How to Write a Cover Letter

What you write about in your letter can range vastly depending on your professional background and the job itself. Below, you'll find some criteria for how to make your cover letter a success.

By Norrell Edwards — June 6, 2023

Tags: applying for jobs, career prospects, cover letter, future planning, how to guide, job experience, templates

Likely, you've already needed a cover letter. Many industries require them as the first entry point to the job recruitment process. Cover letters serve as an opportunity to introduce yourself and make the case for why a company should hire you. Cover letters also exist for other opportunities involving an application process like scholarships, fellowships, or grants.

Your cover letter should be one page. You can go a little over a page, but two full pages is too much. I'll admit, I am often too verbose in my cover letters. If your cover letters read compellingly, most employers won't mind reading a little extra in length. You must draw your reader's interest in your skillset.

What you write about in your letter can range vastly depending on your professional background and the job itself. Below, you'll find some criteria for how to make your cover letter a success.

Who You Are

This is the entire premise, but tell readers who you are and why you make sense for them. Maybe this is an internship with the NAACP's legal arm, and you've dreamed about working for them since learning about Thurgood Marshall. Let your potential employer know about your childhood dream (if it wasn't your childhood dream, please don't lie either). Tell them how this job helps you complete your vision of yourself. Inspire them to see that vision too.

Creating a Vision

Help them imagine YOU specifically in that role and the projects you'd be eager to support them with—mention responsibilities listed in the job ad as well projects they're currently working on.

*Note: do not say you're excited to work on a project that is clearly irrelevant and unrelated to the position in which you're applying. Don't say you'd like to help pitch stories at the New York Times when the role you'e applied to is Human Resource Specialist. Only reference responsibilities and projects that you are certain fall within the purview of the job you're applying to.

Key Words

Try to sprinkle in key words from the job ad into your letter. Perhaps they're looking for a dynamic self-starter. Well take a moment to explain why you're that "dynamic self-starter."

Experience

Pick a few of your strongest job experiences and explain how they align with this position. Do NOT retell your entire resume. Your resume gives breadth, while your cover letter goes into detail about specific experiences. Here's your chance to play up important victories or innovations in your career history.

Research (A)

Do your homework and read about the company/nonprofit/organization you're applying to. Make sure to reference their mission or some recent update they've shared in your letter. You want to convince them that you're excited at the prospect of working at this organization that's revolutionizing access to menstrual products or whatever groundbreaking, important work they're doing. Include language from their website or acknowledge an event, product launch or other news that they've recently created a press release for. This shows you're paying attention to them. Isn't that what everyone wants? To be seen and recognized.

Research (B)

Read whatever related literature in the employer's field. This could mean reading Architectural Digest if you're applying to be an intern at an Architecture firm or even just increasing your exposure to news media.

For a nonprofit or justice-oriented organization, it is important to weave in a mention of relevant current events to show you're paying attention to their world. Maybe this organization has put out a few reports; read those too. When I say mention—I do not mean randomly dropping in a fact without any context. Give your perspective on a relevant news topic like a court case or law that will impact this employer. If you don't feel comfortable doing this, then skip it.

For instance, if you're applying to work in anything related to news media or pop culture, you want to let your employers know you're following the news. Imagine you wanted to apply for a position or even an internship at CNN covering race and equity, but you don't follow any news. That's a hard sell.

Embellish, but Do Not Lie

It's ok to over emphasize the weight of a certain project or role within that project. Most people have way more work experience than they realize, especially when it comes to soft skills. I would, however, steer away from outright lies about tasks or responsibilities you didn't do whatsoever. That lie could really come back to bite if you get the job. Your employer will now expect to perform this task you lied about.

If this sounds like a lot of work, it's because writing a good cover letter can be a lot of work! Once you've got the hang of it, you can turn cover letters into templates. Then you can switch out relevant information based on the job as needed.

Norrell Edwards

Norrell Edwards is a scholar, educator, and communications consultant for non-profit organizations. Her employment experience and research interests place her work at the nexus of global Black identity, cultural memory, and social justice. Norrell graduated with a BA in English Literature from Hunter’s College followed by a PhD from the University of Maryland, College Park in 20th and 21st Century Black Diaspora Literature.

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