B-Schoolers Spoof Cover Letters

Traditionally laden with finely-crafted and slightly insincere rhetoric, the cover letter of a resume often helps determine the fate of its writer with a prospective employer.

This week the Harbus News, the weekly paper of the Business School, published the entries to its first-ever Honest Cover Letter Contest. Staff writer Tom Popik held the competition to find out just how directly B-schoolers could address prospective employers above their ambitions.

Popik, a first-year student, said he only received three letters from Harbus readers. He attributed the minimal response to job-hunting students' not wanting their names published with the letters so soon before important job interviews.

"People don't want to associate the names with anything that could be taken against them, especially by recruiters," Popik said.

Instead of the diplomatic tone of most cover letters, the letters of the three entries state their wishes candidly. "If you have even an ounce of compassion in your taut, aerobically perfect body, you will condescend to grant me an interview on one of the 435 closed schedule positions for Assistant to Mail Clerk," began the letter of first prize winner Ladd K. Biro.

Biro, a second-year student who won a $10 gift certificate to the B-School's pub for his literary endeavor, addressed his letter to "Mr. Rich Sonbitch at Dewey, Screwon & Howe."

"People take things pretty seriously [at the B-School]," Biro said. "They are always trying to put their best foot forward in their cover letter".

In his letter, Biro made light of the controversial drug tests that many companies are now requiring of their applicants.

"To expedite the recruiting process, I have enclosed a vial of urine to be used in your drug screening process," Biro wrote. "If the glass was broken intransit, please let me know, three months inadvance, if you will be needing another sample."

First-year students Michael Konigsberg andDouglas Korn won the second place prize of aninterview schedule book with their entry, sent to"Mr. R. U. Hiring at Toptier and Co."

The letter by Konigsberg and Korn, who areroommates and veterans of Wall Street, reads,"Actually, I don't have the faintest idea what aninvestment banker does, but my friends tell methat you pay more than $1000 per week and takeemployees to athletic events, fancy dinners, andcreative theme parties."

Korn said that when he and Konigsberg worked asinvestment bankers, they noticed that the majorityof cover letters contained phrases about"analytical and interpersonal skills."

"Before we came here, Mike and I did a fairamount of recruiting when we were on Wall St. andall the letters tend to say the same thing," Kornsaid.

Their letter concludes with a bribe and athreat. "I have enclosed my resume and $100 cash,and look forward to hearing from you soon. You hadbetter hurry up, because the phone is ringing, andit's probably Goldman, Sachs calling about thatSummer Vice Presidency."

First-year student Gary Ambro earned a portraitof Abraham Lincoln for the honesty in histhird-prize letter, which contains such candidstatements as, "not just another Harvard MBA, Istand for all that is right and good."

Although he was the only second-year student tosubmit a letter and is in the midst ofinterviewing for jobs, Biro said the publicity didnot worry him.

"If [the companies] get upset about somethinglike that, than I don't want to work for themanyway," he said