The job search pipeline: a framework for getting your next job by thinking like a seller

Introduction

My name is Brian Kane and I am not a career coach, recruiting expert, or recently impacted by recent tech layoffs.?In reading the news of recent tech layoffs, rescinded offers, and hiring freezes, I am someone who wants to help.?My “super power” throughout my career has been developing frameworks and processes to help simplify the ambiguous and complex (and the job search and interview process fits the bill!).?This article is an attempt to provide a framework and series of recommendations to help out all those currently without a job get one.?Please take this as the opinion of just myself (n=1) and not professional career coaching advice.?I am not trying to sell you anything, get social clout (“slam that subscribe button”), or convince you to work for my company.?I just want to help!?If your opinion differs, please comment below.?Let’s all take Ownership of helping those impacted get into their next role.

This article is an “open source” contribution and I approve the re-use of any of this content, as long as it is freely distributed!?Let’s help get these folks back to work!

The job search process

Let’s start off by framing the job search process.?

• The job search process is a full-time job.?Between finding and applying to jobs, preparing for interview loops, participating in interviews, and negotiating your offer, it’s a lot of work.?To keep yourself organized, productive, and sane I recommend a structured approach as outlined below.
• The time from a job being posted to an accepted offer being made is long – if you are currently unemployed, it may feel like forever.?For generalists roles, 2-3 months seems typical, while specialist roles can take 6+ months.?In my experience as a candidate, 6 to 12 weeks seems typical, depending on when you enter the process. Make sure you apply for unemployment, take a contract or gig job if you have to pay the bills, and conserve your cash!?
• You have no visibility to the internal dynamics of each job requisition.?While you may think you’re an incredible fit for the role (and you probably are), you may not even be considered.?There are many reasons for this – an internal transfer candidate, a known external candidate to the hiring team, specific desired characteristics not listed in the job description, and biases (unconscious or conscious) – specific schools, prior employers, affinity biases, etc.?For this reason, you need to balance quality (the “dream jobs”) and quantity (volume of applications). As articulated later on, assume the worst case - you will need to apply to at least 100 job requisitions!
• The more popular the company, the greater your competition will be.?Practically speaking, the most desired companies (e.g., MAAMA (Microsoft, Alphabet, Amazon, Meta, Apple)) receive hundreds (sometimes thousands) of applications per role, and your resume may never be seen by a human.?For this reason, I recommend adopting a tiered model (A, B, C, D) with different approaches for each tier (more on this later).?This balances the volume needed with extra efforts with your top opportunities (“A”) to get your resume seen.
• The job of a recruiter is to help find the right candidates for the job requisition and fill the role (hint: they work for the employer).?They are aligned to a specific set of job requisitions, not a specific set of candidates.?Every recruiter I have met is incredibly busy!?I was told by a recruiter friend that 15-20 concurrent requisitions is the industry standard, while many flex well above this.?If it takes 10 phone screens to get to 1 offer, that could result in 200 candidates in flight for a given recruiter.?Anytime you engage a recruiter, be specific, have a clear action or next step, and include your resume + link to your LinkedIn profile.

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Creating a pipeline for your job search process

I recommend that you adopt a mental model of a seller in your job search.?Sales is about driving towards outcomes (a closed “won” opportunity – aka an accepted offer in this case) through a structured, sequenced approach (pipeline stages) where you drive specific activities in each stage to advance the opportunity.?By aligning your job opportunities against a pipeline framework, you will provide yourself greater visibility to all the opportunities you have in flight and better identify what actions you need to take and where to most effectively apply your energy.

In a sales pipeline, you need to identify potential customers and then qualify them using a BANT-C (there is a budget to purchase the product, there is a contact with the authority to make the purchase, there is a need for the solution, there is a timeline established to make the purchase, and competitors have been identified).?The volume of qualified opportunities needed will vary on your win rate (what percentage of opportunities you convert to customers).?As a general estimation, sales will require at least 3x the number of wins needed as opportunities, which will require 10x+ as unqualified leads / prospects.

We are going to adopt this same mental model, but adjusted for the specifics of job searching.?

