Speaker 1: You're listening to a CNA podcast.
Speaker 1: Hi, welcome to the Work It podcast with Tiffany and Gerald.
Speaker 1: Last month, we talked a little bit about high pressure
Speaker 1: jobs with a CNA Today colleague, but after that podcast
Speaker 1: went out, I thought we really need to talk about
Speaker 1: how to cope with workplace stress. Each day at work,
Speaker 1: I have multiple things on my to do list. Sometimes
Speaker 1: I have to have lunch at my desk and once
Speaker 1: I'm locked off, it's off to my second shift, my
Speaker 1: life as a mom.
Speaker 1: Now Gal, you manage your own time and business. What
Speaker 1: are some stresses you typically face and do you try
Speaker 1: and add in some, you know, me time or self-care
Speaker 1: time in your day? Well, Tiffany, I'm with you on this.
Speaker 1: For me, it's a lot about dealing with things in
Speaker 1: my mind, right, about dealing with expectations from others and
Speaker 1: of myself as well. I think being a business owner
Speaker 1: plus the many other things that I do in my
Speaker 1: other parts of my life like my church.
Speaker 1: I do need to know how to prioritize and also
Speaker 1: know what to react to and what not to react to.
Speaker 1: It's definitely not easy and in Singapore, we often hear
Speaker 1: many people struggle with like time and everyone is just
Speaker 1: in a perpetual busy mode. So this question about how
Speaker 1: do we take care of ourselves when our work is
Speaker 1: so demanding.
Speaker 1: And do we really need like a lot of leave
Speaker 1: brakes just to fully recharge? So today I'm really happy
Speaker 1: that we have two people whose jobs are extremely demanding,
Speaker 1: but yet at the same time, they have found time
Speaker 1: to put together a book on how small actions can
Speaker 1: make a difference to their work, right? So with us,
Speaker 1: we have Dr. Adaira Landry. She's an assistant professor at
Speaker 1: Harvard Medical School and an emergency medicine physician at Brigham
Speaker 1: and Women's Hospital. Hi,
Speaker 2: thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Thanks for having us.
Speaker 1: And we also have Dr. Risa Luis, a professor of
Speaker 1: emergency medicine at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
Speaker 2: Hi, it's great to be with you.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much ladies for speaking to us all the
Speaker 1: way from the US. Now both of you have worked
Speaker 1: in emergency medicine and I'm sure when you were there,
Speaker 1: everything felt pressing, right, because you are making life and
Speaker 1: death decisions. Was there a turning point where you realized
Speaker 1: that
Speaker 1: Your body was holding on to too much stress or
Speaker 1: any indication there was something wrong. Ressa,
Speaker 2: I think in selecting emergency medicine, I knew that I
Speaker 2: was selecting a field that wasn't necessarily consistent with circadian rhythms,
Speaker 2: i sleeping.
Speaker 2: And really good physical, mental, social, emotional, all the ways
Speaker 2: that one could be healthy. Now, when you're in training,
Speaker 2: you don't want to get in trouble, you want to
Speaker 2: do a good job, you're working hard and the responsibilities
Speaker 2: for you to take care of patients.
Speaker 2: So the shift never had any time to take a
Speaker 2: break to eat built in. However, in the hospital where
Speaker 2: I worked, there was a coffee shop. So I shared
Speaker 2: the story of speed walking to the coffee shop, grabbing
Speaker 2: a small coffee, grabbing a bagel, and by the time
Speaker 2: I had sped walked back, I had inhaled the bagel
Speaker 2: and I had the coffee for the rest of the shift.
Speaker 2: And actually, Adara and I wrote an article about agency
Speaker 2: and how
Speaker 2: Microskills is certainly about navigating the workplace and professional journey,
Speaker 2: and we believe though that amidst these large institutions where
Speaker 2: you feel like you have no control and no agency,
Speaker 2: there really can be agency. And so I think it's
Speaker 2: really important even on the busiest shifts to figure out
Speaker 2: ways to eat, to figure out ways to make sure
Speaker 2: you get sleep. And the final thing that we talk
Speaker 2: about in medicine, and there's more than 3, but these
Speaker 2: are 3 that we, we called out.
