Finding good people is so hard, y'all. Lord have mercy. - Derrick

Letters of recc aren't great anyway-talking to people lets you hear them hesitate as they search for ways to describe someone. IMO, of course - ellbeecee

Letters are good for people who express themselves better with a little time to think about it. We actually have to have both phone calls and a follow-up letter for references. We tell the person we're required to have a letter in the file (HR rules, yay!), so they can take notes while we talk and basically write to answer the same questions we asked in the call. Sometimes people have really great info to add after the call. - kaijsa

This is a thing that I've long wanted to talk to our admissions staff about; as a rule, prospective students' employers outside academia write TOTAL CRAP ref letters, which then damage the applicant even though it's not the applicant's fault. - RepoRat

I will say that amongst other members of the search committee, we had our top favorites and the letters didn't really do much to sway or influence us. Moving along to the next stage. - Derrick

that's because, outside academia, reference *letters* don't usually happen. i can only get such letters now because i work in academia and they actually know what i'm talking about. - henry