Job search “pipeline stages” include:

1. Discovery: finding jobs to apply to – through job boards (company, third-party), strong and weak connections, networking, and communities.
2. Application: applying to a job, potentially including a customized resume and (as appropriate) employee referral.
3. Recruiter Phone Screen: 15-30 minute call with the recruiter focused on your overall role fit (you meet the basic requirements of the job requisition) and collecting the basics (compensation expectations, timeline, other interview loops in process, etc.).
4. Hiring Manager (HM) Phone Screen: 30-60 minute call focused on your functional fit for the role (you can do the job), fit for the company (culture fit), and assessing the likelihood of you successfully completing the on-site interview.?If the HM doesn’t think you have a good shot of clearing the on-site loop, they won’t advance you.
5. (optional) Additional Phone Screens: an additional phone screen, most likely with a senior and/or tenured member of the team to further assess your fit.?This interview should not be needed with a calibrated “phone screen 1” but a lot of companies still implement it.
6. Pre-work: depending on the company and role, this could include an online personality assessment, writing assignment, technical assessment, etc.
7. On-Site Interview: 3 to 5 interviews (likely over Zoom), each lasting between 30 and 60 minutes, with a combination of direct peers, management, and adjacent team members.?This varies dramatically by role, level, and company.
8. Offer Negotiation: you will work with recruiter on constructing a mutually agreeable offer package, considering (as appropriate): base pay, bonus/commission, stock grants/options, sign-on bonus, and benefits.
9. Your First Day!?This should be redundant with stage 8, but with the recent trend in rescinded offers, until your first day there is some justification to be nervous.

To make the pipeline actionable, we work backwards from the outcome we are trying to drive (getting you to your first day in your new job). The goal is to advance an opportunity to the next stage until you have your new job!

What does this mean in simpler terms (explain it like I am 5 (ELI5))??Our goal is to get you to your first day in a new role.?We just need 1 job (unless you want to try to be over-employed, which I don’t recommend).?This means we need 4-5 on-site interviews, which requires 8-10 hiring manager phone screens, which requires 16-20 recruiter phone screens, which requires 90-100 job applications.

You might be wondering "Brian, do I really need to apply to 100 hundred jobs?!" Hopefully not, but I want you to assume the worst! There is variance in the percentages provided driven by the popularity of company, the job type / family, the level of seniority and specialization of the role, and the dynamics of the hiring manager and team. Additionally, you can “improve your odds” by connecting directly with the hiring manager, getting an employee referral, and your preparation for the on-site interview.

Job pipeline stage 1: discovery

If you’ve been laid off, fired, or had your job offer rescinded, I first recommend that you engage in self-reflection.?A great question to ask yourself is “when I’ve been at my best, what’s been true?”?At your best can be however you define it – you exceeded goals, you got promoted, you experienced growth and development, you found yourself in a state of flow, you loved your job, etc.?For “what was true”, think about the role itself, the team, your manager, the product/service, the customers you served, etc.

Similarly, look back on each of the jobs you’ve had and write down what you loved (energized you) and frustrated you (de-energized you) about the role, team, organization, company, culture, and broader industry.

My mental model for our professional careers is that "we are who we are, we just don't know who we are." We discover who we are throughout out career journey. Think about how many people are in roles which don't align to their college degree, have made significant industry or job role changes, or are "still figuring out what they want to be when they grow up." You're going to be tempted to apply to and accept any job, which I recommend you resist the urge to do. Give yourself this moment to reflect and create intentionality.

I also recommend an exercise I learned from a career coach I met recently.?Choose someone you are close to (e.g., a parent, sibling, best friend) and write them a letter from yourself 3 years in the future.?In this letter describe what your life is like, including your personal and professional life.?Write about the incredible job you have, the type of work you do, the amazing people you work with, and how you’ve grown and developed.?Write about your personal life as well – where you are living, the activities and hobbies you’re engaged in, your friends and family, and the communities you are a part of.?The act of writing and sending this letter (yes – actually send it out!) will provide a vision for yourself.

Considering your self-reflections and future projections, it’s time to map out companies you want to work for.?I recommend doing so by:

• Considering your past 3-5 years of experience, what are the competitors, partners, and customers of the companies you have worked for??For example, if your offer was just rescinded by Coinbase, Gartner Peer Insights has a list of blockchain platforms (link ), PartnerBase has a list of Coinbase’s partners (link ), the Blockchain Association has a list of member companies (link ).?You can also look at what companies have sponsored or spoken at conferences your prior employer participating in.?You’ve got to be "Nancy Drew with the power of Google search"!?It’s more about knowing the right questions to ask (search for) versus having the answers.
• Take a look at “great companies to work for” lists.?Again, Google Search is your #1 skill.?Some examples include: LinkedIn’s 50 best workplaces to grow your career in the U.S. (link ), Glassdoor’s Best Places to Work (link ), Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For (link ), Inc’s Best Workplaces (link ), etc.
• Discuss with former peers, your mentors, and your network contacts the companies they’d recommend for you.?

You now need to narrow this list down and prioritize where you will invest your energy and time. ?Across various industries a classification framework of “A, B, C, D” is used, which I recommend here as well.?This is a simple way for you to bucket the companies you are considering by tier.?This approach helps balance and focus the volume approach (“apply to anything and everything you are remotely a fit for”) with intentionality and focus.?You want to dedicate the majority of your time and energy on "A" companies.