Speaker 2: is calling in sick when you're sick because it's kind
Speaker 2: of funny, not funny. We see many doctors in training
Speaker 2: and faculty doctors like walk around the emergency department with
Speaker 2: an IV in their arm. Maybe they had food poisoning
Speaker 2: because they ate something bad. Maybe they're pregnant in the
Speaker 2: first trimester and have morning sickness, or maybe they have
Speaker 2: a bad migraine headache. We've certainly seen people kind of
Speaker 2: just work through it with the IV in their arm, medicine,
Speaker 2: fluids to continue to see patients and
Speaker 2: You know, again, we all know that that's not right
Speaker 2: for anybody, for patients, for the doctor, for the teams,
Speaker 2: for anybody. I'll add, I think one of the harder
Speaker 2: parts is that it's not modeled for us, how to
Speaker 2: take care of our own health, our own personal health.
Speaker 2: And I would say I did not learn how to
Speaker 2: take care of myself from a colleague. I actually learned
Speaker 2: it from a patient. I had a patient, he came
Speaker 2: in with terminal cancer. It was very obvious that he
Speaker 2: was not going to be living for much longer, and
Speaker 2: I happened to just ask him, because it was a
Speaker 2: slow shift and I love to get to know my patients,
Speaker 2: how did you come to get diagnosed with cancer?
Speaker 2: And in that story, he shared that he was on
Speaker 2: his last day of working as a consultant. He hung
Speaker 2: up the phone and looked at his wife and said
Speaker 2: to her, I'm all yours now because he had really
Speaker 2: been spending his entire mid-adult life consumed by working, and
Speaker 2: he was finally able to spend time with his wife.
Speaker 2: They were actually in the car when he told her this,
Speaker 2: driving to a primary care doctor's appointment because he had
Speaker 2: been having some back pain and his doctor was like, oh,
Speaker 2: it's probably just a kidney stone. Let's just check.
Speaker 2: And within an hour of him hanging up the phone,
Speaker 2: he was in the doctor's office getting a diagnosis of
Speaker 2: terminal cancer. And what he said to me was so striking.
Speaker 2: He said, I worked my entire life for just that
Speaker 2: one hour of freedom. And at that moment I was like,
Speaker 2: oh my God, I am this person. I, I am
Speaker 2: this person who was just like, my own needs, my
Speaker 2: own health.
Speaker 2: And not even just my own personal needs, it's also
Speaker 2: like the needs of my family, hanging out with them,
Speaker 2: spending time with them, my own hobbies, all of that
Speaker 2: was being deferred to this like later life that was
Speaker 2: assumed to be there, right, retirement. And I think in
Speaker 2: our line of work, we see so many people not
Speaker 2: reach that journey of like freedom. And for me, I
Speaker 2: don't think I really ever had an attending, so a
Speaker 2: supervising doctor.
Speaker 2: sit me down and say, hey, it seems like you're
Speaker 2: not really prioritizing your own needs.
Speaker 1: So there was always a reward for pushing yourself. I
Speaker 1: think Tiffany, that sounds like us in Singapore as well, right?
Speaker 1: It's not just in medicine, but I think in many,
Speaker 1: many areas of our work.
Speaker 1: People glorify themselves by saying that they're busy and they
Speaker 1: didn't have time to eat. It's almost like a badge
Speaker 1: of honor, right? And it perpetuates this thinking that then
Speaker 1: if I have to do self-care, it has to be long.
Speaker 1: It has to take up time, I have to take
Speaker 1: 3 holidays a year.
Speaker 1: I have to spend a whole day by myself, but
Speaker 1: all these things take time, right? And from your experiences,
Speaker 1: is there a way to just have pockets of self-care
Speaker 1: during the day, throughout the day so that you don't
Speaker 1: kind of like run out of steam.
Speaker 2: I think you really set up for us to discuss
Speaker 2: deliberate rest. Deliberate rest could be having a meal with friends.
