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Comment by thehumanmeat | Hacker News Reader

Dec '22 Master's grad + math undergrad here. 4.0 GPA, research + internship experience. 4 months of applications and only 1 interview. Might as well apply to a shredder.

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Graduated into a recession myself. If you can't get hired right away, the situation only compounds, so buckle up. No one's advice helped. Was eventually told by several internal recruiters at job fairs that companies were loath to hire someone more than 6 months out of college who hadn't found employment in the field. Spent years working unrelated jobs, barely scraping by. My debt ballooned. Talking to anyone online typically ended with being told that the problem must be with me; the market was recovering, so I probably just suck. It's depressing to be an outsider looking to get a break. It's easy to lose confidence in yourself.

It took me years and a lot of luck to claw my way into developer roles. And you know what? It wasn't me. I didn't suck. Life had just dealt me a bad hand (one of several).

Not to say everything is great now. I missed out on years' worth of promotions, investments, and retirement savings. I'll probably never achieve fu money or so much as retire early. But I'm hardly hurting financially nowadays.

Which is all to say, hey, I hear ya. Hang in there.

Sorry if you're already doing this, but you should focus 100% of your effort on networking, don't bother sending out any applications ever. You need a referral to put your name on the top of the list unless you went to MIT or something

Friends, family, family friends, old professors, old professors' friends, online game clan members, etc

The positive here is you are going to learn to hustle. Anyone who entered the market in 2020 probably lazily sent out a few applications via job boards and had a position in a month.

You will have it way harder, but stay positive and keep at it. Keep iterating on your resume and personal website. Apply to large numbers of jobs and if you find a position you really like then hunt down someone you can email or figure out how to get a referral. You will embarrass yourself, look foolish and have to feel needy.

This sucks but it is also an opportunity to get super desperate. That desperation will result in some skills that we wouldn't normally gain.

Graduated into the 08 recession. Knowing what I know now , I would have drawn out my graduation date as much as possible until the market started to improve. See if there's a way you can work for/affiliate yourself with some lab and in 2024 you will be able to pretend as if you're fresh out of academia and have never looked for a job yet.

The above is really good advice. I went back to get a PhD in 2008 because I couldn't get a job, and it was definitely the right move (for me, at least).

You’re doing it wrong. 1 interview means you need to spend more time personalizing yourself to the applications. Start cold messaging people on LinkedIn at the company who went to your alma matter, spam blind, whatever it takes to get a connect at the company.

The market for mid-level and up is fine.

As someone who's pretty good at the interview games and have been trying to help some fresh grads and laid off juniors get hired. It is rough right now.

It really is. I do often reach out and try networking on LinkedIn with no luck. I have connections to quite a few companies I'd love to work for, and no its not FANG, who recommend me often whenever a position pops up, but still no luck.

Are teams waiting to see if ChatGPT4 can pick up the slack instead of initiating a new job opening?

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