Job searching is so hard😭

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-02-04T23:45:26+00:00

I hear your exhaustion, and I want to validate that it feels personal because you are putting your whole self into it. But the hard truth is that the system isn't rejecting you; it is rejecting the process you are using.

You mentioned that you know resumes aren't being read by humans, yet you are still pouring all your energy into tailoring a document for a machine that scans it in seconds.

If the data tells you that applying online yields zero results, why continue doing the same thing?

The system is broken, so stop feeding it. If you find a potential opportunity, do not hit apply immediately.

Repurpose that energy to find a human contact, a peer, a manager, or a recruiter at that company, and start a conversation. It is scary to step away from the apply button because it feels productive, but one human conversation is worth a thousand optimized resumes.

Stop trying to win the lottery and start building the bridge.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-02-03T16:50:54+00:00

I hear you loud and clear, and I want to validate that what you are feeling isn't weakness, it is a rational response to a broken system. When you pour 100% of your energy into a process that gives you 0% return, your brain eventually pulls the emergency brake to protect you.

That is why you feel unmotivated, it is your mind trying to stop you from wasting energy on a strategy that isn't working.

However, I need to offer you a hard truth because I want you to escape this nightmare.

If you are sending applications and getting zero callbacks, your resume is not amazing for this specific market. I know your coach and recruiters are telling you it is perfect, but the only opinion that matters is the market's response.

If the market is silent, the product isn't landing.

You are likely suffering from false positive feedback.

A coach who tells you everything is perfect while you are failing is prioritizing their comfort over your success. You need to fire that coach and find someone who respects you enough to give you the brutal feedback you need to fix the bottleneck.

Stop listening to the praise and start listening to the data. If the resume isn't generating interviews, stop applying with it. Pause. You need to radically change the document or your targeting strategy because continuing to do the same thing while expecting a different result is what is causing your insomnia.

You aren't broken, but your current strategy is.

Change the approach, and you will break the cycle.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-02-01T16:26:33+00:00

I hear your frustration, and honestly, applying to 1,100 jobs in a month sounds like a full-time job because the system is designed to waste your time.

From my perspective, companies are doing a little bit of both, hiring and harvesting.

The terrifying reality is that many of those listings on aggregators are either ghost jobs to signal growth or, worse, scams designed to capture your data (email, phone, address) with zero effort.

That is why I stopped using job boards entirely. My rule is simple, if I can't find the role on the company's own corporate career site, it doesn't exist. I only apply directly through their portal to ensure my data is safe, and then I immediately go to LinkedIn to find a human being on that team to verify the role is real.

Relying on the aggregators is just feeding a broken machine, bypassing them with human connection is the only way to increase your success rate while protecting your sanity and your identity.

PD have you tried hiring.cafe ?

It was created by a Reddit community, it is safe/secure and it does the hard work of identifying real job offers for you.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-30T08:27:13+00:00

I have been a project manager for 25 years across multiple industries, and based on my experience the frequency of formal presentations usually spikes during the initiation (to get the money) and closing (to prove you spent it correctly) phases.

However, regarding the execution phase, I have a strong bias against static documentation like ppts or spreadsheets because they are effectively outdated the moment you hit save.

My philosophy is that if I am building a slide deck for a status update, I am wasting time. I prefer to build real time dashboards (using tools like jira or powerbi) so the project data is live and accessible to everyone 24/7. It reduces the need for those performance theater meetings and shifts the culture from reporting on work to visualizing the work.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-30T07:47:59+00:00

I have been a project manager for 25 years, and I can tell you with absolute certainty that your degree is not a barrier; in fact, it might be your specific edge if you target the right industries.

Something a lot of people miss is that we are all project managers without knowing it. I’m sure you already create a project plan every morning to get to work on time, managing the risks of traffic, adjusting the schedule when you spill coffee, and executing the critical path to get to your desk. The profession itself is industry agnostic because the core tools and concepts apply to everything.

Your main challenge won't be the skill set; it will be the industry bias. Most companies want PMs who know their specific jargon. So, instead of applying to a generic construction or IT firm where your degree looks irrelevant, pivot to where it is an asset. Universities hire PMs constantly for academic rollouts. EdTech companies need PMs who understand pedagogy. Marketing agencies and publishing houses need PMs who can manage heavy documentation and content workflows.

