Are You Embarrassed by Your Letter of Recommendation Skills? Here’s What to Do
Letter of Recommendation – A letter of recommendation is a formal document that validates someone’s work, skills or academic performance. You may be asked to prepare a recommendation letter for someone who is applying for a job, internship, college or university, leadership position or volunteer opportunity. The purpose of a recommendation letter is to corroborate what you have learned about the applicant and provide additional positive details about their performance or habits.
Because a recommendation letter is not just what it says while this serves as a kind of ‘guarantee’ that a jobber or candidate possesses good character or some of the qualities and skills that an employer seeks, it has many other uses.
Many times, we receive requests from a relative, friend, colleague or former co-worker, junior team members, students or even boss to write a Letter of Recommendation.
This is the reason that? Why would people who don’t even know you trust another unknown person’s recommendation letter?
How To Write A Recommendation Letter
Using these simple tips can help you write an excellent letter of recommendation and save yourself from any trouble. Try to make your language easy and simple.
This means, never use complex words that force another person to reach for a dictionary, this is how do i write a letter of recommendation?
Also Read – How to write email asking job vacancy
What to write in recommendation letter?
A recommendation letter should include information on who you are, your connection with the person you are recommending; why they are qualified, and the specific skills they have. Specifics. Whenever possible, it’s helpful to provide specific anecdotes and examples that illustrate your support.
Uses of Letter of Recommendation
Ever heard of employee background screening (EBS) or pre-employment verification (PEV) or similar procedures? Let me explain briefly.
EBS, PEV and other such procedures are actually tested by the fact that an employer works against your background. That means, they will verify most of the details you have written.
And this includes your educational certificates and references. There are various companies that provide this service.
Now an EBS service provider will contact everyone from the university to ex-owners, former associates and supervisors. And they will contact those who have also given that recommendation letter.
In other cases, the organization can directly contact the person who provided this letter.
Additionally, this paper also indirectly reveals the occupational, social, and sometimes political relationships of the person who presents one.
And here’s something you should remember: A recommendation letter also includes legal risks in some countries.
How to ask for a recommendation letter
At some point, you may need to ask someone to write a recommendation letter for you. Consider asking former managers, colleagues, teachers, mentors, clients or vendors for a letter of recommendation. They should also be someone you’ve had a positive working relationship with who can thoughtfully discuss your skills and abilities.
Whoever you decide to ask, speak with them first about your request, then send a formal email with more details. Include your resume, the job description, submission details and a requested deadline. You might also send them the template that’s included below. This can help lessen their workload and could even make a recommendation them more likely to agree to your request. Try to ask at least two weeks before the letter is due to give ample time to complete your recommendation letter, as they may be working on multiple letters concurrently. This is especially the case for professors.
What Is a Self Recommendation Letter for Internship?
To complete your college requirement, you need to complete your college internship. Writing a self-recommendation letter for internship will also be like writing a letter of recommendation for job.
Letter Of Recommendation Tips –
- Keep it positive- Your letter should confirm that you believe the person is a strong candidate for the job recommendation with no reservations. Avoid any comments that might suggest otherwise.
- Use a standard business letter format and tone- You can use the template below or a standard business letter format to write your letter. Your tone should also remain formal and polite.
- Focus on the most important qualifications- For the highest impact, discuss two or three of the candidate’s achievements that are most relevant to the job recommendations description and provide specific examples to illustrate their fitness for the role.
- Follow the request instructions- Ask the candidate how you should submit your letter. Strictly follow the instructions and deadline request to avoid negatively affecting their application status.
Find the purpose of the letter of recommendation
All types of people require a recommendation letter for various purposes. Therefore, find out what a letter of recommendation is and why the specific purpose of this letter is necessary.
When you know the purpose, writing a short recommendation letter becomes very simple. In fact, shorter letters are much better than long curved ones. Because the longer your letter, the deeper the implications.
Letter Of Recommendation Example–
It’s my absolute pleasure to recommend [Name] for [position] with [Company]. [Name] and I [relationship] at [Company] for [length of time]. I thoroughly enjoyed my time working with [Name], and came to know [him/her/them] as a truly valuable asset to our team.
Know the Person Well
It is necessary for you to know the person writing this letter. Unfortunately, managers of large corporations with dozens or more employees often ignore this simple tip.
When you know a person, you have some knowledge about their character and abilities, these letters can be easily written .
What if someone you don’t know but works in your organization asks for this letter? In such situations, ask your colleagues and immediate superiors for details like perspectives on work, productivity and other essentials.
