My experience.

After 3 weeks of non-stop interviews (having between 1-4 a day), I landed a job with a nearly 50% pay increase.

I submitted over 800 applications in less than 3 weeks.

The entire process, from the first application I sent to accepting the best offer, was about 1.5 months.

Relevant facts: 1. I have 4+ years in analytical roles. 2. Obtained a bachelor’s in a more technical business degree.

I received 2 offers: 1. Fully remote. Around 7% pay increase. I had to complete a case study and do 4 separate interviews. No references. 2. Hybrid. Around 50% pay increase. 2 interviews. No case studies. Had a referral.

I’ll admit, I applied to many roles I was not fully qualified for. But you miss all the shots you don’t take. I was most qualified for analyst/engineering roles, and tailored my resume to fit such.

My suggestions/observations:

1. Reach out to your contacts for references right away. Requesting references should be the first resort, not last resort. I wish I would have reached out to the reference that helped me get my current job sooner. Had I done that, I could have saved myself 800 other applications and literally hundreds of hours of interviews and case studies.

2. If you receive an offer, expect it to be at the very end or slightly below the proposed range. Ex: $90k – $120k range, expect $88k offer.

3. I’m normally a huge advocate for negotiating salary. I absolutely did not this round. The market is rough. Negotiate at your own risk.

4. Everybody wants fully remote work. There’s less competition for hybrid roles. In my experience, hybrid also pays better because there’s less competition.

5. I’ve noticed that the most lucrative jobs required the least interviews and no case studies/unpaid work. The companies with whom I went through 4+ interviews with/did case studies for/presented projects for often paid less than what I was making and rejected me in the end anyways (often for somebody with more direct experience).

6. Tailor your resume to a specific type of job you want, not individual roles posted. I was targeting analyst roles.

7. Practice interviewing. People hire people they like to talk to. People who they think they’ll get along with. Not just people who can do the job.

8. Try to connect with your interviewers.

9. Avoid Workday/ICIMS. I mainly focused on the Greenhouse ATS as they only require you to attach a resume and answer a few basic questions.

10. Accept the “just in case” interviews. I interviewed for roles paying between $50k and $175k. Good interview practice, if anything.

11. If you’re still in college, please please please focus on getting internships. I had 5, and that helped me a lot when I first got out of school.

12. Get lucky. People love to pretend like luck has nothing to do with it. I lucked the heck out. Sure, it was a combination of my interviewing skills, my resume, my experience, my cover letter, etc. etc….. but also I got the right reference for the right job at the right time.

13. It’s rough out there. You’re valuable. I know it can be discouraging constantly getting rejections for roles you know you were qualified for. It’s the market, not you most likely.