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I've been casually job hunting for a couple months since rounds of layoffs started at my company. I've applied to umpteen places and haven't had a single callb
by donatj 1y ago
I've been casually job hunting for a couple months since rounds of layoffs started at my company.
I've applied to umpteen places and haven't had a single callback. In my twenty+ years working as a dev, this is the worst I've seen it since about 2005.
- khernandezrt 1y agoI’m in the same boat. I’ve been employed since 2019, got laid off 3 weeks ago. I’ve applied to over 70 jobs and not a single has replied other than to reject me. This is brutal.
- abnercoimbre 1y agoI'm sorry to hear that. I have close friends who are brilliant (and seniors) but spent 6-8 months finding a new job. Plan accordingly.
- sqircles 1y agoThe thing that seemed to work best for me was reaching out to dev shops in my area and starting a conversation even if they didn't have a position posted. Go to meetups and talk to people, join their discord, etc... and job fairs, as lame as they seem, produced contacts for me that are still reaching out "just in case" even though I found a position eventually. What's old is new again. Get those soft skills warmed up and go out and shake hands.
- Smeevy 1y agoI completely agree with you. All the best jobs I've had have come from personal relationships.
- saguntum 1y agoJob fairs are super underrated. When my spouse and I were a bit in flux years back for where we were going to live long-term, we ended up living in the city where we met which is very much not a tech hub - only a few big companies that hire engineers - despite spouse applying to various places in SF, Denver, and Seattle. He landed the local job first by going to a career fair that I randomly discovered on Twitter. Affected the whole trajectory of our life.
- sqircles 1y agoI believe they're the current "cheat code" to the hiring process. If you get called up for an interview after talking to a company at a career fair, there's a good inclination that you have already passed or at least have a leg up on the "culture fit" part of the interview. With hundreds to thousands of people spamming every job posting under the sun the second it is posted, just getting your credentials read by a human is a major barrier right now that career fairs help alleviate.
- ethbr1 1y agoBelated reply for posterity: another cheat code for job fairs is pre-researching the companies there. Typically, attending companies are listed (or you can ask an organizer for a list). Do some quick searching and type up a summary. Company name. What they do. 1-2 questions. Emphasis on companies you've never heard of! You'd be amazed how many doors open when you walk up to a recruiter for a small, specialized company and know exactly who they are and what market they're in. (Remember: that poor person has probably spent all day explaining that to everyone else)
- jurking_hoff 1y ago[dead]
- tennisflyi 1y agoGood luck. Reddit job hunting(?) sub has it pegged at ~400 applications, IIRC
- danans 1y agoI'd caution from reading too much into numbers like this. 400 applications is borderline spamming, putting quantity over quality, which employers would notice. It can be far fewer if you have a focus/specialty and specific industries that you target. No doubt though, it's a slog right now. My recent process was around 10 applications - which became 3 interviews - and the last 2 were offers, one that came via a recruiter. Even this is a marked increase in difficulty vs 4 years ago.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- xboxnolifes 1y agoI have sent out 1200 applications with a roughly 15% response rate. Of those 15%, ~85% were instant rejections.
- lovich 1y agoIt would be difficult for employers to notice since they are also spamming job postings en masse
- yetihehe 1y agoAnd after auto-rejecting one hundred people because of faulty filters they say "Why are there no good candidates?".
- Ferret7446 1y agoIt is definitely a MAD arms race. Bad actors on both sides force everyone to aggressively spam/filter
- saelthavron 1y agoBeing deliberate hasn't helped me. Hell, I've learned quite a bit about this one company. In my last interview, I asked a question that surprised the interviewers. It was about something they had yet to start work on which came up in another interview for a different position which I had already been rejected for. They still rejected me. At this point, I'm guessing I'm black-balled.
- sqircles 1y agoRecently went on the market after my employer of 16 years went to shit. Got lucky with a hybrid gig that is really WFH 98% of the time after 120 applications and 26 interviews spread out over 15 companies. It was a roller coaster that I do not recommend.
- ulfw 1y agoThere are no jobs. I've done this for two years now. Bunch of bullshit job ads or referrals to jobs that turn out never got approved internally. Tech hiring is gone, especially in non-direct-engineering roles such as Product, Design, Project/Program Mgmt etc
- forducks 1y agoLaid off from tech and out of work for two years. Thousands of applications. Ran out of contacts, luck, savings, patience, everything. I start my retail career next week earning $12/hr. I can't even provide for my own rent and utilities anymore, even after moving. I almost can't believe it's come to this, sometimes. But another part of me says that's just ego talking, and anyways plenty of others are also desperate for any and all scraps to feed themselves. Problems like mine aren't difficult to come by.
- hackernoops 1y ago[dead]
- mathiaspoint 1y agoI was laid off recently but I typically keep applying even while I'm employed since I don't think of employment as stable. It seems better now than it was two years ago.