Cover letters are becoming less and less useful to job seekers in an increasingly saturated applicant pool. Recruiters often don’t have time to read through five paragraphs of text, and will skip straight to resumes instead. While this might mean one less document for applicants to worry about, a cover letter is one of the best ways to inject some personality into your application and help differentiate yourself from other applicants.

Fast Company recommends making an effort to inject your resume with some personality to make up for the loss of a cover letter on many applications. One of the best ways to make up for the loss of the cover letter and to inject more personality into your resume is to add a summary section. This section should consist of two to three sentences that help make your resume stand out from other applications, and should replace the also-outmoded “objective” section of your resume (your objective is almost always to well, get the job, and your summary section can be used to address any specific points you would have covered with an objective anyway).

Fast Company has more tips for tailoring your resume in lieu of a cover letter, which can be found in their article here: http://bit.ly/20XUwYu