First, to put things in perspective, the identity of the person signing the recommendation letter is more important than the contents of it. However, writing a letter of recommendation can be quite hard, so the person recommending you may ask you to write a draft of the letter yourself.

I have written and received several recommendation letters, and while I am not particularly good in English writing, I think I know how a good recommendation letter should look like.

A good recommendation letter includes: identification, context, recommendation and closing. In one or two pages, it must contain:

• The name of the recommender and the applicant.

• A description of the circumstances in which both met.

• Something positive about the work developed together.

• Something positive about the recommended person.

• The phone number or other personal contact information of the recommender.

It may help to think before writing the letter about 1 or 2 characteristics that you want to highlight, and without insisting too much have these characteristics in your mind while writing the letter. It can be characteristics such as responsibility, care for the details, global vision, capacity to work under pressure, technical competence, intelligence, knowledge, leadership, enthusiasm, commitment, etc. These 1-2 characteristics must really represent how the applicant is (honesty is the best policy) and should be skills that are required by the position for which the application is being written.

Identification

A recommendation letter can be addressed to the chair of the selection or search committee (being careful about writing correctly the name and the position) or to the whole committee.

Typically call for applications include a contact address, in that case, that information should be used. The next paragraph should contain the identification of the person issuing the recommendation, showing the credentials of the recommender clearly but without pomposity:

The best recommendation letters are usually written by people who has worked or collaborated in a close relationship with the organization to which the applicant is applying, and/or by people who are well known in their field..

Context

The next paragraphs indicate which was the work that the recommender and the applicant developed together:

Now it is the right moment to write about something positive about the work done together, here you have a lot of freedom, as you are speaking about a project, not about a specific person. You must be truthful and specific. You can include several ideas:

It is better to pick a high-visibility project, or a project that is well known by the selection committee, or that is similar to some activity that the applicant will have to develop if hired for the position.

Recommendation

Here the letter speaks directly about the applicant in positive terms, without exaggerating and being specific. It is ideal that the characteristics being highlighted be related to the position to which the applicant is applying.

Here it is important to mix the skills of the applicant for the job with his/her skills to work in a team, because it is very important, when hiring someone new, to believe that you will be able to work with this new person easily. The recommendation should include something like:

Closing

First the most obvious, state the recommendation:

Finally it is good to include the phone number of the recommender. This gives more credibility and a more personal tone to the recommendation letter:

Good luck!