# How to Get a Job

A free, open-source course on getting a white-collar job. Web version: https://howtogetajob.tech

License: CC BY 4.0. Quotes belong to their speakers; each links to the moment in the original video.

## Steps

1. **Laid off? Reset first**: If you were laid off, take a few days, never more than a week, to reset before you start.
2. **Build your point of view and your story**: Before you contact anyone, write down what your target companies need and a one-sentence story about why you're the answer.
3. **Make your resume back up the story**: Rewrite your resume so a stranger skimming for ten seconds knows what you're for and sees the proof.
4. **Network your way in**: Talk to people, starting with the ones who like you. End every conversation with a specific ask, and make every intro effortless with a forwardable blurb.
5. **Turn conversations into applications**: Ask for the referral, tailor each application to what the company needs right now, track everything, and treat the recruiter screen as an audition you have to pass.
6. **Interview like you practiced, because you did**: Over-prepare, practice out loud, lead every answer with the result, and leave every interviewer wanting to work with you.
7. **Negotiate the offer, then close the loop**: Once there's an offer, negotiate warmly but firmly on the phone, make one clear final ask, then thank everyone who helped you get there.

---

## Step 1: Laid off? Reset first

_Take a few days before you start. Not a month. The search will run for months, and you want to start it with a clear head._

Time: 2 to 7 days. Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/reset/

This step is optional. If you weren't laid off, or you've already had your reset, skip to [step two](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/).

### Should you take a break after being laid off?

Yes, a short one. Before you update a single bullet or message a single person, take a day or two off. A week at most. Visit a friend. Go somewhere that isn't your apartment. Do something that changes your mood, whatever that is for you.

This is coaching judgment, not research. I've watched a lot of people start their search the morning after a layoff, and the ones who took a short, deliberate break almost always ran a better process than the ones who didn't.

### Why the break is worth it

**The search will take months.** A few days off at the start costs you almost nothing. The first week of a search is also the least productive one, because you haven't done the thinking in [step two](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/) yet. Most people spend it firing off applications that go nowhere.

**You won't do your best work while you're angry.** Layoffs are usually a business decision made in a spreadsheet by people who never met you. That doesn't make them hurt less. If you start calling people while you're still processing it, it leaks into everything: the way you describe your last job, the story you tell about yourself, the tone of your outreach. Your first conversations are with the people who like you most, and you only get to have them once.

Bart Jaworski saw his layoff from Microsoft coming, and it still hit him with self-doubt and anger. He describes realizing he was "just a row in the Excel." Instead of throwing himself straight back into work, he gave himself room to process: a trip he'd already planned, a few fun side projects. He still landed a new role quickly.

> "I realized that something big has happened. I didn't deny it. I let the emotions flow and I started a journey of a little bit of self discovery."
>
> — Bart Jaworski, product manager who was laid off from Microsoft. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "This PM Was Laid Off. Now He Has 125K Followers" at [5:05](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UnBNfJPLYNw&t=305s)

**You want to come out motivated.** The goal of the reset is to start the search determined to run a tight process, not reeling from the layoff.

### Cap it

The risk with "take some time" is that it turns into a month. That's a procrastination permit, and the longer it runs, the harder the restart.

So pick your start date now and put it on your calendar. Tell one person what it is. When the date arrives, open [step two](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/) and start.

Once you're back, momentum matters more than it seems. Anneli Scopazzi, a recruiter who has worked at Figma, Notion and Palantir, tells candidates to use the time between interviews to build or ship something small. It gives you stories to tell, and you walk into conversations excited about what you're learning instead of sounding only urgent.

> "If you can start to build some momentum and start to feel useful in some way, it can really boost your confidence even if you're feeling financial urgency."
>
> — Anneli Scopazzi, founder of Boulevard Recruiting, formerly in recruiting leadership at Figma, Notion and Palantir. Supra Insider, "Inside the new recruiting reality: fewer hires, higher bars" at [31:38](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEb3cJIN7wM&t=1898s)

### What to do first after being laid off

Mostly: rest, see people, move your body, sleep. The first practical steps after a layoff are a few admin tasks that have deadlines or get harder with time:

- **File for unemployment** if you're eligible. Rules and waiting periods vary by state and country, and benefits generally run from when you file, so don't sit on it.
- **Read your severance agreement before you sign it.** There's usually a deadline, and it's worth knowing what you're agreeing to. If the stakes are high, an hour with an employment lawyer is cheap.
- **Sort out health insurance** and any other benefits with cutoff dates. In the US, that usually means comparing COBRA (keeping your employer's plan, at full price) with a marketplace plan. Losing job-based coverage lets you enroll in a marketplace plan outside the usual window, but only for a limited time.
- **Ask for references while goodwill is high.** Your manager and close teammates feel bad right now and want to help. Ask whether they'd be a reference, and ask for a short LinkedIn recommendation while your work is fresh in their minds.
- **Save what you're allowed to keep.** Personal contacts, your own performance reviews, public work samples. Not company confidential material.

