Internship Cover Letter Example For New Washington Hires

Internships keep Washington and a good chunk of congressional and senate offices running smoothly. While internships are a source of low cost and highly motivated and educated hires, it also is a great way to break into some of the more notoriously difficult career paths in government or simply getting a leg up into better positions in both the public and private sector.

Of course its very difficult to land one of these highly coveted positions as often as many as few hundred all highly qualified candidates will be competing for the internship job. So the question is how to you differentiate yourself and stand out from the mass of options that a chief of staff has to select from? Simple.You have to make a strong impression on the first thing that comes across their desk–the cover letter that is attached to your resume.

How do you spice up your cover letter? Well most of the techniques are no different than what you would utilize if you were applying for another job posting in the private sector. For starters your cover letter should be structured into three paragraphs with the following purposes in mind:

Paragraph 1: Why you are writing and applying for the position

Paragraph 2: What you have to offer

Paragraph 3: Final notes and how you will follow up the letter

First paragraph

That first paragraph is crucial as it is what will either hook your prospective employer into reading further or toss the rest of the resume and cover letter on the pile without finding out exactly what you could offer them.

So you have to be clear what you are looking for and soft sell why you would be a good candidate.

Second paragraph

While you do discuss your skills and qualifications–keep it brief as your resume is a comprehensive source for your skills, rather you cover letter should highlight your best and most relevant skills to the job description as well as highlight you past career and education achievements. Note the word highlight you want to talk about the best of you–and not all of you.

The final paragraph will of course draw the letter to a close and will inform the hiring manager that you will call or write to follow up on your application. This will show them that you are interested in landing the position

Sample Cover Letter

Dear _____

Please accept my application for the financial analyst internship position recently posted on the Congressional Budget Office website. I believe my strong accademic commitment in addition to my past experience in other financial internship opportunities makes me an excellent candidate for this position.

In my first two years of attending the Princeton business program, I have routinely excelled in all finance and business courses. I have enjoyed the challenges that I have faced and am continually seeking out new ones to overcome. This has led me to become involved in several finance based projects in collaboration with several other classmates. The project required a strong collaborative effort to ensure the success. I also served as treasurer of the economics club, and successfully organized two fundraisers where the proceeds were donated to a local charity.

Thank you for you time and consideration, I would like the opportunity to make a positive contribution to the Congressional Budget Office in the course of my internship. I will call you in one week to further discuss my candidacy.

Sincerely

Jake Evans

How to Type a Resume that Does Not Suck

At some point in your career you have been faced with having to write your own resume. This process can be less than fun due to the pressure of having to create a short to the point summary of your career goals, past experiences, and skill sets. This is no easy task regardless of what industry you are seeking work in.

Here are a few tips on how you can make the process of writing your resume a lot less painful.

Clarity is key

One of the biggest mistakes that many people make when writing their own resumes is that they’re not succinct or clear enough in highlighting what they’re after as well as what they can offer perspective employers.  Remember, people in human resources and department heads have a limited amount time they can spend reviewing each application say you want to make sure that you’re not wasting their time providing them with a resume with too much fluff.  This is why you want your resume to be no more than 1 to 2 pages at most in length depending on your work experience.  In other words if you are fresh graduate you should be able to fit everything on a single page resume where is more experienced workers will need more page real estate.

Another problem that causes many resumes to be tossed aside is the addition of irrelevant information that does not pertain to a jobs description so if you were applying for position in IT, it would not make any sense to list your medical qualifications.  This again goes back to not wasting a hiring managers time, no matter how impressive the additional qualifications might seem.

Highlight those goals

One of the first things you resume should indicate is a brief statement of your career goals and what you are looking for in the position that you are applying to this will help perspective employers determine if you are indeed a good fit in the organization.  You definitely want to customize this part of a resume based on the job description and requirements.

Customize, customize, customize

Without sounding like a broken record, it is one thing you can take away and applied to your resume writing, it is to tailor your resume and highlighted skills so that it is a better match to the job that applying to.  This will actually help you stand out and be more attractive in a hiring managers eye compared to other applications and perhaps increase your chances of landing that coveted interview.

When in doubt hire a professional

Granted not everyone will have the budget to be able to hire a professional resume writer to creating new resume or edit an existing one however for higher level positions it be a great investment that will pay off in the long run.  A cheaper alternative especially for students is to have your college check and critique yourself ridden resume.