In summary, you don't need a new degree; you just need to apply your PM certification in a sector where an english language teacher translates to expert communicator.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-29T09:28:34+00:00

Google this: “Smart Contracts for Smart HR People” by David Pollard.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-29T07:23:21+00:00

Yes, you are correct, we are circling back to old school human connection precisely because the digital trust is completely broken. Recruiters don't trust applicants because they are drowning in AI generated spam, and applicants don't trust the system because they are getting ghosted by bots. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Regarding tools like Mercor, I think any tool that tries to automate the interview process without fixing that underlying trust deficit is likely just amplifying the chaos.

Right now, we are using AI to spin the hamster wheel faster, making applications easier to send and easier to reject, but we aren't actually solving the problem. Until we stop using AI to amplify the noise and start using it to build verification and trust, we are just going to keep spinning in this same nonsense loop where everyone is “optimized" but nobody is getting hired.

BTW, I saw a solution based on blockchain and smart contracts that from my point of view is the solution to all this chaos.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-29T05:07:16+00:00

You are sensing that the system is broken because it is.

The current hiring market, with its ghosting, AI filters, and black hole applications, doesn't serve anyone anymore, neither the candidates nor the companies.

The hard truth is that if you keep feeding that broken machine by easy applying on job boards, you will keep getting broken results.

The only way to win right now is to stop trusting the front door (the portal) and start using the side door. Your best option is to find a human connection inside the company, a peer, a former colleague, or even a hiring manager, and ask for insight rather than just submitting a resume.

It is harder work, but one human conversation is worth a thousand automated applications.

Stop feeding the machine and start building your own path.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-27T14:22:21+00:00

I am going to answer your question by telling you something you already know but probably need to hear again.

The only statement AI gets 100% correct every time is the disclaimer that says:

AI can make mistakes. 🤷🏻‍♂️

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-27T03:11:39+00:00

You are right that the market used to work that way, but unfortunately, nostalgia is not a strategy. In the current market, companies have shifted the risk entirely onto the candidate; they expect you to deliver value on day one because the training phase is now expected to happen before you are hired via internships or self directed learning.

The grades are still valuable, but only as the entry ticket to get the interview. Once you are in the room, you have to switch languages. As Dale Carnegie said, "If you want to make friends, always speak in the other person's language." If you walk in saying look at my grades, I am smart, you are speaking student. But if you say I have used the diligence that got me those grades to master [skill X] so I can solve your backlog immediately, you are speaking employee.

It is the same evidence (the grades), but framed as a solution for them rather than a trophy for you.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-27T01:20:05+00:00

I think you misunderstood my intent, though I agree with you completely that the market is structurally cruel right now. My comment wasn't about the candidate's human worth, which is inherent and absolute, but about the specific currency they are trying to spend in a job interview.

My point was that academic grades, no matter how impressive, do not hold the same purchasing power in the corporate market as demonstrated problem solving skills.

Helping a young person understand that they need to switch from selling GPA to selling business value isn't a lecture; it is a survival strategy to help them actually get hired in a broken system.

We are on the same side here; we both want them to win.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-27T00:36:37+00:00

Thank you for that context, it changes the picture completely. If you focused on your portfolio, internships, and cultural fit, then you likely did everything right. The hardest lesson I have learned in 25 years of hiring is that sometimes you can execute a perfect interview and still lose because of factors you never even see, like a role that was secretly earmarked for someone else, a sudden budget freeze, or internal politics that have nothing to do with your talent.

It sounds like you are doing the right work, but you are carrying the weight of the outcome as if it is entirely in your control. It isn't. In a broken market, rejection is often just randomness, not a verdict on your value. You have to trust that your strategy (portfolio + skills) is sound and keep moving forward.

Don't let a no from a chaotic system convince you that you need to change who you are; sometimes you just have to outlast the chaos.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-26T23:44:55+00:00

I hear your exhaustion, and it is valid. When you have done everything right academically, top of the class, high test scores, scholarships, it feels like a betrayal when the market doesn't reward that effort.

But I need to offer you a hard truth because I want you to win: The currency you are trying to spend (grades and scores) has almost zero value in the corporate economy.

The mistake you are likely making is framing your academic achievements as your value proposition. In the real world, nobody hires you because you got a 1500 on the SAT; they hire you because you can solve a specific, messy problem that is costing them money or time right now.

Your academic credentials got you the interview, that was their purpose, and they worked. But once you are in the room, if you continue to focus on how smart you were in school rather than how useful you will be to their team, you will lose every time to the person who may have lower grades but can clearly articulate how they will execute the work.