### How to explain being laid off

You'll be asked about it in almost every conversation, including "tell me about yourself" and "why are you looking?" in interviews, so settle on one calm sentence now. Layoffs are common, and nobody serious holds one against you. What they notice is how you talk about it.

**How to explain being laid off in an interview**

"My role was eliminated in a company-wide reduction in March. I'm using it as a chance to focus on [the thing you want next], which is why I wanted to talk to you."

Don't badmouth the company or your manager, even if they deserve it. Don't over-explain. Say the sentence and move to what you want next.

Not every layoff is random, and it's worth being honest with yourself about yours. Ethan Evans, a retired Amazon VP, was laid off twice early in his career. He says both were earned: he was abrasive and critical of his peers, and as a manager today he'd make the same call. His point is the one that matters for you. Whatever the reason, you recover.

> "Look, layoff didn't kill me... If I were now the manager, I'd make the same choice about a version of me that people made about me. The point for you though is if you are subject to a layoff... you can recover from it."
>
> — Ethan Evans, retired Amazon VP. Ethan Evans on YouTube, "Maximizing Your Performance Review and Goal Setting" at [23:45](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ISQUwDiTmDo&t=1425s)

If there's a real lesson in your layoff, take it into the next job. You don't owe anyone that story in your one sentence.

### Questions people ask after a layoff

#### How long does it take to find a job after being laid off?

Longer than most people expect. In mid-2026 the median stretch of unemployment in the US was about 11 weeks, and roughly a quarter of unemployed people had been looking for six months or more ([Bureau of Labor Statistics](https://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.nr0.htm)). Senior roles usually take longer. Plan your money and your energy for months, which is exactly why a few days off at the start costs so little.

#### Is a layoff the same as being fired?

No. A layoff means the company eliminated your role for business reasons. Being fired means you were let go for performance or conduct. Say "I was laid off" or "my role was eliminated," and don't let anyone blur the two, including you.

#### Should you put "laid off" on your resume?

No. Your resume lists dates, not reasons. Explain the layoff in one sentence when someone asks, and use the resume for what you accomplished.

#### Should you post about your layoff on LinkedIn?

It can work well, but post after you've done [step two](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/), not the day it happens. A post that says what you're looking for and what you're good at gives people something to act on. A post that only announces the layoff gets sympathy and very few leads.

#### Can you negotiate your severance?

Sometimes. It's reasonable to ask what's flexible: extra weeks of pay, extended health coverage, accelerated vesting, the wording of your departure and an agreed reference. Whether you can collect unemployment while receiving severance depends on your state, so check with your state's unemployment office before you assume either way.

**Before you move on**

- You've picked a start date for the search, and it's within a week.
- Unemployment, severance and insurance deadlines are written down.
- You've asked two or three people to be references.
- You have one calm sentence that explains the layoff.


---

## Step 2: Build your point of view and your story

_Before you talk to anyone, work out what your target companies need, and write the true version of your story that makes you the answer._

Time: 4 hours to 3 days. Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/story/

### The biggest mistake: starting with networking

The most common mistake I see is jumping straight into networking or applications. People get laid off on Tuesday and by Thursday they're on calls saying "I'm open to a lot of things, let me know if you hear of anything."

That sentence gives the other person nothing to work with. They like you and want to help, but they can't. They don't know what to look for, who to introduce you to, or what to say about you when you're not in the room.

Phyl Terry, author of *Never Search Alone*, puts it as a spear versus a net. If you tell someone you'll take any product job, they'll never think of you.

> "When you're looking for a job, you need a spear and not a net. With a net, everything slips through... If I told you, hey Lenny, I'll take any product job... you are never going to think of me, you're never going to remember me."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Lenny's Podcast, "Land your dream job in today's market" at [31:54](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH3nzRdwYPA&t=1914s)

He adds a useful detail: people can stretch a narrow statement to related roles on their own, but they can't narrow a broad one down to you.

So before any networking, spend about a day on two things:

1. **A point of view** on what the companies you're targeting need right now.
2. **A truthful story** that positions you as valuable to them.

### Why the story comes first

**It's a clear signal to people who want to help you.** When you can say what you're for in a sentence, every person you talk to becomes a scout. They hear about a role or meet a founder and think of you.

