done that and your header that's the same as your resume so putting it together for the cover letter right so once again McKinsey business analyst So once again the qualifications and preferred qualifications are once again just like the resume you want to highlight these In your cover letter. So instead of this for the opening paragraph Dear Sir or Madam I am a hard working and determined individual seeking an opportunity to succeed in a dynamic firm such as yours I believe that my knowledge, ability and experience will allow me to be successful in this role so whenever I see the word believe is conveying I'm not really sure right so you want to convey that confidence in your abilities I would recommend changing it I am confident that my knowledge ability and experience will allow me to be successful in this role but I feel like you need to give a little bit more context to why you are interested in working for McKinsey and once again why you qualify so this is a stronger example for an opening paragraph Dear Mr O'Connor when attending the McKinsey virtual information session June 12th I was impressed by McKinsey's commitment to diversity and recent focus on international sustainability issues I am passionate about joining a company with these values after I graduate from Cornell University in May 2021 with a ph d. in history I would like to use my strong analytical communication and leadership skills to address high impact problems therefore I'm submitting my application for the business analyst position as advertised on the McKinsey website so once again why are you interested in working with them commitment to diversity and recent focus on international standards so that's why you're just working for them and then the next step if you remember is what are your qualifications right so I like to use my strong analytical communication and leadership skills. So you're setting out where you can be talking about in the body of your cover letter. So in the 2nd paragraph so my analytical skills developed during my dissertation research on female suits of armor in the Renaissance age and then I became adept at quickly reading and synthesizing large amounts of information to formulate a coherent argument so once again you're highlighting their looking for analytical skills and then you supporting that claim and then the third paragraph. you're combining the communication and leadership skills that are looking for in applicants right so you communicate complex information to a general audience. President of The Graduate History Association and you're the liaison between faculty and students through 5 new academic collaboration's once again supporting these skills and qualities that you're looking for in applicants in the closing paragraph so working with a dynamic global companies such as McKinsey requires the independence resourcefulness and creativity I demonstrated during my time at Cornell I would welcome the opportunity to discuss the associate position at McKinsey at your convenience and have enclosed my resume for your consideration thank you for your time I look forward to speaking with you want to start strong and strong some typical mistakes so fail to follow instructions right so no cover letter I think a common misconception is. Will they even read the cover letter right so once again if you remember some of the qualities they were looking for are in the position we're strong communication skills right so this verbal and written a lot sometimes you're assessing your writing abilities by the way you draft your resume and your cover letter submit exceptionally poor cover letter right if you don't take the time to really tailor your materials. That can make an impact negatively right so emphasize an important skills in context of the job excessively and then you miss typo so you want to make sure that you spell contact and employer names - that you don't spell incorrectly right so I guess you didn't mean it all the way to final rounds. With McKinsey only to have brought up during the interview. They misspelled McKinsey's name in the cover letter right so the student made it all the way to the final rounds and somebody noticed that they misspelled the name wrong so once again the misconception is that they don't typically read the cover letters but sometimes they do so I think it's always make sure to put some effort into drafting your resume and you cover letters. So today's takeaway So you want to target materials to the job description so demonstrate how your strengths skills and your personal qualities relate to it you want to follow the instructions use effective language action verbs and succinct descriptive phrases. If I can go back to the following instructions sometimes so on the lines of applying to consulting firms to some consulting firms if you go to their Web site this have specific instructions how they want their application materials some firms want the dates on the left side the page not the right side of the page some firms want SAT score some firms if character limit some firms want a lot of whitespace and they can get notes once again take an extra step to go to an employer website to see if there's any specific qualifications how they want their application materials submitted So once again if you do that then is showing that you put forth a lot of time and effort to making sure that you're doing what they hope you do. Here's another important tip is you want to be truthful without underselling your skills and abilities so it's better not to misrepresent yourself it's better to list those specific proficiency levels right so you want to communicate confidently positive and you want to quantify your accomplishments and show results so the next to last bullet communicate confidently and positively so it's so interesting when I do resume reviews with students my 1st question to them always is how do you feel about your resume or your cover letter and the majority I would say they tell me point blank they don't like it some even tell me they hate it right so when you're saying that you hate or you don't like your resume or cover letter that's a problem right so and typically what it is comes down to is like you're so worried or what you don't have instead of being really in tune to what you do have so you don't want to be the perfect cookie cutter applicant you really want to show your uniqueness right so you want to be more of an individual so just embrace what you do have so some next steps to research the position and