Why job searching feels like a full-time job
Because it is one. With no salary and a lot of forms.
Because most of the work is admin: searching the same boards, re-entering the same details, tailoring the same resume and keeping track of it all. Those hours add up fast, and very few of them make you a stronger candidate. The hours that do (interviews, people, practice) get squeezed out.
Where the hours go
- Searching: the same queries on several boards, most results already seen.
- Reading postings to find out, in paragraph six, that it needs eight years or a visa you do not have.
- Forms: accounts, uploads, the same work history typed again.
- Tailoring: nudging the resume and writing another cover letter.
- Tracking: remembering where you applied and what they said.
The admin that adds nothing
Retyping your work history into a form that just read your resume does not make you better at the job. Neither does finding the same listing on three boards. It is necessary, and it is not the work that gets you hired.
The work that does
- Talking to people at the companies you want.
- Practising answers out loud before the interview.
- Thinking hard about which roles you are genuinely strong for.
These feel less productive than sending applications, because there is no count at the end of the day. They are usually what moves a search.
Handing off the first kind
Anything repetitive and rules-based can be handed off: searching, form filling, tracking. Anything that depends on judgement or on being a person, like the interview and the conversation, should stay yours.
That is the split HUNT is built around: it finds and scores roles, handles the applications and keeps the tracker, so your evening goes to the other list. See how it works.
Related: The actual cost of a manual application and Applying more is not always a strategy.
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