Speaker 2: Deliberate rest could be making sure you exercise. Deliberate rest
Speaker 2: could be reading a book, not for your profession, but
Speaker 2: for pleasure. It can mean also like taking a walk
Speaker 2: in nature. So these types of breaks, these deliberate intentional
Speaker 2: breaks where you're resting, when you return back to the work,
Speaker 2: you're even more efficient, you're even more focused, and that
Speaker 2: has proved true over and over again for me. So
Speaker 2: I really have reworked the way I schedule my days
Speaker 2: and my evenings.
Speaker 1: So it's interesting that you brought up examples about taking walks,
Speaker 1: reading books. If I'm reading a book, I'm sure my
Speaker 1: mind stays on the book, but if I'm walking, my
Speaker 1: mind will start to wander. So I bet
Speaker 2: all four of us are like that, that even though
Speaker 2: we're walking in nature, our mind is still going like
Speaker 2: right when I'm done with my nature walk, I need
Speaker 2: to do this, I'm going to do this. The science
Speaker 2: shows that even just being in nature exposing to nature
Speaker 2: does something to us and I'll use the example, there's
Speaker 2: a book called Your Brain on Art.
Speaker 2: If you go to a museum or if you go
Speaker 2: listen to music, like you feel it, it does something
Speaker 2: to you, it moves you, it penetrates you. And so sure,
Speaker 2: maybe we're still thinking about the work we need to
Speaker 2: get back to or our to do list, but we've
Speaker 2: taken ourselves out of that environment of work, of sitting
Speaker 2: at the desk, of staring at the screen, that actually
Speaker 2: is restorative and does give us that break and
Speaker 2: I actually think about it, it allows me to also like,
Speaker 2: as I'm thinking, I'm like, oh, you know what, that's
Speaker 2: not important. I can take that off my task list.
Speaker 2: So you know what, that is high priority. I got
Speaker 2: to make sure I, that's the first thing I need
Speaker 2: to take care of. It allows you to sort of reflect,
Speaker 2: these of be quieting the mind. There are many ways
Speaker 2: to quiet the mind, swimming, something where you're doing a
Speaker 2: repetitive behavior can do.
Speaker 2: for some people.
Speaker 1: In this book that you've written, microskills and there are
Speaker 1: 9 steps on 9 micros skills to help with self-care.
Speaker 1: The other tip that I've noticed and I thought it
Speaker 1: was really interesting is to have a personal board of directors.
Speaker 1: Explain to us what is that and who should be
Speaker 1: in your inner circle.
Speaker 2: A personal board of directors is
Speaker 2: what it sounds like. It's a team of people, a
Speaker 2: very dynamic team, meaning it's not a static group of
Speaker 2: people who are around you at all fixed times of life.
Speaker 2: It's shifting, it's changes in proximity. So someone might be
Speaker 2: very close to you for one period of time and
Speaker 2: then 6 months later, perhaps they're a little bit more
Speaker 2: drifted away because the need is changed. But it's this
Speaker 2: idea that you have people around you who have specialized
Speaker 2: skill sets.
Speaker 2: That can help support you. For instance, around my personal
Speaker 2: board of directors, I might have someone who I go
Speaker 2: to once, twice a year for personal finance questions about
Speaker 2: investing strategies with taxes.
Speaker 2: I have someone else who I go to way more
Speaker 2: regularly in regards to raising my children because I have
Speaker 2: mentors for motherhood. I have someone for writing, someone who
Speaker 2: I go to to help me sort of better learn
Speaker 2: the craft of writing. They read a lot of my work,
Speaker 2: they comment on it, they meet with me regularly.
Speaker 2: And so these are people who just have like finite
Speaker 2: skill sets and they sit at this theoretical table around me,
Speaker 2: almost like a long boardroom table you would see if
Speaker 2: you walked into a business room, right? And they sit
Speaker 2: around me and they add to my growth. It's important
Speaker 2: to remember that this team is always expanding, right? So
Speaker 2: there's always this like open seat where you're hoping that
Speaker 2: as you're networking and meeting more people, you find others.