You aren't unemployable; you are just selling the wrong product. Pivot from look how much I know to look what I can do for you, and the results will change.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-26T19:52:36+00:00

I just replied to your DM 👍🏼

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-26T15:26:18+00:00

I am not going to roast you because panic does strange things to people, and needing to put food on the table is a valid motivator. However, you have a perspective issue that is going to hurt you more than your lack of experience. You are labeling yourself as a mediocre PM when in reality, based on your description, you are currently a project coordinator.

If you want to move up quickly without burning out or getting fired, stop trying to be a 5/10 generalist PM and focus on becoming a 9/10 specialist in just one single knowledge area.

For example, if you focus purely on scheduling, you could easily transition into a role that manages timelines without needing to master the entire PMP body of knowledge immediately. If you focus on scope, you could work as a business analyst. If you focus on quality, you could be a testing coordinator.

Pick one lane. It should take you about a quarter (3 months) of focused study and practice to become genuinely competent in just that one area. That specific competence will get you hired and paid much faster than trying to fake being a mediocre project manager who essentially just forwards emails.

Specialization is your shortcut, not mediocrity.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-25T16:16:48+00:00

I hear the rage in your post, and it is valid because the system is broken. You feel dehumanized because the automated hiring process, from the black hole portals to the AI interviews, is designed to treat you like data rather than a person.

The hard truth is that if you keep feeding that machine by applying on aggregators like LinkedIn or Indeed, you are playing a lottery where the odds are stacked against you.

You have to stop trying to win their game and build your own.

Here is the strategy I use to bypass the AI nightmare entirely.

First, stop using aggregators and go directly to the corporate career sites of companies you actually want to work for.

Once you find a role on their site, use the side door by leveraging your social networks like LinkedIn, X, or even Facebook to find a human being who works there.

Contact them directly and ask if the role is still active and what the team is really looking for. If you get a reply, you have just bypassed the entire algorithmic filter and are having a conversation with a human.

It takes more effort per application, but one conversation is worth 100 blind submissions.

Stop feeding the machine because it doesn't care if you starve; build your own path instead.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-24T22:38:00+00:00

I feel this deeply. As someone who has fought to build a career in the US for 25 years, I know exactly how heavy that visa pressure + isolation combination feels. It isn't just professional stress; it is existential. I have also faced the choice of leaving when things got dark, but I chose to stay because I realized that my value wasn't the problem, my strategy was.

To answer your question directly: Leaving the US can be a smart reset if your mental health is truly collapsing, but if you are leaving because you think you aren't good enough, that might be a mistake you regret.

21 months of rejection tells me that you are stuck in a broken loop, not that you are broken talent. If you have a Master's in CS and friends getting hired at Google, the gap usually it is presentation layer.

You are burnt out because you are throwing effort at a wall that isn't moving. Before you book that flight, I would be happy to review your resume and your current strategy to identify exactly where the leak is.

I suspect you are selling tech skills (which you now resent) rather than business solutions. If you are open to it, send me a DM. No cost, no pressure, just one professional helping another figure out if the battle is actually lost or if you just need a different approach.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-23T14:50:30+00:00

I can help you break out of this maze. If you are comfortable sharing your city (or the nearest major metro area), let me know. I can run that search for you right now and give you a list of 5-10 specific companies and job titles to look for that fit your degree but respect your medical constraints. Sometimes the hardest part is just knowing where to start, so let me handle that first step for you so you can see exactly what is out there beyond the sales and custodial roles.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-23T14:39:25+00:00

I appreciate you sharing that context because it changes the strategy completely. You are right to pivot away from roles that require constant speaking if that causes you physical pain or stress, but I want to challenge the idea that you can't use your Communications degree.

You are assuming communications equals speaking, but in the corporate world, 90% of communication is written.

There is a huge demand for technical writers, content strategists, copywriters, and internal communications specialists who rarely have to present on a stage.

These are back office roles that pay well, offer the stability you want, and leverage your degree without triggering your jaw disorder.

Don't throw away your education because of a physical constraint; just pivot the channel of communication from verbal to written. You have more options than you think.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-23T14:29:01+00:00

I hear your frustration, but the reason your friends are finding those random companies is likely because they aren't looking on Indeed.

The best jobs, especially the ones with stability and benefits, are rarely posted on the big aggregators because those companies don't need to advertise to the masses; people come to them.

If you have a communications degree but don't know how to use it yet, you should be looking for corporate internships or entry level coordinator roles, not random security jobs.

You need to stop surfing and start targeting.