**People react far more easily than they answer open questions.** "What do you think I should do?" is hard to answer. "I'm aiming for growth PM roles at Series B fintech companies because I've spent four years on onboarding and activation; does that make sense to you?" is easy. Even if they disagree, you learn something.

### Time-box it

Spend somewhere between four hours and three days on this step. Not more.

Most people either skip it entirely or decide that "the story" means tweaking their resume. The opposite trap is analysis paralysis: weeks of journaling about what you really want while your network goes cold.

Ship a rough version one. You'll improve it in every later step, because each conversation tells you what lands and what doesn't. A little effort up front makes every one of those iterations better.

Terry's own version of this step (a short written list of what you want and don't want, plus conversations with people you trust) takes a couple of weeks, and he's emphatic that it's a draft, not a thesis. Spraying applications feels productive, the way washing the dishes does. Going slow at first lets you go fast later.

> "We're talking about a couple weeks of work here. We're not talking about a 10-month study... It's going slow at first to go fast later."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "Never Search Alone: Phyl Wrote the Book" at [41:53](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnBX7uc14tw&t=2513s)

### Which of three paths are you on?

Everyone falls into one of three paths, and the path decides how you network. Most people think they're one path further along than they are, so be honest.

#### Path one: you know exactly what you want

You can name the role, the level, the kind of company and why you fit. Someone could repeat it back after hearing it once.

Your job is to execute. Build the point of view, sharpen the story, and get to [networking](https://howtogetajob.tech/networking/) quickly.

#### Path two: you know the neighborhood, not the address

You know the kind of role, the industry or a set of companies, but not one specific thing. "Product roles in health tech, maybe ops." This is the most common path.

You still build the point of view. It narrows the field, and a narrower field is easier for other people to help with.

The worry on this path is getting pigeonholed. Chris Lee, who recruits first product hires for startups, says to pick your best target and go all in on it, then change course if it isn't working. Spread yourself "peanut butter thin" across several targets and you read as lukewarm to every hiring manager.

> "Think of it as multiple shots on goal. Figure out what is your ideal dream job. Position your profile for that. And then that's your first shot on goal. See how well that's working... if you conclude it's not working, pivot."
>
> — Chris Lee, founder of Product Scout, which recruits first product hires for startups. Supra Insider, "How a PM recruiter reads your LinkedIn profile" at [16:37](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4mjfJDv1Xt4&t=997s)

#### Path three: you don't know what job you want yet

You don't know what's next, or you want a real change. That's fine, but it changes the ask. You're asking for advice, not a job: "help me figure this out," not "can you refer me?"

You still need self-knowledge: what you liked, what you were good at, what drained you. Asking for advice beats asking for a job you're not qualified for, and it takes self-awareness to tell the two apart.

Bob Moesta, who co-created the Jobs to Be Done framework and wrote *Job Moves*, describes how to do it: work out your skills and what gives you energy, look wide across industries that use them, talk to people who have those jobs, then narrow down. Those conversations double as practice talking about yourself, which most people haven't done in years.

> "Distill your skills, distill what gives you energy... go wide and find many different industries that can do it, go talk to friends, people who have these jobs and start to realize what they are and narrow down to one area."
>
> — Bob Moesta, co-creator of Jobs to Be Done and author of Job Moves. Lenny's Podcast, "How to find work you love" at [33:20](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wypVv9wZtI&t=2000s)

#### How to tell which path you're on

Answer these in writing, in one or two sentences each. Vague answers mean you're on a later path than you hoped.

1. What job title would you type into a job board tomorrow?
2. Name five companies you'd be excited to work at. Why those five?
3. What problem would you be hired to solve, in words a stranger would understand?
4. What's the best evidence that you can solve it?
5. If a friend said "I know someone who's hiring," what would you want them to say about you?

If you can answer all five crisply, you're on path one. If 1 and 2 come out as categories rather than names, path two. If you're stuck on 1 or 3, path three.

**AI prompt: Which path am I on?**

```text
I'm starting a job search and want an honest read on how clear my direction is.

Here's my background (paste your resume or a few paragraphs about your experience):
[PASTE]

Here are my answers to five questions:
1. The job title I'd search for tomorrow: [ANSWER]
2. Five companies I'd be excited to work at, and why: [ANSWER]
3. The problem I'd be hired to solve: [ANSWER]
4. My best evidence I can solve it: [ANSWER]
5. What I'd want a friend to say about me to a hiring manager: [ANSWER]

Classify me as one of three paths:
- Path 1: I know exactly what I want and how I fit. Execute.
- Path 2: I know the type of role, industry or set of companies, but not one specific thing.
- Path 3: I don't know yet, so I should be asking people for advice rather than jobs.

Be blunt. Most people overrate how clear they are. Quote the specific answers that put me on that path, then tell me the single most useful thing I could do in the next 24 hours to move one path closer to path 1.
```

### Build a point of view on what they need

A point of view is a short, specific belief about what your target companies are struggling with right now. It's what turns "I'm a marketer" into "I'm the marketer you need for the problem you have."

