I received an e-mail from a recent college graduate looking for work. Good school, degree in communications, and, by her own account, “…well-organized, dependable, creative, a quick learner and passionate about my job…friendly personality…enjoy working well with others…”
OK, so the prose is kind of heavy-duty, but we all wrote similar letters when we were seeking our career’s first landing spot. I didn’t have an issue with that.
What I had an issue with was that she sent this e-mail to 38 other recipients, all PR people in town, all the names plainly visible to one another. She addressed the note “To Whom it May Concern”.
Years ago, before the Internet, we researched all the companies we sent employment inquiries to. We asked people we knew who knew people who knew people. We went to the library – remember the Agency Red Book? The Readers Guide to Periodical Literature? Newspaper microfiche?
In these digital times, people expect customization. If you want a job, show me that you care enough to know my company and have something to say about it. Employers always have and still to this day expect anyone seriously interested in working for them to do their homework. It’s a hell of a lot easier to do research now, and so it’s rather bad form for a job-seeker to send a generic letter and not even try to hide that she’s sending it simultaneously to 38 others. And if she isn’t aware enough to realize and understand her faux pas, then perhaps she’s not ready to take on communications work.