Speaker 2: Who you can bring onto your personal boards. One last
Speaker 2: comment about this idea of networking that we talk a
Speaker 2: lot about is it's not just taking from others. There's
Speaker 2: this very important need for you to also think about
Speaker 2: how you can help give. And our first microscope of
Speaker 2: the book is nourishing relationships for people you trust because
Speaker 2: we think it's important to not just siphon off content
Speaker 2: from them, right?
Speaker 2: You have to give back the reciprocal nature allows you
Speaker 2: to really nurture that relationship.
Speaker 1: You know this idea of the personal board of directors,
Speaker 1: it really requires us to allow people into our lives first, right?
Speaker 1: It really requires us to be that little bit more vulnerable,
Speaker 1: be willing to stop to listen to what other people
Speaker 1: are saying. I have a friend and I will consider
Speaker 1: this man to be on my personal board of directors
Speaker 1: and he always asked me this question.
Speaker 1: He said, How are you resting? It's like he doesn't ask,
Speaker 1: how are you? because my response would be like, I've
Speaker 1: been busy, I've been doing this, he said, how are
Speaker 1: you resting? He goes straight to the point, right?
Speaker 1: Allowing people like this into your life, it can help
Speaker 1: with the self-care part because you do sometimes need that
Speaker 1: that check-in somehow. Yeah. So some people would ask, I mean,
Speaker 1: if they can get behind the concept of personal board
Speaker 1: of directors, but I guess the question is how does
Speaker 1: that translate to self-care in the workplace? Like how do
Speaker 1: these people help me to care for myself at work?
Speaker 2: I think it's really good to have someone on your
Speaker 2: board of directors
Speaker 2: really emphasizes that question you just mentioned, Gerald, like, how
Speaker 2: are you resting. So for me, I'm an advisor for
Speaker 2: the Harvard Medical School, so I have like 45 students
Speaker 2: who I oversee regularly. They all sort of consider me
Speaker 2: their self-care board member because I start every single meeting,
Speaker 2: every single time with tell me about your mental, physical,
Speaker 2: and social health. And I'm very direct about asking. So
Speaker 2: how's your mood? How are you feeling about life?
Speaker 2: How are you exercising? I asked someone, something similar, how
Speaker 2: are you resting or how do you relax? And then
Speaker 2: I asked, who, who have you spent time with recently,
Speaker 2: just to try to understand their social dynamic. But we
Speaker 2: talk about that much more than we talk about their
Speaker 2: projects and their research and their grades, because all of
Speaker 2: that is usually a reflection of those first three things,
Speaker 2: their mental health, their physical health, their social health.
Speaker 2: And so I think it's important to try to recruit
Speaker 2: people who you think value well-being and have those folks
Speaker 2: in your corner who can check in with you and
Speaker 2: discuss with you strategies because it's a skill, like well-being,
Speaker 2: self-care is
Speaker 2: Not something that is intrinsic to many of us who
Speaker 2: are probably more so hyperproductive, workaholics, or we just feel
Speaker 2: intimidated to actually set boundaries. So people always think your
Speaker 2: bored must be people that are older than you or
Speaker 2: more experienced than you.
Speaker 2: The same way we picture mentors, and I say that
Speaker 2: one of my favorite kind of mentors, peer mentors, people
Speaker 2: that are my same level, same age, same experience. To date,
Speaker 2: one of my long standing personal board of directors is
Speaker 2: a university friend. He has been my go to person
Speaker 2: with whom I discussed, for example, if I'm considering a
Speaker 2: job position. Number one, weighing it, but also then talking
Speaker 2: about how to
Speaker 2: negotiate. He's also someone that I call, and I have
Speaker 2: a few people because you don't want to tax one
Speaker 2: person more than others. You want to spread out sort
Speaker 2: of the asks. This is someone I call when I
Speaker 2: have a difficult conversation, we role play the conversation and
Speaker 2: that's actually one of the great ways to work with.