• “A” companies are your “dream companies” which you will invest the most time and energy towards.?You will extensively research the company (their history, competitors, markets, founders), network into (“coffee chats”, proactive LinkedIn outreach, attend events), customize your resume for, and find ways to go the extra mile for (examples: achieve a relevant certification, attend their conference, interview their customers and partners, etc.).
• “B” companies are a “great company” that aren’t your first choice to take to prom, but you’d still be happy to dance with.?You will ramp up your time investment into these companies as the job opportunities advances through the pipeline stages. For example, you will dive deep into your research and preparation once you get to the interview loop stage.
• “C” companies are your fall back plan.?In the scoring framework below, you have some concerns (e.g. they are a pre-profit company like your last one who just laid you off) and you are going to tread cautiously.?For these companies, the role-specific considerations need to outweigh your concerns (e.g. a great manager, a highly collaborative team, a particularly interesting focus area).?It’s OK to take a job you know won’t be your forever job as long as it opens the door the “job after this job”.
• “D” companies are your “if all else fails, I can fall back on them” option.?This may be a company you feel is beneath you, a role leveled below your current level of experience, or a contractor/freelance/gig type of role, where the relationship is more transactional. ?These are temporary jobs that you take to have a job.?We all have bills to pay, so depending on your situation you may be more motivated for one of these roles.?If possible, I would recommend holding out for an A/B/C role if possible.

To determine which companies and roles are your A/B/C/D, create a scoring methodology considering value (1-10) and importance weighting (1-10) with 10 being best in both cases.?You own your career so customize this based on what's the most important to you.?My suggested variables include:

1. Market they compete in – consider the size, growth, profitability, ecosystem health, and future potential of the market.?This is “the wave the company is surfing” and ideally you want to see growth (current or near-term potential for), healthy competition, change/innovation, and profitability. The best markets for your career growth are markets which are growing, experiencing change, and are profitable (for example, cloud computing is a "generationally great" market to be in).
2. Product/solution appeal – is this a product that is widely used, loved by customers, and differentiated from competitors??Within tech, look at industry articles, Gartner Magic Quadrants, Forrester Wave reports, customer reviews (Peer Insights), and third-party research.
3. Financial health (revenue size and growth, profitability, diversification of revenue streams, debt, cash reserves, burn-rate (if pre-IPO)) is critical.?Most recent layoffs are for pre-revenue or pre-profit companies who are motivated by survival – they feel the need to preserve cash and valuation multiples to ensure they have the operating capital to continue to operate and can continue to raise needed capital (through investments, debt, stock issuance).?The “fast and loose” money is tightening up, so be careful of any company who has invested in headcount, product development, and market development ahead of actual revenue realization and customer usage.
4. Cultural values – is this a company with a greater purpose you believe in??When you research the company’s website, employee reviews (e.g., Glassdoor ), and through your network, do you resonate with their purpose and values??
5. Product and services diversity – is this company a “one trick pony” where your future career development will the narrowly focused on a specific product, industry, or solution areas??There is nothing wrong with a specialized company as long as you are incredible passionate about that area.?You can uncover insights here from your network, reading employee reviews, and throughout the interview process.
6. Alignment to your prior experience – a theme throughout this article is that “changing careers during a tightening labor market is a low-probability of success approach” and I recommend you prioritize companies where your prior experience aligns – you’ve worked for a partner, supplier, competitor, or customer of this company.?If you’ve never worked in healthcare for example, your likelihood to be hired by a healthcare company is low. You can still get to pipeline stage #9 (your first day) but it will take longer and require a higher volume of activities.

I've created a Google Doc for you to replicate to map out your A/B/C/D companies, track your pipeline, and prepare for your interviews. To create your own document, please see this Google Sheets document (link ). Select “make a copy” from the File Menu to save this to your Google account.

Job pipeline stage 2: applying to roles

The goal: Conversion to conversation with recruiter and hiring manager

High-impact Activities: Optimizing your LinkedIn profile and resume (in that order)

Low-impact Activities: Custom cover letters (hint: no one reads them), applying to jobs that don’t align to your most recent 5 years of experience, applying to jobs where you don’t meet the basic qualifications.

Your LinkedIn profile and your resume are two sides of the same coin. I recommend you first focus on your LinkedIn profile. Recruiters live in LinkedIn and your ability to be found by recruiters is through your LinkedIn profile.?The richer your profile content and the more you engage in the platform, the higher the search ranking algorithms will score you.?Do a Google search for “optimizing your LinkedIn profile” and adopt some of the best practice suggestions.?I’ve found this article to be a great one (link ).?

