5 Tips For Securing Recommendation Letters

Happy Monday, and welcome to Medical Mondays! While this isn’t necessarily a medicine/health-specific topic, it’s rather pertinent to my current life, and possibly a lot of your lives as well, so we’re goin’ with it!

I’ve been in school for a long, long time (technically in 21st grade), and have definitely filled out my fair share of applications–from college + internships and volunteer positions to graduate school and medical school…and most recently, residency programs. These are my top 5 tips for securing recommendation letters!

Ask early.

For instance…the last day of your rotation/course, instead of an entire year later, when they may have already forgotten you.

If possible, give them plentyyyyy of time to write the letter (> 6 months). Include deadlines.

Possibly consider fudging the deadline to at least a month earlier than you actually need the letter to be turned in by, because it gives you a little more leeway to potentially ask someone else if they don’t ever turn it in.

Try to get at least two more than the minimum amount of letter-writers.

Realize that sometimes, even when you do all of the above, life happens, so it’s good to have backups! One of the recommendation letters I asked for got sent in…3 months after I’d already started med school, which was great, but not really something I could use anymore since I was already in.

If the max amount of letters you can send in is 3, try to get >5 people to write you letters, just in case 1-2 fall through.

If your school doesn’t have a letter service, or there’s some weird obscure method for how they need to send in the letter, include instructions.

Your goal is to make your letter-writer’s life as easy as possible. My undergrad didn’t have a letter service and most places require that you waive your rights to see the letter, so Interfolio was a helpful service!

For med school, ERAS now requires that the letter-writer upload it themselves. It’s way more confusing and much more of a hassle, so your letter-writer has to either really, really love or hate you to write you a letter. ._. I included step-by-step instructions for everyone that I asked (except my dean, but only because she already knew how).

If someone offers to write you a letter without you asking for one, TAKE IT.

It will almost always be better than any that you ask for.

If you had a great rotation/course that you loved where you feel that you got along really well with your preceptor/professor, it really doesn’t hurt to ask for a letter even if they’re not in the field you’re pursuing. S/he can still be a personal reference who can attest to your character + personality.

Having more than you need is definitely better than not having enough, and the worst thing that can happen is that they say tell you no. If they do, consider that a blessing in disguise–if they wouldn’t be able to write you a strong recommendation letter, you wouldn’t want  to include it with your application anyway!

I had very positive experiences on most of my rotations this year, so I asked for/am getting letters from my…

• 1st FM preceptor (whom I worked with for 2 months! :D )
• Outpatient IM preceptor (I have massive amounts of respect for him, and still have no idea how he manages to do so much)
• Pediatrics preceptor
• Inpatient FM preceptor (residency director for the program at her hospital)
• Surgery preceptor (surprisingly one of my favorite rotations this year–he was so fun to work with!)
• Dean (residency director for the program at my hospital, and is a super-awesome lady)

I’d like to think I have all the primary care fields well-covered! :]!

(In case you need further proof of the awesomeness that is my dean, check out the Skittles cake she made for us on St. Patricks’ Day!)

• Let me know in the comments if there’s anything else you’d add to this! Next week’s post will be on the 5 things that I think would be good to include in your LOR packet for your letter-writers!
• Have you had any LOR horror stories?