Letters of Recommendation

Without a doubt, one of the most enjoyable tasks for leaders in the military is writing letters of recommendation (LORs). It was my honor to write dozens of LORs for my fellow Soldiers during twenty four years of service. 

Recommendation letters in the military include those in support of Soldiers applying to Warrant or Officer Candidate School (W/OCS), ROTC Green to Gold and occasionally those seeking Army funded Advanced Civilian Schooling for Master’s or Doctorate degrees. Every once in a while, I’d even get a request from a separated Soldier needing a recommendation letter for their college admissions packet.

Of course there are the occasional recommendation letters in support of those Soldiers facing a show cause or service retention board. While the circumstances certainly aren’t pleasant, it is truly humbling to advocate for a Soldier fighting for a second chance.

I wouldn’t write this type of LOR for everyone, but I wasn’t afraid to send a letter telling the Army they’d be getting it wrong to separate a Soldier who I knew was of the highest character but had a challenge along the way.

The real reward comes when the Soldier you wrote the LOR for lets you know they were accepted to OCS, a master’s degree program or retained in service. What an honor to think you may have directly impacted a fellow service member advancing in their career!

When it came to writing LORs, I learned my technique from mentors who wrote LORs for me. Whenever I wrote an LOR, I always asked the person requesting to write the initial draft themselves. Before judging, hear me out!

There are several benefits to having the requestor write the first cut of the LOR. First, they will be the most familiar with the required format for submission and since they have a very keen interest to ensure the i’s are dotted and t’s are crossed, they should ensure the LOR is formatted properly.

Second, no one knows the individual’s accomplishments better than they do. This is where they can brag on all the things they’ve achieved that may not be widely known. Invariably, most folks have a hard time bragging on themselves. This is where the LOR writer comes in, more on this in just a moment.

Lastly, by having the requestor submit the first draft of the LOR, you are teaching them how to write LORs for their subordinates someday. Experience is the best teacher and drafting a recommendation letter is a great lesson in writing.

Once the requestor provided a draft, I always first double checked formatting. Especially for Army schools, a LOR not written in accordance with Army Regulation 25-50, Preparing and Managing Correspondence, could be a real distraction to a member of the application reviewing panel!

Next, I take the achievements the requestor provided and ensure they clearly have a cause and effect. For instance, a requestor may write in their draft “achieved best crew in the battalion”.  I would rewrite and embellish as “earned honors as the best crew in the battalion and as a result was immediately assigned to defend the most critical Army asset from attack”.

After I’m satisfied with the content, I’d go over (and over) the grammar in the letter of recommendation. Ensuring the same tense throughout, using active voice and getting rid of all the useless words presents a precise message.

Finally, I’d ensure the words chosen for my endorsement in the letter of recommendation were very clear. The featured pic in today’s blog is just such an example. One should never hold back in statements such as these. It is time to go all in!

My last tour with Soldiers ended in 2014. Even while working in a strategic level job from 2015-2019 I received numerous requests to write LORs. But since I retired in 2019, the requests for LORs dropped off substantially.

So when I learned that my oldest son’s college application required four Letters of Recommendation (yes you read that correctly, four) from teachers, coaches and guidance counselors I was very excited to help!

As I lamented in last week’s blog, I’ve learned recently that the college application process is a lot different than it was just a few years ago! LORs are submitted entirely on line with the college application system contacting the LOR writer directly.

Although this wasn’t a completely foreign concept to me, I would still follow the same procedure described above. The requestor provided a rough draft which I edited heavily before uploading into the recommendation system.

I guess in High School, in 2021, providing rough drafts of your letter of recommendation to your recommenders is frowned upon! Rather, my son was asked to provide a “resume” to recommenders.  How do you write a strong resume for a 17 year old?

We used a curriculum vitae format that I’ve used during graduate school and adapted it for a high schooler. I was sure to coach him to include verbiage with clear cause and effect. I also ensured he wrote his resume such that phrases could be cut and paste into a recommendation letter, if the recommender chose to do so.

Another thing I always made it a point to do when writing letters of recommendations is to provide the requestor a copy of what I submitted. So far, my son’s recommenders haven’t provided him a copy of their submission.  A little unnerving, but we’ll see how it goes!

It’s past the point of worrying now, we’ll know soon enough whether his application packet and LORs provided the college admissions committees with what they are looking for. I am just thankful to have been able to help him a little. Hope I can continue to help others advance along their education and career paths.

Earlier this year, I shared some thoughts on my favorite spring / summer outdoor activity, fishing. Next week I’ll share some reflections on my favorite fall outdoor pastime, hunting.

The views, opinions and biases expressed in this blog are the authors and do not reflect those of the U.S. Army or Department of Defense.

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