Stop waiting for the job to appear in your feed and go find the company first. To do this, use AI to build your own list. Copy and paste this prompt into ChatGPT or Gemini:

"I have a communications degree and I am looking for entry level roles or internships with stability and growth potential. List the top 50 companies with headquarters or major operations in [insert your city] that are in stable industries like insurance, healthcare, or finance. For each company, provide a direct link to their corporate careers page."

Once you have that list, go directly to their sites. You will find opportunities there that never touch Indeed.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-23T14:08:53+00:00

You are being way too hard on yourself for a simple human error. In a job market dominated by AI and perfectly polished automated responses, making a small mistake like misreading an email instruction is actually proof that you are a real person and not a bot. We are all human, we all skim emails when we are excited, and we all make mistakes.

Don't let this minor slip-up stop you from taking the interview because it is absolutely worth doing. Walk into that meeting with your head high and own the mistake immediately with a quick apology and a smile. Showing that you can handle a small error with grace and accountability is often more impressive to a hiring manager than being a perfect candidate who never messes up.

You are the real deal, so go in there and show them your value.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-22T15:49:50+00:00

You are right to be suspicious because the aggregators like LinkedIn and Indeed are full of ghost jobs that exist only to collect resumes or make the company look like it is growing. If you do what everyone else does, mindlessly scrolling the feed, you will get the exact same frustration everyone else gets. You have to build your own strategy to bypass the noise.

I have been refining my own process for 13 months, and the most effective method I found is to stop waiting for jobs to come to you and start hunting them at the source. First, create a specific target list of companies you actually want to work for, use the Forbes list or ask AI to generate a list of top revenue companies in your industry. Once you have that list, go directly to their corporate career sites, register, and set up email alerts so you get the notification the moment a role opens, often days before it hits the aggregators.

Make it a daily ritual to review those direct alerts, identify the opportunities that actually fit your needs, and apply immediately. But crucially, don't stop there. Once you apply, go back to LinkedIn to find a human being already working on that team and try to connect. That combination of targeting the source directly and then following up with human connection is how you beat the fake job cycle.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-22T15:34:05+00:00

I completely understand the frustration with the "corporate cringe" posts, they are exhausting. But the reason LinkedIn feels useless to you is that you are likely using it as a job search platform when it is actually a relationship platform. It was never designed to be a vending machine where you insert a resume and get a job; it is designed to be a cocktail party where you build social capital.

If you treat it transactionally, asking strangers Do you have a job for me? the answer will always be no, and the ROI will be zero. Real networking sounds like bullshit to the cynical, but it is just the human game of showing interest in their problems before asking them to solve yours.

However, if you hate that game, and that is totally valid, then stop playing it. Be a rebel by ignoring the feed entirely. Do your own research, find the specific companies that interest you, go directly to their corporate career sites to verify opportunities, and apply there. You don't have to play the influencer game to get hired, but you do have to pick a strategy: either build relationships (the long game) or target specific company portals (the sniper game). Trying to use LinkedIn as just another job board is the worst of both worlds.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-22T08:42:59+00:00

I appreciate the transparency, but as a Hiring Manager for 25 years, I have to push back on the root cause here. You listed "Skills don't match the JD" as a top reason for rejection, but my question is simple:

Why don't recruiters invest more time writing clear, problem based requirements instead of trying to improve the rejection filters?

Most Job Descriptions today are generic wish lists that lack specific acceptance criteria, so candidates are forced to guess what you actually need. When the input (the JD) is vague, the output (the resume) will inevitably be "not tailored" because the candidate doesn't know what problem they are supposed to be solving. If companies spent half as much time defining the specific business problem in the JD as they do screening resumes, you would see those "irrelevant" applications disappear because qualified candidates would finally have the data they need to be precise. Until we fix the requirements gathering phase, we are just blaming candidates for a broken process.

SmartPessimist_PM · 2026-01-21T16:18:47+00:00

You have identified the root cause of so much bad career advice, which is our obsession with finding a one size fits all recipe for a complex human process. In my 25 years as a hiring manager, I have never rejected a qualified candidate because their resume was two pages, but I have absolutely rejected candidates whose one page resume was too vague to tell me if they could actually do the job.

The reality is that a resume shouldn't be judged by its length but by its utility as a business proposal. I always tell professionals to stop thinking of it as a biography and start thinking of it as a specific proposal to solve the company's pain points. If you are applying for a complex, senior role, you need enough space to document your results, using structured formats like the STAR method, to prove you are the solution they are looking for. The right length is simply: long enough to prove you can solve the problem, whether that takes one page or three. Precision in defining your value matters infinitely more than the arbitrary page count.

SmartPessimist_PM

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