Speaker 2: board members is to say, hey, can I practice this
Speaker 2: conversation that I'm a little concerned about, but he also,
Speaker 2: even though he is not in medicine or in healthcare,
Speaker 2: has really highlighted for me that all of these different
Speaker 2: industries is all about communication, people management, morale building, navigating conflict,
Speaker 2: these themes which are the themes of our 10 chapters,
Speaker 2: literally go across all work industries.
Speaker 1: Risa, you mentioned about practicing a conversation.
Speaker 1: There is a conversation that I would like to tap
Speaker 1: on both of you for. There's this one tip, one
Speaker 1: microscale that's in the book about offloading routine tasks that
Speaker 1: bring you no joy or purpose. Many Singaporeans will want
Speaker 1: to rehearse that conversation because they can't wait to get
Speaker 1: things off their responsibility, but they don't know how. They
Speaker 1: don't know how to speak to their bosses about it.
Speaker 1: They would just suffer in silence. So tell us, how
Speaker 1: does that practically work out?
Speaker 2: It's very important for us to make it clear that
Speaker 2: we are not referring to the core roles of your job.
Speaker 2: I have given many lectures on this exact topic. We
Speaker 2: should have a sense of happiness, a sense of purpose,
Speaker 2: a sense of growth when we're doing work, right? And
Speaker 2: if you're not having that, then perhaps the work you're
Speaker 2: doing is not right for you. And inevitably, every single
Speaker 2: time I give this lecture,
Speaker 2: Someone more senior raises their hand and says, Are you
Speaker 2: telling people to quit their job? Because if I hired
Speaker 2: you for something and you tell me you're not going
Speaker 2: to do it because it doesn't bring you joy.
Speaker 2: I can't keep you there. And so I think that's
Speaker 2: a big, very important distinction, right? Like I'm a physician,
Speaker 2: I work clinical shifts, and if I were to say
Speaker 2: to my boss, I no longer want to see patients,
Speaker 2: that would be a problem as far as me keeping
Speaker 2: my contract, right? Because that's like the core aspect of
Speaker 2: why I'm hired. What we're referring to is different.
Speaker 2: These are a lot of the more optional tasks that
Speaker 2: still fill our plate, that still cause mental overwhelm and burden.
Speaker 2: In the book, we actually try to take some of
Speaker 2: that challenge off of your plate by providing some scripts
Speaker 2: that will allow you to sort of have a starting place.
Speaker 2: And from there you can workshop. I mean, I would
Speaker 2: say Chat GPT and all sorts of apps can even
Speaker 2: help you further along, but I have used Chat GPT
Speaker 2: as well for navigating conversations in anticipation for having it.
Speaker 2: And so there's all sorts of ways you can do it.
Speaker 2: The idea though is to make sure that the thing
Speaker 2: you are quitting or or leaving behind is not something
Speaker 2: that would actually keep you from keeping your job. And
Speaker 2: and if that is the case, that's an important discussion
Speaker 2: for you to have with your personal board of directors.
Speaker 2: So the way I do it typically is there's something
Speaker 2: I don't want to do. I think about the stakes
Speaker 2: of this. Like, is this something where if if I
Speaker 2: say no or I quit, my supervisor would be upset
Speaker 2: or disappointed. It would impact my salary, my promotion. Like,
Speaker 2: what is the stakes of this thing that I'm stepping
Speaker 2: aside from?
Speaker 2: If it's low stakes, a lot of that fear goes away.
Speaker 2: If I'm worried, that's when I go to my personal
Speaker 2: board of directors and I'm like, Hey, I'm thinking about
Speaker 2: stepping down from this, and I want to know what
Speaker 2: your thoughts are. Is this the right timing? Is this
Speaker 2: the right messaging? Who do I go to first? How
Speaker 2: do I make sure I control the narrative around this?
Speaker 2: And once you get used to this process, it becomes
Speaker 2: much easier every single time.
Speaker 2: Yes. There's a really good graphic in the book where
Speaker 2: we talk about automating, delegating, and there are two others,
Speaker 2: and some things can just be taken off the plate.
Speaker 2: And so certain things, certain tasks can be automated.
