I admit that very occasionally, I would be so impressed with a resume that I would scan, or maybe even read, the cover letter. But if I was that impressed with the resume, I would schedule a phone screen whether or not a cover letter existed. Same with the objective. Who reads those? “To gain a position at a responsible company that offers challenging work blah blah blah”. If I’ve read one, I’ve read them all.

It’s my opinion that spending the time and energy to write a cover letter is a waste. In my case, I was just too busy to read them and learned early enough that I would get what I needed from the person during the phone screen. A cover letter was never the difference between a follow-up call and the circular file.

As a job applicant, I quit writing cover letters a long time ago, and it never stopped me from getting calls on the jobs I was really interested in. This may not be the case for those with less experience, but I wonder what the percentage is of hiring managers that actually take the time to read them? Obviously you do, so I won’t make the blanket statement that “nobody reads them”, but I would venture to guess that the absence of a cover letter on an intriguing resume wouldn’t prevent you from taking the next step?

Corey