I’m in tech; senior level. But I’ve been looking for work for over 3 years. I’ve been getting advice/tips/tricks from other people, but nothing has worked so far. These are things I’ve tried:
- Blindly applying for a job through the job form
- Working with a recruiter to get me a position.
- Asking to chat with someone on a team with an open position.
- Asking to chat with someone on a team with NO positions.
- Working to establish myself as an expert on social media.
- Asking friends if their company is hiring.
- “Slow networking” (not asking for a job directly, but trying VERY hard to be patient and get to know someone first)
- Fast networking…taking the direct “hey, you hiring?” approach.
- Lynchpin networking (connecting people w/ other people)
- Giving talks at conferences
- Guerrilla tech support (providing my 2 cents on a post even if no one was asking for it).
- open source contributions
- Temp agencies
- state jobs
- looking for “hiring” tags on social media.
- connecting with high-profile people and asking if they need help.
- developing a complete MVP that would help someone (yet I couldn’t quite market effectively).
- Leveraging previous employers to see if they have anything new.
- Offering “low hanging fruit” gigs on social media.
- Putting my resume on job boards.
- Getting a role well below my pay grade and working my way up (if I try this I get automatically disqualified for being too overqualified).
- Providing free consultation to businesses.
- Hosting a podcast interview with someone from a company.
- Writing a guest post for an article (I’ve kind of done this, I think).
Edit:
- I’ve also had my resume, LinkedIn profile, and other social media, looked over by professionals and nonprofessionals alike. I’ve even gotten coaching. I’ve probably gotten more coaching than interviews at this point.
Another edit:
- The only think that’s worked lately (as terrible as it sounds) is groveling and telling people the severity of my situation. And that’s just gotten me very very small dead-end projects in someone’s back pocket. I’m definitely trying to leverage these as best I can.
Any other strategies people have found that works? How did you get your job? I’m running out of ideas.
It sounds like if you’re trying all of this and it’s still not working, something about the way you’re selling yourself isn’t working. Have you tried changing your resume to better match different job descriptions? Try having someone give you feedback on the way you interview. Are you coming on too strong? Maybe you dont have enough specific examples in your answers or too many specifics and not enough leadership/direction. I would also use LinkedIn if you’re not already
Yeah custom tailor your resume for every role you apply to.
The hiring manager sees you have 4 years of java and 2 years of C++ for a role using Vue and typescript? Garbage.
Saying you have experience in Java, C++, Vue and typescript? No
“I have this experience which matches or exceeds the posted qualifications”.