Job Search Strategy
Your job search runs on hunches. Here’s the data.
Most career advice is built on what usually works. Here are the four numbers I check before I tell anyone what to change, and how to pull every one of them yourself.
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Full episode transcript
Pip: Angela Malagon spent 15+ years recruiting talent for companies such as Cisco, Google, and Wells Fargo. Then she job searched against the same systems. This episode is about the habit that taught her: checking the numbers before changing anything.
Mara: The post opens with the advice everybody has heard. Apply to more jobs. Tailor every resume. Network more. Fix your LinkedIn. Her point is that some of it is right, and none of it tells you which one your search actually needs.
Pip: That’s the line she draws between advice and strategy. Advice is what usually works. Strategy is what’s working right now, in your market, for the role you want.
The four numbers
Mara: Number one is market demand. Search your exact target title in your location on two major job boards and count what’s been posted in the last thirty days. Note who’s hiring and how much of it is remote.
Pip: And if you only find a handful, the post is blunt about it. Your resume isn’t the first problem. Your target is.
Mara: Number two is posting language. Pull ten recent postings, list the skills and requirements that show up in most of them, then read the top third of your resume against that list.
Pip: Anything missing is something the ATS search and the recruiter can’t find, no matter how good you are at it.
Mara: Number three is posted pay. A growing number of states and cities now require pay ranges in the posting, and those ranges show what companies actually budget. That’s more reliable than any salary estimate site.
Pip: And when the salary question comes, she says give a range with your target at the bottom, not a single number.
Mara: Number four is your own funnel. Applications, responses, recruiter screens, interviews, offers. Five numbers you can pull together in an afternoon.
Reading the drop-off
Pip: This is the part most people skip. Where the numbers fall off tells you which stage is breaking.
Mara: Lots of applications and almost no responses points at the resume or the targeting. Responses but screens that go nowhere points at the recruiter call: the pitch, how you explain a layoff, or a salary number that took you out of range before anyone said so.
Pip: Interviews without offers is the interview itself, and really, what gets said about you in the debrief after you leave the room. Offers that come in low is negotiation, and posted pay is your leverage.
Mara: The post sums it up in one line. Your search isn’t broken everywhere. It’s breaking somewhere specific.
Pip: Rewriting your resume won’t fix an interview problem. Interview practice won’t fix a market with no openings. Find the stage where the numbers drop, fix that one, and leave the rest alone until the data says otherwise.
Angela Malagon · Career Strategist. 15+ years recruiting talent for companies such as Cisco, Google, and Wells Fargo, then job searched against the same systems.
Apply to more jobs. Tailor every resume. Network more. Update your LinkedIn. You’ve heard all of it, and some of it is even right. None of it tells you which one your search actually needs.
That’s the gap between advice and strategy. Advice is what usually works. Strategy is what’s working right now, in your market, for the role you want. I wrote a whole page on what a career strategist actually does, but the short version is this: I don’t tell anyone what to change until I’ve looked at the numbers.
You can pull every one of them yourself. Here’s how.
The four numbers
- Market demand. Search your exact target title in your location on two major job boards and count what’s been posted in the last 30 days. Note which companies are hiring and how much of it is remote versus on-site. If you’re finding a handful of postings, your resume isn’t the first problem. Your target is. You go wider on titles, wider on geography, or somewhere else entirely.
- Posting language. Pull ten recent postings for your target role. List the skills, tools, and requirements that show up in most of them. Now read the top third of your resume. Every one of those terms that’s missing is something the ATS and the recruiter screen can’t find, no matter how good you are at it. That top third is your summary, and somebody is going to summarize you either way.
- Posted pay. A growing number of states and cities now require employers to put pay ranges in the posting. Use them. Those ranges tell you what companies actually budget for the role, which is more reliable than any salary estimate site. When the question comes, give a range with your target at the bottom, not a single number.
- Your own funnel. Track five things: applications sent, responses, recruiter screens, interviews, and offers. Then look for where the numbers fall off.
Effort without data is how strong candidates send hundreds of applications into the same wall and decide the problem is them.
Reading your funnel like a recruiter
Number four is the one most people skip, and it’s the one that tells you where to spend your energy. Each drop-off points at a different stage:
- Lots of applications, almost no responses. That’s your resume or your targeting. Go back to numbers one and two.
- Responses, but screens go nowhere. That’s the recruiter call: your pitch, how you explain a gap or a layoff, or a salary number that took you out of range before anyone said so.
- Interviews, but no offers. That’s the interview, and more specifically what gets said about you in the debrief after you leave the room.
- Offers, but they’re low. That’s negotiation, and number three is your leverage.
Rewriting your resume won’t fix an interview problem. Interview practice won’t fix a market with no openings. The numbers stop you from fixing the wrong thing.
Your search isn’t broken everywhere. It’s breaking somewhere specific.
Find the stage where the numbers drop. Fix that one. Leave the rest alone until the data says otherwise.
Want me to run the numbers with you?
That’s Job Search Strategy, $400. I research your market before we talk, we spend 60 minutes on where your search is breaking and why, and you leave with a 30-day plan built on what the data says, not what usually works. I’ll read your numbers the way the people deciding on you would, because for 15+ years I was one of them.
Send the contact form and you’ll get a personal reply from me within 48 hours. Not a bot, not a template. If you’d rather work through it yourself first, the Job Search Library is free, and the Job Search Tracker is a good place to start logging your applications so the numbers from step four are there when you need them.
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