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Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

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Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#101

Post by SCUSKU »

I was laid off in August 2022, and it took me 6 months to find a new job. I was able to land a decent number of interviews but I interviewed poorly and didn't get any offers. Doing interview prep actually helped a lot -- now having been on the other side it is very apparent when someone hasn't prepared and practiced interviewing. It really is a skill in and of itself.

I found my current job through the January HN Who's Hiring post. This company doesn't post anywhere except HN. Would definitely recommend that since the August post is coming out soon! This experience inspired me to build a tool that uses AI to match your resume to the best matching jobs: https://hnresumetojobs.com/

Give it a try, maybe it'll help you! Best of luck, it truly is a grind and is emotionally taxing -- but you WILL find something soon.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#102

Post by imafish »

Ilasky wrote: post #2

I've had similar issues - so much so that I've created Resgen[0] just because it was tough getting call backs. It turns out I really needed to tailor my resume to each job and it resulted in a lot more call backs. [0] https://resgen.app

I like the idea of ResGen. But I think you should consider changing your pricing.

10 free resumes per month seems too generous. Also, $7 is very low for a paid plan, when your users are likely to churn as soon as they find a job. If this tool is really as valuable for job hunters as it aims to be, they should gladly pay three times that amount.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#103

Post by frant-hartm »

Traubenfuchs wrote: post #71

Have you considered moving to Europe? Germany, Switzerland, Austria? With my senior salary and depending on frugality I can save between 1000 and 2000 € a month in Austria and have a very pleasant life. If you ask if there is gonna be leetcode bullshit in the interviews, most people laugh in your face because the idea is so alien to us. People want to hear about your authentic experiences and see you solve real world…

> I can save between 1000 and 2000 € a year in Austria

You mean a month, right? Or you forgot one zero, or something is wrong.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#104

Post by iExploder »

ItsBob wrote: post #85

I thought I'd add a data point to this discussion. I'm in the UK and the traditional dev/tech job route was via something like JobServe, Indeed etc., where you see a role advertised via an employment agency and you send your CV hoping for a callback. I'm in a stable contract so I'm not looking but two weeks ago, I was contacted by two agents, one day apart, both unrelated to one another, completely out of the blue. T…

as a rule of thumb I ignore all UK agents, they have the attention span of a coked up butterfly. from my experience they try extract as much information out of you (your salary, last company, are they hiring, give me phone number to their manager or hr) and never call even if they scheduled a call. they never update you if the role you applied for have been filled in meantime, you simply get ghosted and your email gets spammed with offers.

I would suggest to email directly to a company hr or apply directly through company's job portal. Apply to companies that don't advertise on linkedin or similar portals. This is how I got essentially all of my jobs and this is how I get leads even now.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#105

Post by stonks »

physicsguy wrote: post #91

Things that disqualify CVs straight away for us: * Unclear if have right to work in country. This needs to be stated up front! Our company can't sponsor visas, so if based in another country unless it says something about the visa status, we basically have to throw it away. * Poor grammar, spelling, attention to detail on CV. I get some CVs through that are almost unreadable. I'm not saying if there's a single typo t…

Why working in crypto exchanges would show poor judgment? There are still technical problems to solve.

I knew a principal engineer who heavily disliked blockchain because it uses a lot of energy for proof of work, but with proof of stake this should be better now.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#106

Post by physicsguy »

Tao3300 wrote: post #95
physicsguy wrote: post #91

Things that disqualify CVs straight away for us: * Unclear if have right to work in country. This needs to be stated up front! Our company can't sponsor visas, so if based in another country unless it says something about the visa status, we basically have to throw it away. * Poor grammar, spelling, attention to detail on CV. I get some CVs through that are almost unreadable. I'm not saying if there's a single typo t…

> Big gaps in employment Really curious what you suggest as a remedy for this one. It seems to boil down to "sorry, you're screwed now" or "lie but don't get caught"

If you've got 300 CVs to review, much of them with similar experience, do you interview the people who've had 2 years off, or the people that haven't?

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#107

Post by expertentipp »

Bots and scams. Housing, dating, job search - these three have become hopeless "marketplaces", hopefully we are at the tipping point and they will collapse. I compile Latex CV for every job application and make an extra effort to apply directly to the company. Every time they have direct one to one communication with an experienced professional with relevant education, and they... insist on digging into inconsistencies and gaps in the CV, search for fraud on my side, ask for salary upfront (ie. "we want cheap" or they simply probe the market for salaries). The market is bad, you have bad luck, the shit's fucked.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#108

Post by jacknews »

rahimnathwani wrote: post #14

I'm curious: when you say you've 'been applying constantly', how many jobs have you applied for? Assuming the number of available roles isn't a limiting factor, you probably applied for ~1000+ jobs in that time. (1 job per hour * 40 hours/week * 4.3 weeks per month * 7 months) Is that right? If so, where have you had drop off in your funnel? Are you getting dropped before or after the recruiter screening call? If aft…

That seems unrealistic unless you're just scattering applicaitons.

By the time you've filtered out suitable jobs, researched the company a little, written a cover letter, customized your CV, gone through their application process/questions, sometimes even a test, you're looking at 3-4 a day quality applications at most.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#109

Post by Traubenfuchs »

frant-hartm wrote: post #103
Traubenfuchs wrote: post #71

Have you considered moving to Europe? Germany, Switzerland, Austria? With my senior salary and depending on frugality I can save between 1000 and 2000 € a month in Austria and have a very pleasant life. If you ask if there is gonna be leetcode bullshit in the interviews, most people laugh in your face because the idea is so alien to us. People want to hear about your authentic experiences and see you solve real world…

> I can save between 1000 and 2000 € a year in Austria You mean a month, right? Or you forgot one zero, or something is wrong.

Hahaha, yes. Oops.

Re: Ask HN: Is the market bad, or am I having the worst luck job hunting?

#110

Post by iExploder »

how its suppose to be done and how it worked for me in past in order of the most effective to least:

1. social circle 2. attend conferences, exchange business cards, contact info 3. apply to companies through their own job portal or direct hr email 4. don't go for shiny companies (either location or business must suck, less competition this way)

anything else such as random recruiter agencies, linkedin, job portals is not going to yield any effect in this day and age. there is just too much saturation and bots + we are in a layoff cycle and AI uncertainty.

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