Speaker 2: Certain things can be delegated is say you want to
Speaker 2: train up someone who hasn't learned the skill that you
Speaker 2: no longer really are feeling it and you actually don't
Speaker 2: need it for doing the core roles and responsibilities of
Speaker 2: your job by taking things off the plate, that leaves
Speaker 2: opportunity for more things or for you to actually do
Speaker 2: some more of that deliberate
Speaker 1: rest.
Speaker 1: Another thing that resonated with me when I was reading
Speaker 1: your book was to set limits on time spent during meetings. Now,
Speaker 1: this will be a very interesting one for our listeners
Speaker 1: because some people would say, look, I'm not the one
Speaker 1: chairing the meeting, so I can't set a time limit
Speaker 1: on the meeting that I'm going for. Can you help
Speaker 1: us by teaching us how to communicate with our peers
Speaker 1: and our bosses on trying to make a meeting like
Speaker 1: a half an hour meeting rather than a 1 hour meeting.
Speaker 2: I think this is a challenge. I mean, we don't
Speaker 2: say that any of this stuff is easy. It's possible.
Speaker 2: It's a skill, and I think this is a very
Speaker 2: common challenge. I've been in this exact situation. I used
Speaker 2: to have almost 2 hour meetings regularly, and it was
Speaker 2: painful because I think we were probably only productive for
Speaker 2: about 30 minutes or so. There's this part of me
Speaker 2: that wanted to see how my peers felt first before
Speaker 2: I even raised anything.
Speaker 2: Up to the person who was leading this meeting. And
Speaker 2: so I, I definitely remember asking other folks who were
Speaker 2: on my team, like, hey, what do you think about
Speaker 2: these meetings? And a lot of people were like, yeah,
Speaker 2: not very productive, not very helpful. So that was step one,
Speaker 2: making sure that my intuition was correct.
Speaker 2: The second step was really trying to understand the personality
Speaker 2: of the person who's leading this and how they will
Speaker 2: respond to any suggestion. And that was a really important
Speaker 2: step because there are different leadership skills and styles, personality types,
Speaker 2: and so you want to know who you're working with.
Speaker 2: We talk a lot about learning your workplace culture and
Speaker 2: a big part of that is observation, observing just how
Speaker 2: sensitive someone is, how quick they are to respond in
Speaker 2: positive or negative ways.
Speaker 2: And so I think that was my second step was
Speaker 2: just trying to understand like how well does this person
Speaker 2: take feedback? What are the best ways of giving them feedback?
Speaker 2: And then from there, I actually asked a mentor of
Speaker 2: mine what they think about my strategy, what they think
Speaker 2: about telling this person, and I got some feedback there.
Speaker 2: I think I started with just this idea of
Speaker 2: What's best for the team, and I think what's best
Speaker 2: for the team is us being efficient. Yes. And so
Speaker 2: I really framed it around efficiency and sort of use
Speaker 2: language like we have these regular meetings and I'm curious
Speaker 2: if there are ways for us to be more efficient
Speaker 2: towards goals that I think would benefit all of us.
Speaker 2: So instead of having like a two hour meeting regularly,
Speaker 2: What are your thoughts about 30 minutes, and instead we
Speaker 2: use like an hour for our individual goals and we
Speaker 2: work asynchronously. And it actually took some time, I actually
Speaker 2: think it took COVID, because we used to meet in person,
Speaker 2: but it took some time for us to really just
Speaker 2: like
Speaker 2: Welcome. This is a better way. But I think for me,
Speaker 2: it was this idea of like not just like running
Speaker 2: into it and saying, Hey, these meetings aren't working for me,
Speaker 2: but it was like making sure that my intuition was correct,
Speaker 2: understanding who I'm working with and what's their best way
Speaker 2: of getting feedback, getting just a little bit of coaching
Speaker 2: on the language.
Speaker 2: And then phrasing it in a way that benefits them
Speaker 2: and the team, and it's not just like all about me.