You don't need insider access to form one. In an afternoon you can:

- **Read ten job descriptions** for the role you want across different companies. Look for what keeps repeating. The repeated phrases are the market telling you what it's short on.
- **Read what the companies say about themselves.** Recent funding announcements, earnings call summaries, layoff memos, the CEO's posts. A company that just cut staff to "focus on efficiency" is hiring for a different world than one that just raised a big round.
- **Ask an AI to summarize** the strategic situation at each company, then check what it says against primary sources. It saves time, but it will confidently fill gaps.

Write the result down as three or four bullets: the problems these companies have that someone like you could solve.

Alex Rechevskiy, a former Google group PM who now coaches job seekers, pushes this further than I do. He says to stop focusing on what you want altogether and turn the question around: what do they need, and which of those problems can you actually solve? I think you need both. Your wants decide where to aim, and their needs decide what you say when you get there.

> "Don't focus throughout your job search on what you want. Instead, focus on what the company actually wants... Try to turn this whole concept of what do I want, what's next for me, into what did they need? What problems can I actually solve?"
>
> — Alex Rechevskiy, former Google group PM and career coach. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "How to Land a $700K AI PM Job: Full Roadmap" at [4:36](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nbu9JNPDig&t=276s)

**AI prompt: Build a point of view on your target companies**

```text
I'm targeting [ROLE] roles at companies like [COMPANY 1], [COMPANY 2], [COMPANY 3].

For each company, summarize in 3–4 bullets:
- What changed for them in the last 12 months (funding, layoffs, new products, leadership changes, market shifts).
- What they seem to be prioritizing now, based on public statements and their open roles.
- What a person in my target role would most likely be asked to fix or build in their first six months.

Then step back and tell me the 3 problems that show up across most of these companies, phrased the way a hiring manager would describe them.

Mark anything you're unsure about or can't source, and list the sources I should check myself.
```

### Write your story: an elevator pitch template

Your story connects their problem to your evidence. It's your elevator pitch, the answer to "so what do you do?" and the opening of every networking call. It has to be true, it has to be specific, and it has to fit in a sentence or two before you expand it.

A simple elevator pitch template for job seekers:

**Elevator pitch template**

"I'm a [role] who [what you're distinctively good at]. Most recently I [the result that proves it]. I'm looking for [the specific next thing], because [why it fits what they need]."

A few examples, one per path:

**Elevator pitch example: path one**

"I'm a product manager who turns messy onboarding into growth. At Ledgerly I rebuilt activation and took week-one retention from 31% to 44%. I'm looking for a senior PM role on a growth team at a Series B or C fintech, where activation is the bottleneck."

**Elevator pitch example: path two**

"I've spent six years in operations at fast-growing marketplaces, most recently running supply planning for 40 cities. I'm looking at ops and strategy roles in climate and energy companies, because the logistics problems there look a lot like the ones I've solved."

**Elevator pitch example: path three**

"I spent eight years in agency account management and I'm good at keeping demanding clients happy and projects moving. I want to move in-house, but I'm still working out whether that's customer success, partnerships or something else. I'm talking to people who've made that move to learn what fits."

Notice what's missing: adjectives about yourself ("passionate," "results-driven"), a chronological résumé recital, and anything you can't back up.

**AI prompt: Draft my story**

```text
Help me write a short, truthful positioning story for my job search.

My background (resume or notes):
[PASTE]

What my target companies need right now (my point of view):
[PASTE YOUR 3–4 BULLETS]

Write three versions of a two-sentence story in this shape:
"I'm a [role] who [distinctive strength]. Most recently I [specific result]. I'm looking for [specific next thing], because [fit with what they need]."

Rules:
- Use only facts from my background. If a stronger claim would need evidence I haven't given you, ask me for it instead of inventing it.
- No adjectives about me like "passionate", "results-driven" or "strategic".
- Each version should emphasize a different strength.

Then tell me which version a busy hiring manager would remember after hearing it once, and why.
```

### Use it to answer "tell me about yourself"

The same story is your answer when an interviewer opens with "tell me about yourself." The 30-second version works on a recruiter screen or a networking call. In an interview, use the two-minute version: where you are now, the proof, and why this role is the next step.