Some specific recommendations from me:

• Reflect on your past 5 years of experience and capture and summarize the story you want to tell throughout your profile – it should be clear who you are.?If you’ve lived multiple lives and have experience in sales, product, and now marketing, emphasize marketing.?The first question you need to answer is “can they do the job?”.?Edit your entire profile to align to this narrative, emphasizing elements of each role which relate to this story.?Don't lie or stretch the truth, rather highlight activities and accomplishments which enhance this story. In sales terms, you are a product or service you are trying to sell that can do many different things, but you need to focus your sales pitch on the things you have done (and can do) that are relevant to the problems the customer wants to solve (the job to be done, literally).
• If you don’t have a strong profile picture jump onto Groupon (or other local deal services) to purchase a professional headshot.?A picture of you at your wedding with your spouse's arm partially cropped off, a picture of you in your backyard, etc. isn’t going to cut it.?This is a worthwhile investment to ensure you present well.?Assume every recruiter and hiring manager will look at your LinkedIn profile and therefore profile picture. Similarly, once you get to interviews, purchase a ring light and a good webcam to make sure you present well during your interviews.
• Go through every section of your profile and optimize it using articles like above.?Additionally, take a look at profiles of people with similar experience for inspiration on what key words and phrases to use, what skills to highlight, how to describe your experience, etc.?I also recommend digging up the old job descriptions of roles you’ve had (hint: search your e-mail inbox or do a Google search for a similarly titled role) and look for language you can leverage.?These are shortcuts to instantly boosting your profile.?
• Set a goal to make 3 to 5 comments in your LinkedIn feed per day.?Each should be at least 1 to 2 sentences long.?This encourages the ranking algorithm to highlight you to recruiters.?Don’t comment, like, or post anything divisive, political, or polarizing however!?I am shocked on a daily basis, how many people “open to work” decide to provide their opinion on a highly divisive political issue.?As a Hiring Manager, I always look through a candidate's LinkedIn activity feed. It's a red flag for judgment - if you're making those comments on a professional networking site (visible to the entire world) what are you going to say in front of a customer at dinner?
• Avoid the fluff! Would you rather hire a “dynamic hard-working individual looking for a company to grow with” or “campaign strategist with 5 years’ experience in outbound lead generation in the infrastructure monitoring space”??Comb your entire profile and replace vague, weak, and passive languages with concise, data-driven statements.?For example, replace “significantly grew sales and won multiple awards” with “137% quota attainment in 2021, achieving President’s Club and Sales Rep of the Quarter (’21 Q4)”.?

The purpose of your resume is to get you an interview.?Studies have shown most people spend less than a minute actually reading your resume.?In most interviews, the interviewer will look at your resume 5 minutes before the interview and is going to ask you to “tell me about yourself” at the beginning of the interview anyway.?The most important element of your resume is that it actually gets seen by a recruiter and hiring manager.?I recommend doing a Google search for “ATS friendly resume templates” which will produce results like this (link ).?If you have the financing to do so, hiring a resume writer is a good investment.?There are many on LinkedIn.

Resume tips from me (as someone who has read a lot of them):

• Keep it to one page if possible.?If you need two pages, optimize wherever you can, knowing how little time will be spent actually reading your resume.
• Check for typos, grammar issues, and consistency of verb tense throughout your resume.?This is a common mistake that doesn’t disqualify you but is a flag for attention to detail and written communication skills.
• Remove the objective statement if possible.?If you disagree, keep it short and specific.?Again, avoid the fluff!
• For jobs within the last 5 years, up to 5 bullet points per job is acceptable, if warranted.?Jobs older than 5 years should be 3 bullets or less.?
• For every job have a quantitative measurement of success if possible.?Every role has goals, metrics, timelines, and budgets.?
• Put a link to your LinkedIn profile in your resume.?The recruiter, hiring manager, or interviewer is likely going to look you up regardless.
• Do a Google search for the job titles you’ve held (e.g., full stack software engineer) and look at the language used in those job reqs.?Borrow and adapt descriptions that are the most relevant, prioritizing language from job reqs from your “A” companies.?

With your polished LinkedIn profile and resume in hand, it’s now time to start sharing your resume with the world.?For your “A” companies (your “dream companies”), bookmark their first-party job board (for example, if you want to work at Amazon, bookmark https://www.amazon.jobs/en/ ) and check it daily.?Create saved searches and alerts when possible.?When you find a job, find someone in your network who works for that company who can refer you.?This approach helps you: 1/be an early-applicant and 2/increase the odds of your resume being seen through a referral.?I recommend asking your referrer to refer you for no more than 5 roles out of professional courtesy (and risking spamming the company).?When you email your referrer about the role, send them the job req link/ID, your resume (ideally customized for that specific role), and three bullets on why you think you are a great fit for that specific role).?Ask your referrer to formally refer you (note: you will need to formally apply to the role yourself once they’ve referred you) and send a note to the hiring manager and recruiter with the three bullets.?You can also ask for a referral through websites like the Blind although those referrals are weaker “networking” referrals versus someone who knows and can vouch for you.?Another trick is to take the job title (i.e. Mid-Market Account Manager for Microsoft), add quotes to it (e.g., “Mid-Market Account Manager”+Microsoft) and throw that into the LinkedIn search bar and filter for “posts”.?It’s very likely the hiring manager, recruiter, or member of the team has created a public post promoting this role.?With the LinkedIn Premium trial, you can message them for free without needing to be connected.?Send them a note (with those those three bullets) and a request to chat for 10 to 15 minutes informally.

