203 E Fairmount Ave.

Apt 219 State College, PA 16801 814-470-3628 February 08, 2012 Calvin McNeely Golf Course Superintendent Kananaskis Country Golf Course P.O. Box 1710 Kananaskis Village, AB T0L 2H0 Dear Mr. McNeely: I am interested in applying for the Assistant Superintendent position listed at Kananaskis Country Golf Course. I have a great deal of experience working in the Turf Management industry, most recently at Oakmont Country Club. As a senior in Turfgrass science at The Pennsylvania State University, I have a sufficient background in chemical applications, hand watering, teamwork, and cultural practices required to be an effective addition to Kananaskis. I have been given the opportunity to work as an intern at Oakmont Country Club and Pinehurst No. 2. These courses have been consistently ranked in the top 100 and have provided me with the necessary skills to move forward in this industry. These courses provided me a chance to gain experience in chemical applications and water management. This position would provide me the opportunity to expand my knowledge and skills in the golf course industry. My goal is to become a skilled agronomist and contribute to improving golf courses like Kananaskis. I believe this position will better help me understand and move forward in this industry. My goal is to work at a course with industry leaders at Kananaskis Country Golf Course. Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Spencer Hennen

203 E Fairmount Ave. Apt 219 State College, PA 16801 814-470-3628 February 08, 2012 Chad Anderson Golf Course Superintendent The Tuxedo Club 1 West Lake Road Tuxedo Park, NY 10987 Dear Mr. Anderson: I am interested in applying for the Assistant Superintendent position listed at The Tuxedo Club. I have a great deal of experience working in the Turf Management industry, most recently at Oakmont Country Club. As a senior in Turfgrass science at The Pennsylvania State University and a recent graduate of The University of Guelph, I have a sufficient background in chemical applications, hand watering, teamwork, and cultural practices required to be an effective addition to The Tuxedo Club. During my time at The University of Guelph and Penn State I have become skilled in a variety of turfgrass situations including plant pathology, plant nutrition, entomology, and agronomy. I am also very proficient using Microsoft Office and the TORO Site Pro applications. During my internship at Pinehurst No. 2 I was able to create an irrigation program using TORO Site Pro that we used for the month of July. This position would provide me the opportunity to expand my knowledge and skills in the golf course industry. My goal is to become a skilled agronomist and contribute to improving golf courses like The Tuxedo Club. I believe this position will better help me understand and move forward in this industry. My goal is to work at a course with industry leaders at The Tuxedo Club. Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

Spencer Hennen

Memorandum
To: From: Subject: Date: Rachel Bara Spencer Hennen Cover Letter and Resume Analysis February 15, 2012

The purpose of this memo is to evaluate and analyze the decisions I made regarding the choices I made on writing my cover letters and resumes for each of the two job advertisements from Kananaskis Country Golf Course and The Tuxedo Club. I will separate this memo into audience analysis, job description, and a rhetorical analysis. I will explain whom these job advertisements are directed to and give some background information on the two companies. I will provide the job descriptions, which include the requirements and opportunities. Finally, I will provide an analysis of the differences and similarities of the two resumes and cover letters. Audience Analysis Kananaskis Country Golf Course: Kananaskis Country Golf is a public golf resort located in Alberta, Canada. Kananaskis has two golf courses called The Mt. Kidd course and The Mt. Lorette course. The Mt. Kidd course is currently ranked 30th among the best golf courses in Canada according to Score Golf. Because this is a publically commercialized golf resort, the main goal is to profit from play. This results in lower golf course standards. This is very different compared to privately owned golf courses where the membership controls ownership. Kananaskis prides themselves on providing a service to golfers. Their main goal is to provide exceptional hospitality and an experience that golfers will not forget. The Tuxedo Club: The Tuxedo club is very different in many ways. Firstly The Tuxedo Club is a privately owned country club located in Tuxedo Park, New York. With only one course it changes everything related to golf expectations and usage. The Tuxedo Club started in 1886 and is an extremely exclusive country club. The Tuxedo Club is a privately member owned country club and their goals are much different from the goals of Kananaskis Country Golf. The Tuxedo Clubs main goals are quality of golf and high standards. The Tuxedo Club is a not a profit run organization and this is much different from Kananaskis. Job Description Kananaskis Country Golf Course: The job opportunity that is posted at Kananaskis Country Golf Course is an Assistant Superintendent position. This job advertisement has listed several requirements including a degree or diploma in Turf Management, having a minimum of 3 years of experience as an assistant superintendent, possessing an Alberta pesticide license, and being an excellent leader

