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I'm helping my stepdaughter write a cover letter and we are at odds as to whether this sentence is structurally and grammatically correct.

My experience in customer service qualifies me for this position and have attached my resume for your review.

I've run it through a number of grammar checkers online, but I'd love some "human" input.

Mari-Lou A
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KarenG
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    Proofreading is off topic--is there a specific part you're confused about? –  Feb 03 '13 at 18:23
  • What's the subject of 'have'? Is it in the sentence already? – Mitch Feb 03 '13 at 18:34
  • The confusion and disagreement is about the subject/verb agreement. My line of thought agrees with the first answer below, but since it was run through a grammar checker and no errors appeared, I want to be able to back up my explanation of sentence structure to her. – KarenG Feb 03 '13 at 18:37
  • @KarenG Please add information on what you and your stepdaughter think it should be and why/why not. – coleopterist Feb 03 '13 at 18:38
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    My stepdaughter and husband feel the sentence is correct as written. I believe it should read, "My experience in customer service qualifies me for this position, and I have attached my resume for your review." – KarenG Feb 03 '13 at 18:41
  • If it feels better with the optional stuff added in, then it is better with the optional stuff added in. As it's currently written, the rule of Conjunction Reduction appears to have deleted the subject of have, which is clearly intended to be I; however, conjunction reduction only works for repeated parallel constituents (i.e, both are subjects), and the coreferential me in qualify me is an object, not a subject; and the my in my experience is a modifier, not an object. So it's ungrammatical. – John Lawler Feb 03 '13 at 19:59
  • This is just my opinion, but I feel it would be better off as two sentences. Also I would write résumé, because in my head resume is not the same as résumé. Again, just my opition. – Mr Lister Feb 03 '13 at 20:21
  • I wouldn't spell it résumé unless I spoke French, where both E's have acute accent. As an English word, a single accent, on the end only, is significant to distinguish one word from another. As recounted here. – John Lawler Feb 03 '13 at 22:09
  • @JohnLawler Ehm, Oxford says BE only has résumé while AE allows both resume and résumé. No mention of resumé. – Mr Lister Feb 04 '13 at 08:26
  • @MrLister: It's all laid out in the link. You pays your money and you takes your choice. – John Lawler Feb 04 '13 at 14:33
  • @JohnLawler I did! I did click the link! And the first thing I saw was, "We communicate you." That didn't inspire much confidence to start with... – Mr Lister Feb 04 '13 at 15:58

2 Answers2

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This should be a compound sentence, so put a comma after "position" and a subject "I" before "have". Then you will be fine.

Patrick T. Randolph
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The sentence

My experience in customer service qualifies me for this position and have attached my resume for your review.

is imbalanced.

An example of another imbalanced/illogical sentence,

My chair is broken and have attached a description for the returns department to read.

To see why the sentences are imbalanced or illogical you would de-factorise the sentences. This is what I mean by factorization:

(a X b) + (a X c) => a X (b + c)

Therefore, de-factorization would be

a X (b + c) => (a X b) + (a X c)

Let's defactorize the sentence ..

My chair is broken and have attached a description =>

My chair {is broken}
and
my chair {have attached a description}

Hence, the sentence is imbalanced and illogical because

My experience in customer service qualifies me for this position
and have attached my resume for your review. =>

{My experience in customer service} {qualifies me for this position}
and
{My experience in customer service} {have attached my resume for your review}.

Therefore, to be logical, you need to write

My experience in customer service qualifies me for this position and I have attached my resume for your review.

In effect, we have removed any factorization in the sentence ...

{a X b} + {d X c} rather than (a X b) + (a X c)

Dilute self-patronage

However, being customer service as it is, you might wish to dilute any self-patronage. Being affirmative without patronising oneself, you should imply "here is my extensive experience, from which you should conclude that I qualify for the position" rather than crudely making a direct implication "here are my extensive experiences which qualify me for the job".

I have extensive experience in customer service. From the experience in customer service I have listed in my resume, I believe you would find me appropriately and adequately qualified for this position. I have attached my resume for you review.

However, employment of the subjunctive is hazardous because it projects a mood of uncertainty. It would depend on the cultural atmosphere of the organisation of that position. It should play well to small town modesty, or to be the manager of the neighbourhood Burger King. To sound more affirmative, when applying to a self-affirmative-loving metropolitan, or to a major position in a large corporate entity,

I have extensive experience in customer service which I have listed in my resume. I believe and hope you will find me appropriately and adequately qualified for this position by reviewing my experience I have listed in my resume. I am attaching my resume for your review.

Blessed Geek
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  • Blessed Geek (and everyone else who took the time to comment or answer) - thank you for confirming my suspicions that the quoted sentence was not grammatically correct. As a side note, I also agree that the statement sentence is sub-optimal; however, I've been accused of having overly high expectations regarding the content and context of business correspondence. I am not optimistic about the language skills of future generations in light of the changes in early educational protocols of late, but it is websites like this that keep me from losing all hope. – KarenG Feb 04 '13 at 04:11