Recommendations

Recommendations are very coherent inputs to a great budding career. This writing affidavit is a basic factor that can seal the deal for your envisioned career. It defines every career path ranging from the academic, professional or the research and innovative career route. We encourage you to start asking your recommenders to start drafting your letters immediately after your interview for the job or after your application to the School. This will ensure that your recommenders have quality time to draft a thoughtful letter which will be distinctly and not hurriedly written. Also by asking early, this also will ensure that you are a priority with your recommenders, who will probably have other things doing.

Factors to consider in selecting recommenders

o Area of interest

o Personal Relationship

o Availability and Accessibility

o Usage

Area of Interest

The greatest mistake an individual will make is picking a recommender outside his/her interests or career path. For example, a student applying to a school should pick recommenders in his/her academic line. You should also consider choosing Lecturers in subjects that are relevant to your academic goals. If you are interested in studying business, a recommendation from your economics teacher might hold more weight than one from your French teacher. Also as someone applying for a job, you must consider recommenders that can further strengthen your application and experience overview such as your past employers, your Academic tutors, professional personnel e.t.c.

These three questions must be answered;

Does he understand what course I want to study?

Does he relate to my kind of job application?

Does he have a great weight in pulling my career forward?

Personal Relationship

Why will you pick recommenders who you do not have a personal relationship with? Either a short term or long term relationship experience, it is quite important that you have a relationship with your recommenders. It is important to request letters of recommendation from individuals who know you well since a vague and noncommittal letter is of marginal value. Recommendations are affidavits that swear about the characters, capabilities, achievements and limits of the person in question. This can only be written by someone who knows the subject very well. Don’t ever make the mistake of picking a recommender who doesn’t have a relationship with you. As you can’t describe a country you have not been to, so your recommenders cannot describe you if they don’t have a relationship with you. The most effective letters of recommendation are those that stress the context in which the writer knows you, the duration of his or her acquaintance with you, and your performance level as compared to other individuals in similar settings. Your communication skills, interpersonal skills, cultural competence, teamwork, initiative, integrity, resilience, and capacity for improvement are among the areas that your recommenders may discuss.

Let these two questions ring in your heart always;

Do my recommenders know me?

Do my recommenders have a relationship with me?

Availability and Accessibility

There is a need to select recommenders who are always available and easily accessible. If he can be called upon at anytime, then you have a recommender. Some folks are good recommenders but are either too busy or are not mostly available. For example, a student who wants a Professor to be his/her recommender and such professor is on a sabbatical break and can’t be accessible; such though he might be the best for the job, for the sake of the urgency of the task might not be the right recommender to consider. Make sure you can call on your presumed recommenders at any period of time.

Usage

You must at first understand clearly what you want to use your recommendations for before you recruit the services of your recommenders. Recommendations are not to be written for all purposes but it should be written per each need. For example, if you are applying for an application in a School, and at the same time applying for a part-time job, you need different recommenders for the two paths. An academic can recommend you for the School application but someone who understands your other skills outside academics can recommend you for the job. Therefore, there is a vivid need to select recommenders based on the usage of the recommendation letters you are writing.

It’s important to give yourself as much time as you can to put together an application that you are proud of and that reflects who you are as an individual. As you want your recommendations to reflect these aspects too, it is important to give your recommenders as much time as possible as well. Most importantly, always learn to appreciate your recommenders for their time and effort.