Chapter 7: Fundamentals of Job Searching
Do not rely on one channel
Job boards are only one route into a role, and typically the most competitive, since every visible advert attracts a large volume of applications. A well run search works several channels at once: job boards, direct speculative approaches, recruitment consultants, your own network, and referrals from people already inside target organisations.
Balancing effort across channels
Not every channel deserves equal time. Track response rates honestly by channel, as covered in Chapter 4, and shift your effort towards what is actually working for your specific field and level, rather than what feels like the most obvious or comfortable option.
What the research tells us
Estimates vary by source, but a large body of career research consistently suggests that a substantial majority of roles, commonly cited in the range of sixty to eighty per cent, are ultimately filled through personal connections and networking rather than through advertised job boards alone. That does not mean job boards are worthless. It does mean that a search built entirely around them is, by definition, competing for a minority of the roles genuinely available.
In practice: Aisha's channel spread
Aisha initially applied only through job boards and heard nothing back for six weeks. Once she added direct applications to three target employers, re-engaged two former colleagues now working where she wanted to be, and registered with two specialist recruiters in her sector, she had three live conversations running within a fortnight.
In practice: Robert's specialist recruiters
Robert, a senior engineer, assumed recruiters would not be interested in someone at his level and avoided the channel entirely. Once he registered with two specialist engineering recruiters and briefed them clearly on his target roles and salary expectations, one submitted him for a role within days that he would never have found through general job boards, since it had been kept confidential ahead of a public announcement.
- Relying on a single job board and assuming that represents the whole market.
- Avoiding recruitment consultants due to a mistaken assumption they are not relevant at your level.
- Applying to roles that do not genuinely match your experience, which wastes time and dilutes your credibility with any recruiter you are working with.
- Failing to track which channel is actually producing results.
- List every channel currently open to you: boards, direct approach, recruiters, network, referrals.
- Identify which channel you have been neglecting, and take one action on it this week.
- Track response rates by channel so you can see, with evidence, where your time is best spent.
- Register with at least one specialist recruiter relevant to your sector if you have not already.
This programme gives you frameworks and actions. Your coach is where they become genuinely yours. Rather than arriving with answers, consider bringing these open questions into your next session and exploring them together:
- Which channel are you avoiding, and what is underneath that avoidance?
- What would trying the most uncomfortable channel actually tell you?