Your Personal Statement has the power to bring your entire residency application together. Currently, it is the most key document which brings you closest to residency Program Directors and Interview Committees.

However, the Personal Statement also has the ability to cause major damage to your application as well if it is underestimated or poorly written. There are any number of mistakes that can hurt your Personal Statement, just a few are:

• Generic Statement: Applying with one, generic Personal Statement communicates a lack of passion and interest in the specialty.
• Cliche or Lack of Originality: Program Directors and Interview Committees read through thousands of Personal Statements and see the same content repeatedly. Using the same tired anecdotes or motivations will not help you stand out from the crowd.
• Typos: Typos can be grammatical errors, misspelling or formatting issues.

Letters of Recommendation are yet another part of the application that can throw up red flags if not approached with care and dedication. Depending on your amount of clinical experience, it may be difficult to obtain the strongest Letters of Recommendation. Some examples of Letters of Recommendation red flags are:

• Waived vs. Unwaived: In general, residency applicants will want to have their Letter Writers submit the Letters of Recommendation for them. Regardless of your personal circumstances, unwaived letters tell programs you are not confident in the content of the letter.
• Late Letters: Anyone who has ever asked for a Letter of Recommendation knows it can be very difficult to obtain these letters on time. Doctors are busy people and may struggle to write quality letters in time to submit them before applications begin. However, applying with letters that arrive later run the risk of seeming disorganized.
• Generic:Much like Personal Statements, Letters of Recommendation should be specialty-specific whenever possible. Generic LoRs communicate a lack of passion in the field and a lack of effort.

Yet another component of the overall ERAS® Application that often gets overlooked is the MyERAS Common Application. Some red flags that can occur within the MyERAS Common Application are:

• Certifying too soon: The absolute, number one mistake any residency applicant can make is certifying their MyERAS Application before completion. Residency applicants can begin certifying their application once applying begins, but remember, after certification the application is set in stone.
• Errors, Typos or Incomplete sections: As with any of the written elements in the ERAS® Residency Application, you will want to proofread your MyERAS Application carefully. Note, there is no spellchecker, so you may want to consider copying and pasting your answers into another document that has a spellchecker.
• Dishonesty: It is important to only tell the truth in your MyERAS Application. Claiming you were the head author of a case study or article when you only helped a little can be easily caught and will look incredibly bad to Program Directors.

• For one reason or another, residency candidates may struggle to obtain a component of their ERAS® application.Typical examples of this are:
• The MSPE
• Transcripts
• Photograph
• PTAL (for CA Programs Only)
• Regardless of your personal circumstances, incomplete residency applications communicate to residency programs that you are not willing to try and complete such an important part of the process.