> I'm an average software engineer in Western Europe. When I was junior (around 2010-2015) I usually got a job after submitting ~3 job applications Your situat

> I'm an average software engineer in Western Europe. When I was junior (around 2010-2015) I usually got a job after submitting ~3 job applications Your situation is actually very rare unless you are accepting bottom of the barrel offers or very well connected landing quick offers. I am also from West Europe and for me with a decade of experience it still takes 30-45+ applications because most companies(except boring ones) do not publish a salary range and doesn’t share anything until the last stage, when I realize that what they are offering is garbage. On most applications, they also ask for expectations and some just outright ghost you after or simply hope that post interview they might be able to find some “shallow experience on this specific tech we use” so I might be willing to “take a bit of cut to work with their wonderful team..”. Also typically every interview process is loooong, on average a complete process takes 4 weeks to 2 months. Also, some one are out right stupid and start asking me about if am open/passionate about focusing on the work instead of “counting hours and going home”(ELI5: they want unpaid off record overtime). So shifting through many garbages to find the one(or two) golden ones is a good effort.