Applicant Experience

When adding a Recommender via the 'Add Recommender' widget in the Slate-hosted application, the applicant will have the option to add a custom message to the recommender:

Recommender Experience

Any text that an applicant enters can be merged into the automatic system mailing that notifies the recommender of the recommendation request using the merge field 'personal_message.' The text will also appear at the top of the recommendation form the recommender is requested to complete:

Configure System Email (Optional)

If the custom message is enabled in the application, the automatic system email will need liquid markup to account for applicants who may not wish to include a personal message. For information on liquid markup, please review Liquid Markup & Conditional Logic.

Note: This example includes two single-quote characters immediately before the second % character. While it looks like a double-quote character, it is in fact, two single-quotes characters together (actually an empty string surrounded by single quotes). If desired, you can copy the following code to paste into your message:

{% if {{personal_message}} != null and {{personal_message}} != ''%} 
Personal Message from {{first}}:

{{personal_message}}|{% endif %}