For your “A” and some “B” companies, we take this approach because third-party job boards are not the source of truth.?When you see a job posted on LinkedIn it may appear to be “new” with “0 applicants”, but this data is often inaccurate.?The primary customer of LinkedIn (and other third party job boards) are employers and part of the product/service being sold to an employer is automatic re-posting of the job requisition for freshness.?

For your “B” and “C” companies, LinkedIn (and other job boards like Indeed and Glassdoor) are fantastic.?Assume that you need to get to ~100 applications to get hired, so volume matters. I recommend that you download the mobile app for the job board(s) on your phone and throughout the day browse through newly added jobs and save them for later.?Set aside time each day to apply for roles from your computer.?Give yourself a goal to apply to at least 10 jobs a week (or however high you want to set the bar). In pipeline terms, you need to keep adding "top of funnel opportunities" (applications) until you've got enough "late stage opportunities" (on-site interviews) to get to an offer.

Additional job application tips:

• Don’t limit yourself to one city in your search, even if you aren’t interested in relocating.?In this post-COVID world, many hiring managers are open to candidates outside of the listed city in the job req but their tools don’t allow them to post to multiple cities.?
• When customizing your resume for a specific job requisition, try Rewordify .?To use this free NLP (natural language processing) tool, simply paste the job description for the job requisition, click “rewordify text”, and then select parts of speech (hint: you can further narrow down to nouns and verbs).?This give you keywords to include in your customized resume! There are other tools as well - a simple Google search away.
• Normalize your job titles to industry norms in your resume and LinkedIn.?For example, your prior employer may have used a non-standard title like “Small Business Specialist” while the industry would call this role a “Pre-Sales Evangelist”.?Use the industry standard titles. This will improve your discoverability and matching score.
• Lean into your networking, communities, and contacts to get the early scoop on roles not yet posted, roles which won’t be posted, and potential roles which can be created for you.?This is often referred to as the “hidden” or “shadow” job market.

Job pipeline stage 3: Recruiter Phone Screen (RPS)

The goal: Conversion to conversation with the hiring manager, gaining key insights on the process and interviewers

High-impact Activities: Focusing your talk track on the basic requirements of the role, asking questions of the recruiter to prepare you for the hiring manager interview and interview process overall, being polite and respectful to the recruiter and making them your ally and champion

Low-impact Activities: Asking in-depth/technical questions about the role and team, negotiating salary at this stage

As a reminder, recruiters are a high-volume role (potentially 200 candidates in flight for 20 roles, or more).?Recruiters work for the company and their goal is to successfully fill open reqs.?They don’t work for you.?I think we all have stories of recruiters ghosting us, sending a canned rejection e-mail after multiple interviews, being unresponsive for multiple weeks, etc.?I can’t emphasize this enough – be professional, polite, and respectful to your recruiter.?Don't punish them for the misdeeds of past recruiters. You want them to as your partner in this process (yes - even though it’s the hiring manager who ultimately makes the hiring decision).?I’ve found recruiters to be incredibly nice people who genuinely want to help, but are often treated with disrespect from candidates.?When you treat your recruiter as your partner in this process, they will go the extra mile in helping you prepare for the interviews, connect you with a different role if the initial roles doesn’t work out, and be more open with you in the negotiation process.?

If your recruiter specializes in a specific team, department, or role type, they may be able to go deeper with you in terms of the role specifics, team dynamics, and nuances of the organization.?If your recruiter spans across a broader set of teams (e.g., all sales and marketing), their knowledge will skew more towards company-level insights.?In either scenario, I recommend you focus the conversation on convincing them you meet all the basic requirements of the role and gaining as many insights you can on the hiring manager, interview process, and timeline.

If asked about salary expectations, I’d recommend you deflect and offer “if you can share with me the overall salary range for the role I am happy to tell you if we are in the ballpark”.?You can also share that you’d like to consider the holistic package including base pay, signing bonus, equity grants, and benefits and that it’s the total package that matters most to you.