the employer have a focus and demonstrate an understanding of your strengths skills and personal qualities relative to it take the time to create a tailored resume and cover letter for each position I know it takes a little extra work but it's worth it but if you're planning to the same types of jobs or same industry then basically your resume cover that could stay about the same but I feel like if you're looking for something unique then it's better to kind of highlight that in your new resume cover you don't want to be sending these templates I know this much easier but taking the extra step. So strengthen your resume bullet points and cover letter opening paragraphs use optimal resume and then read your resume and cover letter backwards from the bottom up and why do you do that because if you start the bottom and work way up you're more inclined to notice some typos or saying medical mistakes right but if you're reading it you know top to bottom is so much easier kind to skim over things and not make assumptions right so it's better to start at the bottom and work your way up and have your resume and cover letter reviewed and another point too I want to mention is let's say you're applying for a position that was looking for a let's go back to McKinsey so they were looking for Excel and Access So let's say perhaps you haven't taken a course or had a really basic proficiency in those computer skills go to LinkedIn and take one of the  LinkedIn learning courses in Excel or Access whatever other skill or quality that you're hoping to to improve and that way when you complete the course module then that badge is going to appear your LinkedIn profile and then you can kind of add that to your resume right so once again do some professional development these are the skills I need to call on or improve on and how can I do that LinkedIn learning that's the best tool. So today's workshop is a series of careers offering all summer on Tuesdays the next one next Tuesday would be job an internship search and then something that we're doing differently this summer is the Thursday the same week they were doing a workshop is we're doing a q. and a and our practice sessions this Thursday if your resume cover letter questions or you want some tips you can certainly log in once again from 2:30 to 430. on Thursday June 18th So these are some of the upcoming workshops that we have career readiness, virtual interviews behavior interviews case interview job offer considerations inductions to fellowships and then medical and dental school interviews as our last workshop on August 18th and then you can connect with career services virtually right Monday through Friday 8 am to 430 you can call this number to schedule an appointment or you can go to our website and schedule payment advisor bookings and then we have 30 minute claimants résumé cover letter and links reviews practice interviews advising and career exploration topics and career assessments. right so and then Job an internship search help. And then we would appreciate any feedback that you give us regarding the summer series or today's workshop so if you could take this brief 2 minute anonymous survey we would greatly appreciate it so I think I'm going to take the time if anybody has questions we have quite a few that's come in so I'm going to. Go through some of these questions so question came in how long years months after graduation should you be including your g.p.a. So that's a really good question I think if it's in the job description. You should list it for a while even if you have a really good g.p.a. I think it's good to list that regardless of how many years out you've been. Is it a good idea to separate relevant courses with a comma you can separate them with commas but I think separating them. With a vertical slash or a bullet point kind of makes that separation easier to read I think a lot of times when there is comma separating your courses it looks like a sea of text right so making sure that you kind of separate those and also keep in mind with courses that you want the most relevant courses to be on the left side of the page right so some is getting down to good read left or right so making sure that you're prioritize and putting those relevant courses on the left side of the page and probably like in the 1st 2 rows there might not read all the way through so you want to make sure that your prioritize. A lot of time students put them in alphabetical order or in the order they took them but you want to list them actually in the order of importance and if you can the relevant courses all the courses there should actually be relevant to what you're buying to. Should I include the total range of g.p.a. on the resume it is a 4.00 in general but it seems to be 4.3 for Cornell. Yeah I think there's a lot of discrepancy with this comes the about also by college right so yes I think it's better to list what your actually g.p.a. is right and then you don't want to round up you know a round down and same thing with g.p.a. if it's higher than a 4.00 with a write down g.p.a. 4.3 or should you round down 4.0 I think it's better to see once again if you're actually g.p.a. is 4.3 then list 4.3 A lot of good questions coming in. Well that's a really really good question Is there such a thing as being too confident in a cover letter I don't think there's an issue of being too confident I think a lot of students are worried about coming across like they're too confident right or if you're worried about being too confident tells me that that's not your nature I think it's good to be confident in your abilities right but you don't want to overexaggerate right so I think it's really good to make a statement but then also support those claims that you actually have that experience or those skills or qualities. Will we have access to this presentation after this meeting and if so where can we find it yes everybody that attended today's Webinar you are going to be receiving. It would be emailed the p.d.f. version of this and then the audio video will be on our website shortly you want to get about g.p.a. It seems strange to round down to 4.0 In my opinion since won't match the transcript that's exactly right so you want to actually list your g.p.a. you want to round up you don't want to round out so once again you want to misrepresent yourself and then when applying to a job online if we don't know the hiring manager is it a good idea to begin with Dear hiring manager what if you know someone who's involved