Turn rough notes into polished recommendation letters in seconds
Input who you're recommending, your relationship, their qualities, and a few rough bullet points. Get 3 letter versions (narrative, structured, concise) calibrated to the formality level and context. Each version highlights placeholders to personalize, power phrases to keep, and refinement options to dial in the tone.
Ghost Writer solves one of the most procrastinated writing tasks: recommendation letters. It takes your rough knowledge of someone and produces polished letters that sound like YOU wrote them thoughtfully, with specific anecdotes and persuasive structure that actually moves reviewers.
Scenario: Your direct report Sarah is applying for a Senior PM role at Google. You've managed her for 2 years. She led the Q3 launch, mentored junior team members, and is exceptionally good at stakeholder communication.
What you do: Enter Sarah's name, your relationship, the role, select Leadership + Communication + Initiative, add bullet points about the Q3 launch and mentoring.
Result: Ghost Writer generates 3 versions: a narrative letter opening with the Q3 launch story, a structured letter with sections on leadership/communication/initiative, and a concise LinkedIn recommendation. Each highlights [BRACKETS] where you should add specific details only you'd know.
Strong letters make one clear claim about the person, prove it with two or three specific stories, and state the stakes ('I would hire them again without hesitation'). Weak letters list adjectives. GhostWriter drafts the letter from what you tell it about the person, the role, and your relationship — structured the way selection committees actually read.
It's more common than anyone admits — write the honest strong version, not the modest one, because your recommender chose delegation over drafting and will happily sign genuine strengths. Give the tool your real accomplishments and relationship context, and it writes in a credible third-person voice that doesn't sound like you praising yourself.
Specificity and stakes. 'Maria is hardworking' does nothing; 'Maria rebuilt our reporting pipeline in a quarter, and I've trusted her with every ambiguous project since' does everything. One vivid, verifiable story outweighs five adjectives — the drafts are built around extracting those stories from you.
One page — three to five paragraphs. Committees skim; a tight page that leads with the strongest claim beats two pages of throat-clearing. Academic letters run slightly longer by convention, and the tool adjusts length and register for academic, professional, or character references.
You should, if you can't write a genuinely positive one — a lukewarm letter damages the candidate more than a polite no. 'I don't think I'm the strongest advocate for this — you deserve someone who can speak to your recent work' is a kindness. If you're on the fence, drafting with the tool sometimes reveals you have more to say than you thought.