{"id":8218,"date":"2025-11-28T10:02:58","date_gmt":"2025-11-28T10:02:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/cover-letter-templates-and-examples\/"},"modified":"2025-11-28T10:02:58","modified_gmt":"2025-11-28T10:02:58","slug":"cover-letter-templates-and-examples","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/cover-letter-templates-and-examples\/","title":{"rendered":"Cover Letter Templates and Examples"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>You know that moment when you\u2019re staring at a blank Word doc at 11 PM, trying to sound \u201cprofessional but personable\u201d for a job you actually want? Yeah. Been there \u2014 with a screaming toddler in the background and a cold cup of Folgers on my desk. (Spoiler: My first 20 cover letters were straight-up cringe. Let me save you the misery.)<\/p>\n<p>Here\u2019s what I wish someone had told me back when I thought <em><strong>\u201cDear Hiring Manager, I am writing to express my interest\u2026\u201d<\/strong><\/em> was peak creativity: <strong>Templates aren\u2019t cheat sheets. They\u2019re training wheels.<\/strong> The best ones help you unlearn robotic corporate-speak, not copy-paste your way into sounding like a LinkedIn bot.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>My turning point?<\/strong><\/em> Getting ghosted by a job I was <em>sure<\/em> I\u2019d land. The hiring manager later told me (over a very awkward Starbucks meetup) my letter read like it was \u201cwritten by ChatGPT\u2019s uptight cousin.\u201d Ouch. But she was right \u2014 I\u2019d used a \u201cproven template\u201d from a career site verbatim. No soul, no stakes, no <em>me<\/em>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>What actually works:<\/strong><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Start messy.<\/strong> I draft my first version in the Notes app while pretending I\u2019m explaining to my sister why I\u2019m perfect for the role. (Example: <em>\u201cRemember how I organized Mom\u2019s chaotic book club into a well-oiled machine? Yeah, that\u2019s basically project management.\u201d<\/em>)<\/li>\n<li><strong>Steal structure, not sentences.<\/strong> The template I\u2019ve reused for 5+ years looks like this:\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Hook:<\/strong> A 1-sentence <em>story<\/em> about a problem I\u2019ve solved (e.g., <em>\u201cThe time I convinced a Karen to stop yelling at our cashier by\u2026 actually listening to her\u201d<\/em>)<\/li>\n<li><strong>Middle:<\/strong> 2-3 bullet points tying that story to the job\u2019s <em>exact<\/em> requirements (I highlight keywords from the posting in yellow)<\/li>\n<li><strong>Close:<\/strong> A genuine \u201cWhy this company?\u201d line that\u2019s <em>not<\/em> about their \u201cinnovative dynamic synergy.\u201d (Pro tip: Check their Instagram or GlassDoor reviews. I once got an interview because I mentioned loving their volunteer days at the local food bank.)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n<li><strong>Read it aloud at 2x speed.<\/strong> If it sounds like a TED Talk from someone you\u2019d trust to fix your Wi-Fi? Keep it. If it feels like a terms-of-service agreement? Delete.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><strong>The real secret:<\/strong> Your cover letter is just Tinder for jobs. You\u2019re not proposing marriage \u2014 you\u2019re saying, <em>\u201cHey, my chaos might complement your chaos. Let\u2019s coffee?\u201d<\/em> (Fun fact: My last job offer came after I compared my multitasking skills to <em>\u201ca parent assembling IKEA furniture during a baby\u2019s nap\u201d<\/em> \u2014 the hiring mom loved it.)<\/p>\n<p>So grab a template. Tear it apart. Add your weird hobby, that time you failed spectacularly but learned, or how you\u2019d actually use their product. Then hit send before you overthink it. Worst case? You\u2019ll end up with a better story for next time.<\/p>\n<p>(Need a reality check? I\u2019ll send you my 2018 cover letter where I accidentally wrote <em>\u201cpassion for meat processing\u201d<\/em> instead of <em>\u201cmedia production.\u201d<\/em> We laugh \u2014 but I still got the interview. You\u2019ve got this.)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>You know that moment when you\u2019re staring at a blank Word doc at 11 PM, trying to sound \u201cprofessional but personable\u201d for a job you actually want? Yeah. Been there \u2014 with a screaming toddler in the background and a cold cup of Folgers on my desk. (Spoiler: My first 20 cover letters were straight-up&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1752,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8218","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-content"],"modified_by":null,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8218","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8218"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8218\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1752"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8218"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8218"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.oreateai.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8218"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}