A recruiter or headhunter found you, pitched a role, and you said yes, tell me more. Now they want your CV, and you are wondering whether a cover letter has to go with it. Almost always it does not. What goes with the CV is a short covering note, and it does more work than most candidates realise.
Do I need a cover letter if a recruiter contacted me?
Usually not. A cover letter exists to answer one question: why are you applying? When the recruiter made the first move, somebody else has already answered it. They decided you looked relevant before you knew the job existed.
There is a practical reason too. An agency recruiter or search consultant rarely forwards your documents untouched. Most write their own summary of each candidate for the client, often in the firm's template, and your CV may be reformatted to match. A full-page letter addressed to "Dear Hiring Manager" has nowhere to go in that pack.
In-house recruiters are slightly different. If the person who approached you works for the employer itself, your CV usually goes into the company's applicant system, and some of those systems have a cover letter field. Ask one plain question: "Do you need anything besides the CV?" Most will say no.
What the note is for
The email that carries your CV is a working document. The recruiter is about to argue your case to a client who has never heard of you, and they will do it from three sources: your CV, their memory of your call, and whatever you wrote down. Memory is the weakest of the three. A recruiter running several briefs at once talks to a lot of people in a week, and details blur.
Your note fixes the facts in writing. It also tells the recruiter what a CV cannot: when you could start, what you would move for, what you would not accept. Without those, they either guess or come back with questions, and both slow you down.
Write the note as if the recruiter will paste parts of it into their own email to the client. Many of them will.
Reply to the recruiter with your CV: five things the note carries
Fit to the brief, in two or three lines
Not your career story. Pick the two or three requirements the recruiter stressed on the call and match each to something specific you have done. If the client needs someone who has run a warehouse system migration and managed a large shift workforce, say that you have done both, where, and at what scale. Use the client's wording where it is honest to do so.
This is the part most likely to be reused, so each line has to stand on its own.
Availability and notice
State your notice period as it stands in your contract, and whether you think it is negotiable. Mention anything that affects interview scheduling: a booked holiday, a project deadline, the fact that you can only take calls before nine or after five. Calendar surprises cost candidates more interviews than weak CVs do, in my experience.
A salary range
Give your current package and the range you would move for, with the components separated: base, bonus, and anything significant such as a car allowance or equity. With a recruiter this is not the delicate question it is in an application letter, a debate covered in "Should You Include Salary Expectations in a Cover Letter?". The recruiter needs the figure to check you against the client's budget before putting you forward, and an agency fee is generally linked to the salary you are hired on, so they gain nothing by pushing you down.
What you want from a move
One or two honest sentences. Bigger scope, a different sector, less travel, a route into management, a hybrid pattern you need to keep. This helps the recruiter twice. It hands them the answer to the client's inevitable "why would this person leave?", and it lets them rule the role out early if it cannot deliver what you are after. A no at this stage is cheap. A no after three interviews is not.
Anything they must know before presenting you
This is the section people skip, and the one that causes real damage.
- Prior contact with the client. If you applied to that company in the last year or so, or another agency has already sent your CV there, say so. Duplicate submissions create disputes over who represents you, and some employers respond by dropping the candidate.
- Restrictions. A non-compete clause, a visa or work permit condition, a relocation you cannot make.
- Other processes. If you are at final stage elsewhere, the recruiter needs to know the clock is running.
- Confidentiality. Name anyone who must not hear about your search, and state that your CV goes to this client for this role only, with your agreement needed for any other.
An example note
Here is the whole thing for an imaginary logistics manager. It runs to about 140 words.
Hi Dana, thanks for the call this morning. CV attached, and yes, please put me forward to your client in Leeds for the Head of Logistics role, this role only.
>
Fit: I have run two warehouse management system migrations (2021 and 2024), the second across three sites. I manage 85 people on shifts. I have held an operating budget of similar size since 2022.
>
Notice: three months, probably negotiable to two. Away 14 to 21 November.
>
Package: 68k base, 10 percent bonus, car allowance. I would move for 78k to 85k base.
>
Why move: I want multi-site responsibility, which my current employer cannot offer.
>
To know: I applied to this group in 2023 for a different role and was not interviewed. No non-compete. Please do not contact my current employer.
>
Best, Sam
No paragraph about being excited. No adjectives. Everything in it is a fact someone will need.
How the recruiter reuses it
Once your CV and note arrive, the recruiter typically writes a short profile of you for the client. Your fit lines often open that profile, sometimes almost word for word. Notice and salary sit near the top, because those are the first things a client asks. Your reason for moving becomes the answer to the motivation question.
Two consequences follow. First, write sentences that survive being lifted out of context: "I manage 85 people" works, "as discussed, the team thing" does not. Second, keep anything you would not want the client to read out of the reusable parts. Private context goes on its own line, marked "for you only". How search firms run the rest of the process is the subject of "How headhunters work - and how to get on their radar".
Check, too, that the CV you attach agrees with the note. If your LinkedIn profile is current but your CV is three years old, a tool such as Postulit can turn the profile into an up-to-date CV, so the titles and dates match what the recruiter already saw.
When the company asks for a proper letter later
Sometimes the client does want one. It tends to happen in a few recognisable situations:
- Public sector bodies, universities and charities, where a supporting statement against the person specification is part of the formal process, whoever introduced you.
- Senior and board-level searches, where shortlisted candidates may be asked for a statement of interest or a short paper on how they would approach the role.
- Employers whose system demands a formal application before an offer can be issued, so you are asked to "apply" late in the process.
- A hiring manager who simply likes letters.
When this happens you are far better placed than a cold applicant. You know the brief, you have probably met the people, and the recruiter can tell you what worries the client. Ask who reads the letter, what length they expect, and which doubt it should settle. Then write to that reader, addressed directly to the employer, with your fit lines as the backbone.
What to do today
If a recruiter is waiting for your CV right now, do not draft a letter. Open the email, write five short labelled blocks (fit, notice, package, why move, to know), attach the CV, and state which role and which client you agree to be presented for. Read it once as if you were the client seeing those lines pasted into a profile. If every sentence still makes sense on its own, send it.