**Tell me about yourself: sample answer for an experienced professional**

"I'm a product manager who turns messy onboarding into growth. For the last four years I've led activation at Ledgerly, a consumer fintech app. The biggest project was rebuilding onboarding with design and engineering, which took week-one retention from 31% to 44%. Before that I spent three years in growth marketing, which is why I'm comfortable owning both the product and the numbers. I'm looking for a senior growth PM role where activation is the bottleneck, and from what I've read about your new self-serve plan, that's exactly the problem you're working on."

Notice it doesn't start with college or walk through every job. It starts with what you're for and ends with why them. More on interview answers in [step six](https://howtogetajob.tech/interviews/).

### Practice saying it out loud, without bragging

Here's the real blocker. Almost everyone is bad at talking about themselves. It feels unnatural, a bit like bragging, and so people hedge, apologize, and start at the beginning of their career instead of the point.

There's no trick for getting over it. Deb Liu, now CEO of Ancestry and a self-described introvert, says it plainly: it's a learnable skill, and you don't have to love it, you just have to do it.

> "People say, well, you wouldn't understand, I'm an introvert. And I'm like, so was I... This is a necessary skill. And it's a learnable skill. You don't have to be comfortable with it. You don't have to love it. But you just have to do it."
>
> — Deb Liu, CEO of Ancestry and former VP of Product at Facebook. Lenny's Podcast, "Succeeding as an introvert, and why you should PM your career like you PM your product" at [38:58](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MajB5CQUKDA&t=2338s)

The only fix is practice. Lauren Ipsen, an executive recruiter, says most people don't figure out how to tell their story until around their tenth interview. Do those reps before the interviews that count.

> "Practice telling your story. So often people don't do that, especially when they're not looking for jobs. And then it's not until their 10th interview that they know how to tell their story and what they did and what they impacted."
>
> — Lauren Ipsen, executive recruiter, formerly at Daversa Partners. Lenny's Podcast, "Lessons from one of the world's top executive recruiters" at [54:17](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3pofqabzhs&t=3257s)

Here's a free drill that works:

1. **Write two versions:** a 30-second version and a 2-minute version of your story. That's how long an elevator pitch should be: thirty seconds to start, two minutes if they ask for more.
2. **Record yourself** saying the 30-second version on your phone. Don't read it.
3. **Listen back and count the tells:** "kind of," "sort of," "I guess," "just," apologies, and any sentence that starts with a year ("So in 2016 I joined...").
4. **Do it ten times.** Seriously, ten. The first three are awful for everyone.
5. **Say it to a friend**, then ask them to tell you what you do and what you're looking for. If they can't repeat it back, the story isn't clear yet. Rewrite it, not your delivery.

You can also practice with any AI voice mode: paste your story, ask it to play a skeptical hiring manager, and have it interrupt with "so what?" until your answer holds up. Work Coach's elevator pitch practice is another option if you want structured feedback on delivery.

### Update your base resume as part of this

Updating your base resume belongs inside this step, not after it. Writing the bullets forces you to find the evidence for your story, and sometimes it shows you the story is wrong.

[Step three](https://howtogetajob.tech/resume/) covers the resume in detail. Tailoring it per company comes later, during networking and applications.

**Before you move on**

- You know which of the three paths you're on, and you've been honest about it.
- You've written three or four bullets on what your target companies need.
- You have a two-sentence story, and a friend can repeat it back to you.
- You've said it out loud at least ten times.


---

## Step 3: Make your resume back up the story

_Your resume is evidence for the story you just wrote. Most resumes fail in the same few ways. Here they are, each with its own link._

Time: Half a day for the base version. Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/resume/

The resume is intertwined with the story work in [step two](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/). Do them together: the story tells you what the resume has to prove, and writing the resume tells you whether you can prove it.

Each mistake below has its own permanent link, so if someone sent you here from a comment on your resume, that's why.

### How long recruiters actually look at your resume

A person skims it for five to ten seconds before deciding whether to read further. They're looking for one thing: a reason to talk to you. Your job is to make that reason impossible to miss.

Gayle Laakmann McDowell, author of *Cracking the PM Interview*, says this is the thing most people haven't internalized: nobody reads your resume, they skim it. It's the real reason to keep it short, because a great accomplishment on page two simply goes unnoticed.

