Another fault in letters of this character is that the applicant very rarely supplies the particulars which are asked for in the advertisement. The advertiser may say, " State age, previous record, and qualifications," and a large percentage of the applications received will leave out the age, previous record or qualifications, while in classic cases the applicant leaves out all three. The writer of a letter of application cannot be too careful in covering the ground specified by the prospective employer, and he may take it that when special information is asked for, any letter which does not contain it is immediately thrown aside.
Another fertile cause of failure in applying for situations is the tendency of the man who writes to apply for anything or everything, so long as he is writing. Wherever there is a situation vacant he sends his letter of appl',1!a tion, and in work where special qualifications are necessary, he finds it diffi cult to say anything likely to influence the man who has the appointment to give. When a man is writing ten or fifteen applications of this type per day, he usually settles down into a steady routine and makes the one letter do for every chance of employment presented by an advertiser. The result is that he gets replies from none.
The best advertisements to which a man may reply are those which demand specific qualifications, and qualifications to which he can legitimately make claim. In such a case the writer would concentrate on the points raised, and make the strongest feature of his application an outline of the peculiar abilities which suit him to that appointment. The writer has in his mind applications for positions in journalism by men who state that they have never done any journalistic work, but could easily learn ; for positions in advertising by men who have read advertisements, and think that they could do exactly the same work ; for positions as travellers by men who have never done any travelling, but have been advised by their doctors to seek employment in the open air ; and for positions as salesmen by men who have spent years of their lives in the routine of clerical work To state this in cold print is to almost state the commonplace, but it is quite a usual feature on opening letters of application to find letters of this type. The point of this suggestion is that men who are looking for employment should not even trouble to write letters of this character. A man who is looking for a sales man needs a salesman ; a man who is looking for an advertising expert will not be content with the man who thinks he might do it ; a man who is looking for journalistic help does not want the services of an applicant who thinks that he could easily learn the work. When vacancies occur where special qualifi
cations are necessary, the applicant who secures the appointment will have those special qualifications, and it is a sheer waste of time on the part of the man out of em ployment to ask fOr the appointment if his experience has not qualified him in that direction. One excellent rule for successfully applying for appointments is to choose an advertisement which offers work that the man knows he can do, and can refer to experience which will prove to the prospective employer that he can do it. Broadly speaking, any application which does not conform to this rule has so slender a chance of being successful, that to make it is almost wasting both the time spent on writing the letter and the postage stamp which carries it.
An excellent general rule is to keep to the point. It is not necessary to tell a prospective employer your whole life story, or the fact that you have a widowed mother or are overburdened with too large a family. If you are an abstainer it is not advisable to devote half your application to empha sising this point of view. Some employers are suspicious, and the man who parades his virtues is instinctively suspected of vices on the principle that he protests too much. The same rules might be applied to protestations of honesty. The average employer detests fulsome protestations and would prefer to judge integrity by its references. A plain statement of the facts is much better than a lot of explanatory matter on side issues which do not increase qualifications. It is advisable not to be too clever, as, following the American plan, applications of recent years have somewhat overworked the pronoun "1" and have carried a great deal too much egotism. It is advisable not to be too modest on the "Urfafa Heep" plan. The employer is frequently of the opinion that the man who cannot straightforwardly talk about his merits and qualifications would not have the necessary nerve to do the work. Avoid long letters, avoid fine language, avoid exaggeration, and stick to facts that can be easily verified, so that when the man who is reading the application shows an inclination to make an engagement, he shall find the statement presented to him capable of verification at every point.