Speaker 2: Like this isn't working for me. It was, this isn't
Speaker 2: working for everyone. Here, here are ways that we can
Speaker 2: help everyone.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, if there's one thing that I'm taking away
Speaker 1: with with me from today's sport, it's really about how
Speaker 1: everything the micros skills are there for us to practice,
Speaker 1: but yet it's a challenge. It's a challenge. It requires
Speaker 1: us to adapt it into our own context and to
Speaker 1: be deliberate intentional in practicing them. So I'm really glad
Speaker 1: that both of you came on here to give us
Speaker 1: this reality check, right? Yes, there are micros skills, but
Speaker 1: you got to be deliberate about it.
Speaker 1: So thank you for your time, Dr. Adara and Dr. Risa.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much.
Speaker 2: Thank you. Thank you.
Speaker 2: Hello,
Speaker 1: this is our Ask Me Anything segment where we take
Speaker 1: on a work-related question that you have sent to us.
Speaker 1: Do continue to write to us. We really, really love
Speaker 1: answering them. Now today's question is sent by our listener, Josiah.
Speaker 1: Let me read, Josiah says, I am job hunting now
Speaker 1: and I understand that it's important to write my resumes
Speaker 1: for the job that I'm applying for.
Speaker 1: But I find it a waste of time to write
Speaker 1: cover letters. Are cover letters really necessary? And if I
Speaker 1: must submit one, how do I make my cover letter
Speaker 1: stand out? Josiah, I feel you. So I'm going to
Speaker 1: ask Gerald this question. Why do we even need cover
Speaker 1: letters in the first place? I think Josiah asked a
Speaker 1: question that many people have in their minds as well
Speaker 1: when they're job seeking, right? Like writing the resume is
Speaker 1: painful enough, right? And then now you got to.
Speaker 1: The cover letter to it and you don't even know
Speaker 1: what it's for. So I think if today we go
Speaker 1: back a little bit in history to where the cover
Speaker 1: letters start from, right? In the 50s, right, in the US,
Speaker 1: they started to ask for cover letters to try to
Speaker 1: understand a bit more of the context of why this
Speaker 1: person is trying to apply for a job. So at
Speaker 1: the back of the cover letter, they have your resume, right,
Speaker 1: or your qualifications, your experiences, but in the front, it's
Speaker 1: meant to be that summary, a quick snapshot of what
Speaker 1: you have and also
Speaker 1: So why are you applying for this job, right? So
Speaker 1: this was done in the 50s and as the name suggests,
Speaker 1: cover letter is meant to cover the the resume. So
Speaker 1: it's the first thing that you should see. But this
Speaker 1: was in the 50s and right now today in our
Speaker 1: modern society where the number of job applications outnumber the
Speaker 1: number of jobs on average I think 200 plus, easily
Speaker 1: 200 plus per job applicant. So you can't imagine a
Speaker 1: recruiter reading everything, right?
Speaker 1: So what I've often observed is recruiters will just skip
Speaker 1: the cover letter. They go straight to the resume, they
Speaker 1: will take a look and then they would come back.
Speaker 1: They would come back to the cover letter. So instead
Speaker 1: of reading it first, they may usually last the second
Speaker 1: thing and of course they will spend more time reading
Speaker 1: the front page, the cover letter, if the contents of
Speaker 1: the resume fit with what they're looking for. OK, OK,
Speaker 1: so don't write a generic cover letter that's what you're saying.
Speaker 1: Understanding it right that put effort into your resume first
Speaker 1: so that it will peak the hiring manager's interest, then
Speaker 1: write a good summary for your cover letter because then
Speaker 1: if you are shortlisted as the top 5 people that
Speaker 1: they want to maybe send to the next round, they
Speaker 1: may then read your cover letter. Yes, I think the
Speaker 1: cover letter still has its purpose. I wouldn't suggest to
Speaker 1: omit it.
Speaker 1: But like what you mentioned, right, the resume, it should
Speaker 1: be a strong one, right? And then your cover letter
Speaker 1: reinforces what is on the resume, right? There are a
Speaker 1: few other things that you can do with your cover
Speaker 1: letter as well. The first thing is to add a
Speaker 1: little bit of personality, a bit of the why. Why
Speaker 1: are you attracted to the company, or what about the
Speaker 1: product or the service is relevant to what you have
Speaker 1: done before.