> "People are not reading your resume, they are skimming. You are looking for somebody saying yes after glancing for 10, 15, 20 seconds at your resume. ... When your resume is three pages, ... some great accomplishment might be on page two and somebody just doesn't notice it."
>
> — Gayle Laakmann McDowell, author of Cracking the PM Interview. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "Cracking the PM Interview: She Wrote the Book" at [1:03:16](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmvrlSghI8w&t=3796s)

That means your resume isn't a record of everything you've done. It's an argument, and it should read like one: what you're for, then the proof.

### Mistake: there's no story

The reader should finish your resume with a clear idea of who you are and what you're good at, and the rest of the page should back it up.

The test: hand the top third of your resume to a stranger for ten seconds, then take it away. Can they say in one sentence what you're for? If they say "some kind of manager?" or list three unrelated things, there's no story.

Fixes:

- Lead with a one-line summary that matches the story from step two. Not a vague objective ("Seeking a challenging role..."), a claim: "Growth product manager. Four years taking fintech onboarding from leaky to compounding."
- Order bullets within each role so the ones that support the story come first.
- Cut or shrink anything that pulls in a different direction, even if you're proud of it.

**Resume summary examples**

"Growth product manager. Four years taking fintech onboarding from leaky to compounding."

"Operations leader for fast-growing marketplaces. Ran supply planning across 40 cities through two years of 3x growth."

"Enterprise account executive. Closes six-figure security deals with long, technical buying committees."

Ethan Evans goes a step further and names the target role right at the top: "Senior product manager seeking director of product management opportunity." He admits not everyone agrees, but his reasoning is hard to argue with. People stay vague because they're afraid of ruling things out, and by not being specialized in anything, they end up the best candidate for nothing.

> "Say at the top of your resume what you want to do. ... I prefer to say senior product manager seeking director of product management opportunity. ... By not being specialized on anything, you're actually not the best person for anything."
>
> — Ethan Evans, retired Amazon VP. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "This Ex-Amazon VP Makes $950K in Retirement" at [1:03:57](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z95pArx8M_c&t=3837s)

### Mistake: two pages (should a resume be one page?)

Should a resume be one page? Yes, for almost everyone, including people with 10 or 20 years of experience. Two pages is a bad sign. Early in your career you haven't done enough to fill two. Later in your career, you're supposed to show judgment about what matters and the ability to be concise, and a second page shows the opposite.

I'm two decades in and my resume is one page.

The exceptions are narrow: senior engineers and researchers with a long list of publications, patents or open-source work some readers expect to see, and countries where a long CV is the norm. If you're not sure you're an exception, you aren't.

### Mistake: listing duties instead of accomplishments

"Responsible for the onboarding flow" tells the reader what was on your plate. It says nothing about whether you were any good.

Every bullet should answer: what changed because you were there?

Evans makes the hiring-side case. Nobody opens a role because they need more work done. They open it because a project is on fire or there's a market to win, so your resume has to show you've solved that kind of problem before.

> "What work did you do? Sure, but what did it result in? Because results are what we look for in higher level people. We don't want to hire someone to do work. We're trying to hire someone to solve a problem."
>
> — Ethan Evans, retired Amazon VP. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "This Ex-Amazon VP Makes $950K in Retirement" at [1:03:10](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z95pArx8M_c&t=3790s)

**Before and after**

**Before:** Responsible for managing the onboarding flow and coordinating with design and engineering.

**After:** Rebuilt onboarding with design and engineering; week-one retention rose from 31% to 44% in two quarters.

Speak simply. If a smart friend outside your industry couldn't understand the bullet, rewrite it.

### Mistake: the result is buried

Readers skim the start of each bullet, so put the number or the outcome there, not at the end of a long sentence. The format for a resume bullet point: the result first, then how you did it, then any context the reader needs.

**Front-load the result**

**Buried:** Partnered with sales leadership and RevOps to redesign territory planning and compensation, which ultimately led to a 22% increase in quota attainment.

**Front-loaded:** Raised quota attainment 22% by redesigning territory planning and comp with sales leadership.

### Mistake: numbers without context

A number on its own doesn't tell the reader whether it's impressive. Shobhit Chugh, a coach who has worked with more than a thousand product managers, gives the example: $10 million in new revenue is huge at a startup doing $20 million, and invisible at Google.

> "The second is the context of the impact. 10 million dollars of revenue might be awesome for a startup who had 20 million dollars. You've got a 50% increase. If you're at Google, no one's going to care at all at Google scale."
>
> — Shobhit Chugh, PM career coach who has worked with more than 1,000 product managers. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "How to Land a Product Management Job" at [1:02:30](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5j84VU9OeY&t=3750s)

Add the denominator: "grew revenue 50% ($10M to $15M)" or "cut churn from 4.1% to 2.6% monthly." If you can't share exact figures, percentages and rough scale ("for a 200-person sales team") still give the reader something to judge.

