Journal #9:
During the process of peer review, a whole lot was discussed. In our discussion, we covered almost all of the errors that were in our cover letters. A common problem with our cover letters was definitely clunky wording or improper wording. There were many instances, both in my paper and everyone else’s, where the point the author was trying to make was over-complicated for an unnecessary reason. Sometimes it’s better to just say what you are trying to say instead of trying to put a twist on it before you finish your thought.
Overall, this was a very helpful process for myself and everyone else. As a writer, I definitely have some things to work on like, wording, specification in certain places, and being a little more indicative of what I am trying to accomplish by applying to these jobs. Other things in my paper I did very well. This includes putting all of the necessary contact information at the top of the letter, introducing the letter properly with where the advertisement was found and when. As my group can attest, all of us were very honest and efficient while peer reviewing our classmates letters. This, of course included being kind and forthcoming with how we thought they should fix a certain mistake.
Journal #11:
This whole process of writing and revising cover letters has been more than helpful for me for many different reasons. This assignment opened my eyes to persuasion that I thought was always forced, but it turned out to be quite necessary when trying to get what you want. I found this aspect applicable to the atmosphere of a sales meeting and other instances in which you want something out of.
This process as a whole has taught me that using careful wording, not being too full of yourself, and being as honest as humanly possible provides the best image of yourself to whoever may be reading your cover letter. What was interesting about this process, though, is that it was not as difficult as it seemed at first. A lot of the cover letter is just talking about your accomplishments, qualifications, and interests in a humble way and I practice this skill almost every day.
All in all, I really enjoyed the process of writing the cover letter and revising it. The initial writing tested my ability to write honest, concise, and descriptive simultaneously, in which I was somewhat successful. The revision process gave me a chance to look back on my writing and fix my mistakes, but also to look at my peer’s writings and see if I could incorporate anything they did, into mine.