in hiring Could you please repeat what you said about whom to address a cover letter to so a lot of times the hiring manager perhaps is not involved with the selection process right and you don't want to say I know this person I think they're going to be in the hiring in the interviewing Committee right it's always better to just address it dear selection committee or Dear Sir Madam right. And here's another good question I notice that several positions on handshake do not ask specifically for a cover letter would you advise we still try and send one sometimes the employers they prefer not to write because they want to see when a student found instructions but I feel like maybe also go to the employer website to see if there is any thing listed differently there or what they want application material wise but once again if you're looking for strong communication skills written skills I think it's always helpful to include that cover letter as well so once again another question about bragging or being unlikable so for example I provide for a visiting assistant professor position last week and I exerted. At the end of my letter a whole page on positive comments from ita valuation is that look good or does it make me look like a narcissist so maybe I don't know if I would list all your positive comments you received as a TA, But you could certainly put on your resume as well as your cover letter consistently received positive evaluations from students right then you're making that statement and then maybe doing the interview can you give me one of those feedback that you didn't receive from a student. to take up space to list several of those I think it's better for something like that to maybe just  list that you consistently received and maybe something that was really amazing that you could include maybe one statement so this is a recent feedback that I received from a student you don't want to allocate a lot of space but I think it's good to make that statement not only on your cover letter but on your resume as well Are leadership skills and Independence synonymous it's interesting I asked because hiking was highlighted to show leadership skills previously our That seems to show one's drive to be oneself more so than the group of other people rights once again I'm not sure if leadership was for them or. Another quality but I feel like if you lead hikes right but once again or if you lead others in hiking then yes but also yes and yes you're right that it's independence right so I don't think there's there's synonomous But also I think a lot of students are an impression if you don't have a specific leadership title like President or Vice President or treasure then you don't have leadership experience but I view it differently I view but if you do tutoring if you're in that's leadership experience your assisting others then what is the distinction between activities that people reading your resume would trigger yes this person is a leader versus this person has a strong will and sense of ambition for example where would learning a foreign language as a hobby fall so learning a foreign language I think I could go in the skill section right so under languages or if you studied abroad in your education section right so yeah I think putting foreign language skills would be better in in the skills section. So another question is very similar the same question if a cover letter isn't specifically requested and another applicant sent one anyways to those who followed instructions and didn't submit one look less motivated what should we do in that situation so I think it's hard to say like. For example if you're planning positions to work at Cornell University a lot of postings say that they don't mention that you need a cover letter but then I was talking human resources representatives they said that they actually prefer to have a cover letter submitted so then I say why don't you just list the posting so once again you're looking for people who are being proactive and even though it's not stated there that's what they are looking for.  I think goes both ways for other players so I think when in doubt you could ask or we're probably I would just send one right unless it says specifically only resume preferred right so you want to make sure that you're following instructions but I think once again like it's good to kind of highlight those communications in a cover letter because you kind of convey I think passion a strong interest in why you want to work there in a cover letter as it is in a resume and other cover question is it worth taking time to write a cover letter if the application says it's optional Yes I feel it says optional then that to me is a good indicator is they would prefer that right even though they are not clearly stating that once again take that initiative that you should do to do more would you recommend putting your name and resume section headings in royal blue to make them stand out you need to keep in mind that. Sometimes when you're adding color that can be distracting right I think if you put your name in all caps and bolded in black I think that's fine. A lot of students to decide to use kind of like a lighter grey font and so to me that's very difficult to read whether it's on your computer screen or if they print it out in their make extra photocopy So once again you want to make it easy to read but if you're playing a certain industries where creativity is important then yes you can use those colors and unique fonts to make your resume and cover letter stand out what is the appropriate length of a cover letter I tend to elaborate a lot about my experience to try and show that I'm ready for a job especially when experience doesn't necessarily speak for itself however it's too bulky would a recruiter decline to even read so sometimes less is more right so I don't think you want to go over 5 paragraphs right and you don't want to be so long either I think you want to kind of give a brief glimpse and not overwhelm the reader right so you want to pique their interest to warrant an interview right so sometimes less is more so that's why it's really helpful to get somebody from career services to to review your resume cover letter any other questions or concerns So here's my contact information if any student would like to schedule a time to go over resume or cover letter you can certainly email me to set up a time to meet I'd be happy to meet with you or you can schedule it. Through the bookings link on our website