and good communicator. This job would be a full time, 40 plus hour schedule and I would have to be prepared to work every day if needed. The job requires you to hire and fire, schedule, and manage a crew if course superintendent is not present. The candidate must be energetic and enthusiastic about working in this industry. A position like this also requires the candidate to always be willing to learn. The Tuxedo Club: The job opportunity that has been posted by The Tuxedo Club is a similar position but does have some differences. This is a 2nd Assistant Superintendent Position and does require a little less. This position does still require a bachelor of science or an associated degree in Turf Management or a related field. It also requires the candidate to have a pesticide license from the state of New York. This position requires less management and more cultural practice experience. This position also does not require you to have past experience as an assistant superintendent. This job ad does not focus in on personal characteristics but more hands on skills. It requires you to be familiar with the irrigation system, chemical applications, and fertilizer applications. It also emphasizes a strong work ethic is needed along with the willingness to work long hours. Rhetorical Analysis Resumes: For my resumes I decided to make their layout similar but their styles different. I organized them both in a chronological fashion however; the resume for the Kananaskis position is more focused on the skills rather than education. The Tuxedo Club resume was different because it was a lot more formal and focused on education more. For the Kananaskis position, because they are a public course and are not as formal is a club like Tuxedo I decided to make the resume straight forward and to the point. The style was very easy to read and casual. I still used the chronological order style because I knew a public course like Kananaskis will focus more on experience than education. I also added a skills section because of the emphasis on skills in the job ad. For this particular resume I felt that education should be second to experience so I placed experience first in the resume. This resort is a lot less formal and respects experience more than education. I also emphasized the previous courses that I had worked at to show the prestige of them. For my resume that was presented for The Tuxedo Club I chose a much more formal style of resume. This is a club owned by the members and a lot of these members are lawyers and high end businessmen. Also the members will also have more of an influence in the hiring in this position. It was important for me to make this a very formal and professional resume. I also had to focus more on the education rather than experience. Education is very important with this company mainly because the owners for the most part have very good educations. Also for this resume I decided to leave out the skills section and put in an Organizations section to show that I have active in the turfgrass industry. Most importantly I placed the education first which was different than the other resume, to showcase right away where I went to school. Also I did not include all my job experience that I had. I did this in the Kananaskis resume because job

experience more looked at. I listed the courses that had most similarities to the position I was applying to. The courses I listed in my job experience were also top courses in North America to show them my experience as well as my top notch education. Cover Letters: Unlike the resumes the cover letters share the same format. There was not much to change in the style of these letters because I chose a basic letter format. All the styling was the same but it was just the information that I decided to change. For the introduction for both the letters I stated how I was interested in applying for the job where I found them posted. Both of the letters included my education and previous experience at other courses. I provided sufficient information to the employer that I was capable of the positions. In each of the cover letters I also went more into depth of the history of the courses and my past courses. The cover letter I wrote to Kananaskis Country Golf like the resume focused on my experience and skills more than the one I wrote towards The Tuxedo Club. In this cover letter I explained how I had participated in previous internships at Oakmont Country Club and Pinehurst No. 2, two courses in the top 50 in the world. This was important because it would let the employer know I have great experience and that I had been taught well. This cover letter did not go to in depth of education. I stated in the letter that I was a senior at The Pennsylvania State University but left out that I had a diploma from The University of Guelph. I also elaborated on my skills such as chemical applications, hand watering, cultural practices, and leadership. Because this is more of a management position it requires more knowledge of these practices. My cover letter to The Tuxedo Club mentioned like the other letter that I was interested in the position and how I found out about the job. This letter was to be more formal and had to include more about my education and less about my experience. I did however include some technical skills that may be pertinent in this job. Instead of claiming to have learned my skills from experience I changed it to say that during my time at The Pennsylvania State University and The University of Guelph I have learned my skills. I did not go too in depth about my experience and only stated that I just completed an internship at Oakmont Country Club. In this letter I explained more of what I learned at Penn State such as agronomy and entomology. I also explained that I am fully capable of using Microsoft Office and TORO Site Pro. This shows that I have been dedicated to learning and advancing in this industry. It also shows that I am qualified for both the cultural and technical portion of this job. Being able to use Site Pro and Microsoft Office makes me a standout in the technical portion of this job. Studying at Penn State and having top-notch experience also makes me a standout in the cultural portion. While both jobs may seem very similar, they are also very different from each other. The two companies are very much different and require different sets of qualities. While both companies are very professional, they do have different goals and missions.