Speaker 1: So these are some of the things that you may
Speaker 1: not be able to add into your resume that much, right?
Speaker 1: So think of your cover letter as a little bit
Speaker 1: of the forward piece while your resume is like a
Speaker 1: training back in your career experiences. OK, but I never
Speaker 1: read the forward part of any book. So just assume
Speaker 1: if let's say today the recruiter is printing out some
Speaker 1: of these documents, right, and the first thing that they
Speaker 1: put on top is the cover letter, right? So then
Speaker 1: Their eyes would glance and they would see some things
Speaker 1: on the cover letter. You catch the eye, right? So
Speaker 1: that's why it's important to also have some good formatting
Speaker 1: on the cover letter page, bullet points, numberings so that
Speaker 1: they don't have to read the whole letter, but when
Speaker 1: their eyes are drawn to something very concise and they
Speaker 1: see that and they like what they see, and then
Speaker 1: it will encourage them to turn back, right?
Speaker 1: The other thing often I remind people is in a
Speaker 1: very tight race where many people are hunting for the
Speaker 1: same job, sometimes smallest preparation makes the difference, right? The
Speaker 1: things that you do slightly differently, with a bit more effort,
Speaker 1: a bit more heart, it might just get picked up
Speaker 1: and you're just hit by that. Yeah, so don't give
Speaker 1: up on the cover letter. That's what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Some people I know, some companies I know they, they
Speaker 1: may even take it as incomplete. If you don't provide
Speaker 1: a cover letter, it just, OK, so I know of
Speaker 1: this recruiter, this one person, I won't name who this
Speaker 1: person is, but I observed that the person tended to
Speaker 1: omit applications that didn't come with cover letters.
Speaker 1: They infer it as like you're not sincere because we
Speaker 1: asked for a cover letter and a resume, right, and
Speaker 1: you didn't want to provide that. So I'm just going
Speaker 1: to meet you lah. It's incomplete and basically the person
Speaker 1: halved the number of applications to screen. Wow, wow, so
Speaker 1: half of them didn't provide a cover letter and automatically
Speaker 1: they were not considered. So I think you can be
Speaker 1: a little bit more cautious and just provide.
Speaker 1: But make the most of it lah. Don't just provide
Speaker 1: something that is similar to what you've written, customize it
Speaker 1: a bit, add your personality, a bit of your why
Speaker 1: you're going to be there. And of course, ending off
Speaker 1: with a call to action, right? Put down your phone
Speaker 1: number there again, right, because again if it's on the
Speaker 1: first thing that they see, you're just making their life
Speaker 1: a bit more convenient. Yeah, exactly, make it easier for them.
Speaker 1: to contact you. Yeah, I mean that I can get
Speaker 1: behind because I think with the resume we are all
Speaker 1: kind of just throwing out sometimes the entire bus, right?
Speaker 1: The bus and the sink and everything. So with the
Speaker 1: cover letter, you're saying it's OK to put bullet points,
Speaker 1: show a bit of your personality and also the tone
Speaker 1: is be nice about it and then lastly to have
Speaker 1: the call to action.
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, so that answers my question too, because I've
Speaker 1: always wondered like how much effort should I put in
Speaker 1: my cover letter and how do I actually even stand
Speaker 1: out among the CEO of cover letters. Well, if like Josiah,
Speaker 1: you have a work-related question that you think we can
Speaker 1: help you to answer, do write into us. We are
Speaker 1: at CNA podcasts at Mediacorp.com.sg. We're also on Spotify, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: Me Listen, and YouTube where a video version of this
Speaker 1: is at.
Speaker 1: The team behind the Workki podcast is Christina Robert, Joanne Chan,
Speaker 1: Junai Johari, Sayey and Alison Jenner. Video by Hanida Amin.
Speaker 1: I'm Gerald and I'm Tiffany. Have a super work week ahead.