If pressured to provide data, leverage the research you’ve done and provide a broad range based on the job type, industry, and level of seniority. Websites like levels.fyi and Glassdoor and apps like The Blind can help. There are also numerous pay transparency communities, Slack channels, etc.?Be aware that data from these self-reported sources can be misleading. A lot of compensation data on The Blind for example is for premium markets like the Bay Area and includes stock appreciation (and personal embellishments). Keep salary discussions as high level as possible until actual salary negotiations. At this stage, the recruiter just wants to make sure they can afford you.?

Questions to ask the recruiter:

• Where is the team in the process for this role?
• How long has the role been open?
• Is this a backfill or net new role?
• What can you tell me about the hiring manager and team?
• Are there specific experiences or attributes the hiring manager has highlighted I should focus on?
• How flexible is the team on location and amount of?time in office?
• Do you have any advice or recommendations to best prepare for the interview process?
• In your opinion, what are some things which separate a great candidate from a good one?

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Job pipeline stage 4:hiring manager phone screen

Objectives: Convince the hiring manager you can do the job and are a good fit for the team, advance to on-site interview?

High-impact activities: Read the job description thoroughly, prepare and polish your top 3-5 examples most relevant to the job

Low-impact opportunities: Additional edits to your resume (you’ve already gotten the interview), extensive company research (save this for the on-site)

The hiring manager is the most important person in the hiring process. To ensure long-term fit companies have introduced counter-balances (example: Amazon has a bar raiser to assess your ability to be better than 50% than people in similar roles at the level you’re being considered at and have long-term growth potential), however the Hiring Manager will always have the discretion to not extend an offer for the role.

Approach this conversation with three goals in mind. First, try to uncover their “must haves” and “wish list” for the role. This is equivalent to asking for the answers for the test!?Once you know this, you can highlight your experiences which best align to what they are looking for. It’s also a good way to assess your fit and adjust accordingly (including removing your application if you see a clear misalignment). There may be elements of the role not captured in the job description that will significantly impact your fit. Try to ask these qualifying questions upfront to accomplish your second goal of convincing the hiring manager you are great functional fit (you can do the job).?Third, you are interviewing the hiring manager too. Upwards of 70% of the variance in your engagement is directly influenced by your manager and according to Gallup only 28% of people have the capacity to be a good manager (only 10% a great one).?In other words, there’s a lot of bad managers out there and you should avoid the really bad ones whenever you can.?

If you were recently fired, laid off, or had your offer rescinded, the elephant in the room is if your termination was driven by underperformance or personality challenges.?You might already be questioning yourself and losing confidence.?You need to own this story and turn it into a positive. Someone who joins a pre-revenue startup is willing to take risks, is comfortable with ambiguity, and is a builder. Focus your story on the underlying value of your recent experience and tie it to the new company’s values and the responsibilities of the role. For example, if you were laid off by a FinTech startup, talk about your passion around the future of payments, commerce, and distributed ledger technology.?Tie this to a greater purpose and explain that you’d like to look back on your career and say you were a part of the decentralization of payments.?

Approach this conversation with a mindset that you’ve already been hired and you’re collaborating with your new manager on what you will do, how your success will be measured, what the priority focus areas are, and how you will best work together. This a subtle but impactful way of gaining the confidence of the manager.?

Questions to ask the hiring manager:

1. What are the most important things you are looking for in this role?
2. How is success measured for this role and the team?
3. If I spoke with the team how would they describe your management approach?
4. How would you describe the culture of this team specifically?
5. What are the obstacles this role will have to overcome?
6. What are they key stakeholders outside of the immediate team I will need to work with?
7. What are your top team-level priorities for this year?

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Job pipeline stage 5 & 6: additional phone screens & pre-work

Objectives: Advance to on-site interview?

High-impact activities: Read the job description thoroughly, prepare and polish your top 5-7 examples most relevant to the job, prepare for the pre-work

Low-impact opportunities: Extensive company research (save this for the on-site)

The cost of making the wrong hire is significant, so hiring managers frequently opt for a second (and sometimes a third) phone screen to ensure you are a strong functional and cultural fit.?This adds 1-2 weeks to the process and at most companies doesn’t meaningfully impact the hiring decision. That’s not going to stop hiring teams from requesting them however.?I recommend approaching these interviews with the same overall approach as the on-site interviews mentioned below.

Companies also introduce pre-work to their processes to assess role-specific competencies they consider important, which is role-specific.?This may include a writing assignment, mock sales presentation, personality assessment, or technical assessment.?These are generally treated as “a piece of evidence” used when considering if to extend an offer.?

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Job pipeline stage 7: on-site interview (OS)

Objective: Address each interviewer’s focus area and convince them to be a “strong hire” vote, get a job offer

High-impact activities: Preparing and practicing STAR examples, focused and intentional company research

Low-impact activities: In-depth research on each interviewer (a 60 second scan of their LinkedIn profile is sufficient), sending personalized emails afterwards, trying to learn everything about the company (“drink the ocean”)?