### Mistake: claiming impact you can't back up

When you can't honestly claim a big result, don't inflate. Interviewers dig into resumes, and an inflated bullet becomes the worst ten minutes of your interview. Climb down the impact hierarchy instead:

1. **You drove an impressive result.** You did something specific and it moved a number. Best case.
2. **Why what you did was impressive.** The result was small or unmeasured, but the work was hard: a tight deadline, a tiny team, a messy legacy system.
3. **You were on an impressive team or product.** You didn't drive the result, but you were part of something that worked, and you can say what your part was.
4. **Scale and exposure.** You worked around real competence and absorbed real processes. Running payroll for 8,000 people across 12 countries teaches you things running it for 20 doesn't.

Level four is legitimate when it says what you did and what that environment required. It turns into name-dropping when it's only the logo.

**Level four, done right and done wrong**

**Name-drop:** Member of the payments team at [famous fintech].

**Legitimate:** Ran month-end reconciliation for [famous fintech]'s European payouts (€2B a month); built the close checklist the team still uses.

### Mistake: leaving short jobs off your resume

It's tempting to leave off the job you held for seven months. Don't. Lauren Ipsen, an executive recruiter, says hiding short stints is almost more of a red flag than including them. It happened, and the people you talk to will find out.

> "People will often, because they're so afraid of that narrative, not include on their resume companies that they didn't stay for a year. And in my personal opinion, that's actually almost more of a red flag, because that did happen."
>
> — Lauren Ipsen, executive recruiter, formerly at Daversa Partners. Lenny's Podcast, "Lessons from one of the world's top executive recruiters" at [50:42](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3pofqabzhs&t=3042s)

One short stint is normal: layoffs and pivots happen. A pattern is a real flag, and the answer is a clear one-line reason for each move, not omission. Be straight about dates and tell the story in the conversation.

### Mistake: two columns, graphics and formatting that fight the reader

Use one column, a plain layout and a standard font. Two-column resumes look tidy, but they're harder to skim and often come out scrambled when software parses them. No skill bars, graphics, photos (in the US), icons or two-tone sidebars. Creative formatting makes a resume harder to skim and can garble the text when it's parsed into an applicant tracking system.

Designers are a partial exception: your portfolio carries the visual argument, and the resume should still be easy to skim.

### Mistake: the skills dump

A block of 40 keywords ("Agile, Jira, Leadership, Excel, Stakeholder Management, SQL...") tells the reader nothing, and the soft skills in it read as filler. Keep a short skills line only for hard, checkable things the role asks for: languages, tools, certifications. Show the rest through your bullets.

### Mistake: long bullets and run-ons

A bullet should be one line, two at most. If it's three lines, it's really two bullets or it has filler in it. Cut "successfully," "various," "in order to," "helped to" and "utilized."

### Mistake: typos

One typo makes a reader wonder what else you were careless about. Read it out loud, backwards if you need to. Have a friend read it. Run it through a spell checker and an AI, then read it again yourself, because both will miss things.

### Mistake: education at the top

After your first few years of work, what you've done matters more than where you studied. Put education at the bottom. Keep it at the top only if you're a recent graduate or the degree is the qualification (a nursing license, a law degree for a legal role).

### Do ATS systems reject resumes?

My position: the robot that secretly rejects good resumes is mostly a myth, and worrying about it is a distraction.

Nickey Skarstad, a director of product at Duolingo, says it in four words: "It's actually me." She screens resumes herself, spends about 30 seconds on each, and gets thousands per role.

> "I actually am the person that's reviewing resumes. People always are like, there's a bot that does it. It's actually me. I spend probably 30 seconds on a resume, maybe no more, because we will get thousands of resumes for an open role."
>
> — Nickey Skarstad, director of product at Duolingo. Supra Insider, "How top companies evaluate PM candidates in 2025 (Stripe, Duolingo, LTK)" at [12:48](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=otQ3eeEvBf4&t=768s)

Most applicant tracking systems are databases and workflow tools. Recruiters use them to search, filter and skim. Where you do get auto-rejected, it's usually from knockout questions you answered: work authorization, location, a required license. AI screening is spreading, but it's looking for the same things a human recruiter is: a clear match between the role and your experience.

So do what helps humans and machines both:

- Use standard section headings (Experience, Education, Skills) and a text-based PDF or Word file.
- Use the job's real language where it honestly describes your work. If they say "lifecycle marketing" and you did lifecycle marketing, call it that.
- Make your titles clear. If your official title was "Member of Technical Staff," add what you actually were: "Member of Technical Staff (Backend Engineer)."

