Job Search Strategy
Job Search Strategy is a public community on OnJob. Tactics for running a job search that actually converts - where to apply, how often to follow up, and how to read a job description.
What are people discussing in Job Search Strategy?
- Ananya Iyer
Track your applications somewhere you will actually look
A spreadsheet with five columns is enough: company, role, date applied, source, and status. The value is not the record keeping. It is that after four weeks you can see which sour…
- Rahul Verma
A job search generates far more rejection per week than most jobs do per year, and it arrives without explanation
Two things help. First, decide in advance how many applications constitute a week's work, so that a bad outcome does not turn into working every evening. Second, separate the part…
- Ananya Iyer
Cover letters matter in about a third of applications, and you usually cannot tell which third
The workable compromise is a short one - four or five sentences - that says why this company, why this role, and what you would bring to the specific problem the posting describes…
- Vikram Singh
Networking works badly when it is framed as networking and well when it is framed as interest
Ask someone about the thing they actually do - how their team handles releases, what changed after their last migration, what they would build differently. People answer that. A m…
- Vikram Singh
Welcome to Job Search Strategy
This space is for the mechanics of finding work: which roles to target, how many applications is the right number, when to follow up, and how to tell a serious posting from a plac…
- Sandeep Rao
Apply one band up as well as at your level, and be honest about both
The band above is where posted requirements are least literal, and teams routinely hire someone slightly below the description if the trajectory is right. What does not work is ap…
- Karthik Reddy
Research pay before the first conversation, not after the offer
Look at posted ranges for the same title, same seniority, same city, from several companies. Then decide two numbers: what you would accept, and what you would decline. Having bot…
- Rahul Verma
On following up: one message, five to seven working days after applying, addressed to a person if you can find one
Keep it to three sentences - which role, one line on why you fit it, and a direct question about timelines. Do not resend your whole cover letter. If there is no reply to the foll…
- Arjun Mehta
How to ask for a referral without it being awkward: give the person everything they need to say yes in one message
That means the specific role link, two lines on why you fit it, and an explicit out - "no problem at all if you would rather not". What you are asking for is thirty seconds of the…
- Pooja Desai
How to read a job description quickly
Requirements listed as "must have" with a number of years attached are usually real. Long lists of nice-to-have technologies usually are not - they are the team describing their w…
- Vikram Singh
Half of a job search is applying. The other half is being findable when someone is looking
That means your profile headline says what you do rather than where you work, your skills list contains the words a recruiter would actually search for, and your last two roles ha…
- Sneha Kulkarni
Some postings never intended to hire from the open pool
Signs: the same role reposted every few weeks unchanged, a description that reads as a copy of a job you have seen elsewhere, or a requirement list assembled to match one specific…
- Vikram Singh
Where you apply changes your odds more than most people expect
A posting on a large aggregator has been seen by thousands. The same role on the company's own careers page has been seen by far fewer, and often lands in the applicant system mor…
- Sandeep Rao
Hiring is seasonal in most markets. Budgets reset, teams plan, and postings cluster in the weeks after those cycles
The practical takeaway is not to wait for a good month. It is to expect quiet stretches - late in the year, around major holidays - and not read them as evidence about you. If you…
- Ananya Iyer
A pattern worth knowing: applying to 200 roles rarely beats applying to 30 well
Volume applications are usually generic, and generic applications are the first thing a recruiter filters out. A smaller list where you have read the description properly, matched…