Or better still, call the person and speak for a few minutes to get to know them a little. However, it will not be possible to call a person if they are working at some distant location for your organization.
Provide Neutral View
Remember, you are directly responsible for going to the letter of recommendation. Therefore, be neutral do not exaggerate. Mention all your positive traits of character as both person and worker on your letter.
If the person has some undesirable qualities, then you can refer to those people in a different way. For example, you can use words like ‘satisfactory performance’ if an employee has not met your organization’s standards.
And if the person is lazy, then use words like “be good motivated for a good performer”.
Keep it Conditional
This means, you are indirectly recommending the person for the job or position. How is this possible? “I suggest … include words such as these, provided they meet your standards.”
This means, you cannot distance yourself from any legal liabilities that may arise from your letter of recommendation.
When you use words like “meet your standards”, the ball is in the other party’s court.
Therefore, the new employer needs to verify whether the jobber meets their standards. And if they hire a person without such verification, they are square to blame.
With Disclaimer
Always end your letter with a disclaimer. To do this, include a sentence such as this: “This recommendation letter is given at the request of… for whatever purposes it may serve.” This organization is not responsible in any way for the contents of this paper. “
Obviously, this may sound rude or objectionable. The person receiving the recommendation letter may also object to this clause.
Here, it is important to note that you are talking about the liabilities of your organization. Therefore, it has nothing to do with the person to whom you are issuing the letter of recommendation.
And yes, this letter is always given on request. Therefore, you are only telling the truth.
Letter of Appreciation
There is a big difference between a letter of appreciation and a letter of recommendation. If you are writing this letter for someone you know well and is actually a virtue, issue a letter of appreciation.
In such cases, you can praise the person for their work. If you find that they have a pleasant personality, add some lines to that too.
Also, speak about the project or work for which you are appreciating that person.
Include such a letter thanking such a person for their excellent work. And add a line as a recommendation: “We hope they can meet your standards,” or something similar.
Using: “We are confident …” instead of “We are hopeful …” gives you that important ambiguity. It means that you are honest and fair to everyone: the person who gets the letter and the person who reads it to give him a job.
Letter of Recommendation for Student
If you are writing this letter for a student, do so without any reservation. However, focus more on a student’s educational qualities rather than personal traits especially if the student is a teenager.
This is because teenagers suffer from personality changes and mood swings during those years. It is not their fault. A polite and mild-mannered teenager may develop into an aggressive bully after a few years.
Therefore, limit your recommendation letter to the academic abilities of your student. If the recommendation letter is for the job, talk about the skills they have, so it will help their career.
In this way, you are helping the student without making a decision about his personality.
LinkedIn / Letter of Recommendation for Online Use
You need to be extra cautious when writing a recommendation letter for LinkedIn or for online use. If you know that person, fine. Go ahead and write an excellent letter of recommendation on the above lines.
But if it is some freelancer who has done some great work and then issue a letter of commendation with some words of recommendation as mentioned above.
We will give you some ideas on how to write recommendation letter.
Other Letter Of Recommendation Job
In some instances, a bank or financial organization may ask to provide a loan or some purchase for this letter.
This is not common in India, although it is done in some foreign countries. Be careful before recommending someone for a loan or credit: If you default you can end your liabilities.
Also, in some countries, people applying for senior managerial or supervisory positions have to get this letter from their juniors.
To ensure that the person has total control over the organization that invests them. This prevents abuse of powers.
However, these are quite uncommon in India, although the trend can be seen anytime here, pencils for Indians to mimic foreign systems. Therefore, it is better to be aware of these trends.
Legal Risk of Letter of Request
Yes, giving this letter also poses a legal risk. This means that the person or company issuing this letter is legally responsible for its contents.
In some countries, the person or organization issuing this letter may face penalties. If the person holding this letter violates company law, then incompetent or other such reasons are found.
Therefore, you need to be extra cautious while writing recommendation letters. You cannot get into legal problems. However, issuing this letter to someone you don’t really know can ruin your illustrious reputation in society or profession.
However, this does not mean that you remove everyone and anyone requesting a letter of recommendation. If you find that the person is indeed eligible or receives a letter or recognition, then by all means, go ahead and issue one.
In fact, this letter can help improve one’s life. Therefore, here are some simple tips for writing letter of recommendation.
Wrap up
Before I wrap up, here’s something to remember.
A recommendation letter is an indirect guarantee of a person’s abilities as a worker and a personality as a human.
Therefore, instead of playing very carefully to please someone or avoid problems, project on a proper picture. The above tips will definitely help you draft amazing letters of recommendation jobs.