You will usually have between 3 to 5 interviews, each lasting between 30 and 60 minutes.?This varies by role type, level of seniority, and company. The recruiting team will share with you beforehand these details, hopefully also providing background and recommendations for each interviewer.?You can also read about their interview approach on Glassdoor, through contacts who work at the company, and through Google searches.?Most interviews will be with one person, however multiple interviewers per interview is common (typically the secondary interviewer will be a non-participating shadow).?

Your interviewers will typically be a mix a peers on the same team, cross-functional stakeholders from teams you will work closely with, and individuals who you won’t directly with (to provide a balanced interviewer panel).?Similar to the hiring manager interview, approach each interview with the mentality that you’re already working together and the discussion is an opportunity to identify how you two will collaborate together.?Your objectives are to convince them: 1/you can do the job, 2/you are both a “culture fit” and “culture add” for the team, and 3/you are someone they want to work with.?

If this is “your dream job” (an “A” company), think about ways to you can earn extra credit with the interviewers.?This could be achieving a relevant certification for their products, attending one of their conferences or events, using their product (e.g., if you interview at a company which makes website creation software, create a website using their tools), or reading a book on their founder.?You can weave this into the section of the interview where you ask questions.?For example, “I attended a webinar your team hosted last week and I found the section on the future of additive manufacturing particularly interesting.?How will this role contribute towards this?” ??

My top 5 tips for on-site interviews:

1. Each interviewer will ask for an overview of your background (“tell me about yourself”) so have a variation of your 3 to 5 minute elevator pitch ready to go.?You are setting the tone for the interview with this introduction and setting up your key talking points (aligned to functional and cultural fit).?Align this message to what the hiring manager has told you is the most important things they are looking for.
2. Assume your interviewer is taking notes, so speak slowly and clearly, spell out acronyms and the names of company names and jargon they may not be familiar with. Pause throughout and offer “let me know if you want me to repeat or clarify anything” or “happy to go into more detail if you’d like me to”. From a tactical perspective, your interviewer is both an interviewer and a data entry clerk / note summarizer.?You demonstrate empathy through this approach.
3. Keep your tone positive and professional.?If this was Festivus, I am sure you have some grievances to air, especially if you were laid off via a mass Zoom call, however avoid speaking negatively about a former employer.?Similarly, avoid profanity, potentially offensive humor, and any other “self-forced errors”.?While the tone may appear casual, an interview is still a business conversation.?Interviewers can be hard to read and sometimes the person you think “can take a joke” will react the most negatively to it.
4. When preparing for knowledge-based questions where you want to show you understand the solution area, take a focused approach versus a broad approach.?For example, when a candidate prepares for an AWS interview, they often watch 30+ hours of videos on 100+ of our 200+ native services ("trying to drink the ocean") and then struggle to articulate any of it in an interview.?I recommend instead choosing a specific offering, use case, industry vertical application, etc. and diving deep.?Read case studies, watch videos, research competitors.?Ideally this is an area you are personally passionate about.
5. Preparation and practice (and then more practice) will help you be confident, articulate, and even-keeled during an interview.?These are time-bound conversations with people you’ve never met asking you rapid-fire questions, which are increasingly behavioral interview questions.?Ask your friends and family to give you a mock interview or connect with other job seekers and each give each other a mock interview.?See questions below you can use for the most popular question format of the day… the “STAR” question.

?Preparing for behavioral interview

Behavioral interviews are a mechanism to predict future behavior based on how you behaved in similar past situations. Companies like retailers, hotels, and other customer service industries have been using them for decades. Today, the use of behavioral interview questions, also called STAR (situation, task, action, results), are becoming more popular with tech companies. ?Typically, these questions come from a question bank to ensure consistency across interviews.

If the company you’re applying to leverages STAR interview questions, the majority of your preparation (80%+) for the on-site interview should be on identifying and rehearsing your STAR examples.?This is an art and science, balancing demonstrating functional fit (the examples directly relate to the job you’re applying to) and the behavior itself (you will succeed in how the company collaborates, communicates, makes decisions, approaches work, and delivers results).?Assume that you will need 15 to 20 total examples.

I recommend preparing responses for the following generic STAR questions, which will cover the majority of company-specific variations.

Tell me about a time when you:

• Drove something innovative or disruptive
• Exceeded results and expectations
• Failed to deliver against a commitment
• Disagreed with your management and team and had to convince them to support your idea
• Had to make a decision without complete information?
• Were provided constructive/critical feedback and how you acted on it
• Drove improvements to an existing process or way of doing things
• Had to solve a complex problem?
• Took on a project outside of your core responsibilities
• Had to work with a difficult customer or stakeholder and how you handled it

For each example you provide, be prepared to answer the following follow up questions:

• What data did you use to make your decisions?
• Did you have to overcome any obstacles to achieve the result?
• What activities did you specifically do, versus the team?
• What would have done differently? (hint: you specifically, not the team, organization, or company)
• What did you learn?

