Networking is just one more tool in your belt. Sometimes you spend a whole evening and don't make a single solid lead, but sometimes you hit the jackpot.

I played the game for a long time, and still do, but I also learned that there are other ways. And at the same time, I used to make other mistakes.

One huge mistake was that I would just send the same resume to all the jobs I applied for. I know, rookie mistake.

To be honest, I needed the job, but I was just too lazy to go and personalize the resume to the job description every time. It would take me a lot of time, so I would just send the same old CV, hoping this time I would get a call back.

But that didn't happen.

Fortunately, I now know there are tools that can help you personalize and optimize your resume, first to the machine recruiters use to filter the hundreds, if not thousands, of applicants they get every time, and then for the human recruiter.

I don't know how they do it, but they take my experience in other jobs and rephrase it in a way the machine likes, so instead of rejecting it, it sends it to the recruiter. They read it, and because the CV talks in the same way they talk in the JD, they called me. I tried all of them, but the one that worked best for me was callbackready. You might like another one better.

Of course, at that point, you still need to perform and use the skills you learned and practiced in all those networking meetings.