In the Google Sheet I’ve created for you, I have provided these 10 questions STAR questions along with the 5 follow-up questions.?I’ve also written in more depth about how Amazon specifically approaches STAR questions in this article , which I recommend diving deeper into if you’re at this stage.

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Job pipeline stage 8: offer negotiation

Following your on-site interview, the interviewers will de-brief and decide if they are going to proceed to offer on the role you interviewed for or not.?I recommend asking the recruiter / recruiting coordinator when the debrief is scheduled for (which is is usually within a week of the on-site interview).?Give the recruiter at least one day after the de-brief to follow-up with them, if they haven’t done so already. There are multiple potential outcomes of the interview loop:

An offer is coming!

This is the outcome you want!?As a reminder, the recruiter’s goal is to fill the job requisitions they are assigned and if the team is inclined to move to offer their job is now that of a closer.?The recruiter will give you a call and discuss the inputs needed to construct an offer, including pay (base pay, bonus/commissions, stock grants/options), relocation assistance required, VISA sponsorship, start date, sign-on bonus, etc.

Approach this conversation with a collaborative versus adversarial mindset.?You are working with the recruiter to get to a win-win outcome.?In this context, ask questions to help you better understand their approach to offer construction:

• Can you share the overall interview feedback??You want to get a sense for how “strong” of a hire you are.?This helps you understand how much negotiating leverage you have. ?
• What is the target job level I am being considered for??This helps you calibrate to the pay band you will be working with.
• What is the compensation range at this level??The recruiter may or may not be willing to tell you, but if you know the job level, job type, and job location, you should be able to do some research online (Glassdoor, Levels.fyi, The Blind, etc.).
• Can you walk me through the elements of the offer and help me understand where there is more or less flexibility??This helps you understand where to request improvements.?
• Can you send me a copy of the benefits? Benefits are a part of the total compensation and it may be wise to accept an offer a little less than you’re hoping for if the benefits are great.

Always assume the first offer is not the final offer and there are improvements which can be made.??I have known people who have hired salary negotiation coaches, which is not something I have done, but is something you can consider.

You interviewed well, but are not being considered for the role.

This is the classic “fit for the company but not the role” scenario, which is unsatisfying if you’re currently unemployed.?Strong recruiters will help you find another role within the company if there is one which is a good fit. At a minimum, most will make a warm introduction to the recruiter of another role within the company.

Ask the recruiter:

• If I am matched with another role, do I need to go through a full loop again or can I have just a one-on-one conversation with the hiring manager?
• Are there other roles you are recruiting for you think would be a good fit?
• If I find other roles, what’s the process to get me connected to the recruiter and hiring manager?

You are still in consideration, but the team wants to interview other candidates

This is “candidate purgatory” where feedback was positive, you are still in consideration, but the team wants to interview other candidates, which is common if you entered early into their interview process.?Unfortunately this can also mean there is a hiring freeze or this role is being potentially repurposed. All you can do in this scenario is stay in touch with the recruiter and hiring manager.?A competing offer will put pressure on them, however these hiring teams will still want to take their time.

You are not being considered for the role

You didn’t get the job and chances are the recruiter won’t be able to provide much detail into why.?If you’ve established good rapport with the recruiter, they will probably tell you as much as they can, but don’t expect it. Don't be defensive or attack the recruiter verbally if you hear feedback you may not want to hear. Thank them for the feedback and use it as a feedback loop to improve your performance for the next interview. ?“Take the loss” as they say and move on.

Questions to ask the recruiter:

• Is there any feedback you can share so I can improve going into other interviews?
• Do you recommend I hold off on applying to other jobs at the company?
• Do you have any other advice or recommendations for me?

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Job pipeline stage 9: your first day!

Unexpected job loss followed by weeks and months of job search is emotionally and mentally exhausting. Give yourself a moment to exhale and (depending on your financial situation) find a way to celebrate the occasion.?

Remind yourself that every day is a new day and past circumstances outside of your control have no bearing on your future trajectory. Over the course of your career you are bound to experience disappointments (a bad performance review, not getting the promotion you deserved, getting laid off or fired) and successes (bonuses, raises, promotions, new opportunities).?What’s important is that you learn from the experiences and focus on the future.

Take the time to thank the people who helped you throughout your job search process.?Pay it forward by helping out someone else who is in the midst of their own job search –give them an endorsement on LinkedIn, review their resume, offer to conduct a mock interview, refer them to a role, etc.?

I hope you've found this helpful. Please let me know if there is anything you would suggest to improve the content. Hopefully we can help all the folks go from "open to work" to "back to work".