Don't stuff keywords, and don't paste the job description in white text. Recruiters see it the moment they open the file.

The specific questions people ask:

- **Does ATS reject PDFs?** No. A normal PDF exported from Word or Google Docs parses fine. A scanned image of your resume doesn't, because there's no text in it.
- **Does ATS reject two-page resumes?** Software doesn't care about length. The human who skims it does, which is why [one page](#mistake-its-two-pages) still matters.
- **Does ATS reject AI-generated resumes?** It isn't checking. The risk is that AI-written bullets all sound the same, and a human reader skims right past them. Use AI to edit, not to invent.
- **Should you put a photo on your resume?** In the US, no. It adds nothing a recruiter needs and can invite bias.

The real reason cold applications fail is volume, not robots. That's why [networking](https://howtogetajob.tech/networking/) is how you actually apply.

**AI prompt: Give my resume the ten-second test**

```text
Act as a busy recruiter who spends 10 seconds skimming each resume. I'm targeting this kind of role: [TARGET ROLE AND LEVEL]. My positioning story is: [YOUR TWO-SENTENCE STORY].

Here's my resume:
[PASTE]

1. After 10 seconds on the top third only, say in one sentence what you think I'm for. Then say whether it matches my story.
2. List every bullet that describes duties instead of impact, and rewrite each with the result first. Where you'd need a number I haven't given, write [NUMBER?] instead of inventing one.
3. Flag any claim that sounds inflated or that an interviewer could easily poke holes in.
4. Tell me what to cut to fit on one page, starting with whatever doesn't support my story.
5. Point out typos, inconsistent formatting and filler words.

Be blunt. Don't praise anything unless it's genuinely strong.
```

### Tailoring comes later

This is your base resume. You'll tailor it for each company in about 30 minutes, as part of preparing for each conversation and application. That's covered in [step five](https://howtogetajob.tech/applying/#tailor-the-application).

**Before you move on**

- A stranger can say what you're for after ten seconds on the top third.
- It's one page, unless you're one of the narrow exceptions.
- Every bullet starts with a result or a strong verb, and none describes duties alone.
- Every claim is one you can defend in detail in an interview.
- Someone other than you has proofread it.


---

## Step 4: Network your way in

_Applying online is a lottery with unlimited tickets. Conversations are how you actually apply. Here's how to have a lot of them, and how each one leads to two more._

Time: Most of your search. Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/networking/

### Networking is how you actually apply

Every open role online gets flooded with applicants, and more of them now come from people using AI to apply to hundreds of jobs a week. A resume that arrives cold competes with all of them. A resume that arrives with someone saying "you should talk to this person" skips the line.

Ethan Evans spent years hiring at Amazon. He puts it from the hiring manager's side: when a big role is open, there are people they know and people they don't, and a bad hire is painful enough that they default to the ones they know. Someone vouching for you is how you move from the second group to the first.

> "I have a role. It's a big important role on my team. I need to hire somebody for it. And I have two choices: people I know and people I don't. Now, from a risk viewpoint, who am I going to default to? Knowing someone gives such a huge leg up."
>
> — Ethan Evans, retired Amazon VP. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "This Ex-Amazon VP Makes $950K in Retirement" at [1:13:35](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z95pArx8M_c&t=4415s)

Recruiters work the same way. Lauren Ipsen, who has filled senior product roles for venture-backed companies, doesn't start a search by messaging strangers on LinkedIn. She starts by asking a handful of people she trusts.

> "I've got probably five of my all-time favorite product leaders in the world that I tap whenever I'm kicking off a search... they're willing to point me in the right direction of great people, make those introductions. And I'm going to know simply because of how great they are that they would never put me in touch with someone that wasn't equally as qualified."
>
> — Lauren Ipsen, executive recruiter, formerly at Daversa Partners. Lenny's Podcast, "Lessons from one of the world's top executive recruiters" at [29:16](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v3pofqabzhs&t=1756s)

So networking isn't a side activity you do while applying. It's how you apply. Most of these conversations are what people call informational interviews or coffee chats: twenty or thirty minutes with someone who knows a company, a role or a field you're aiming at. (There's a full [guide to informational interviews](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/informational-interview/), with questions to ask.) Before each conversation, tailor your resume for the person and company you're about to talk to (that's covered in [step five](https://howtogetajob.tech/applying/#tailor-the-application)).

The playbook changes a bit depending on [which path you're on](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/#which-of-three-paths-are-you-on), but the mechanics below apply to everyone.

### Why you avoid it, and why you shouldn't

The fear is the ask. Asking feels like imposing, or like admitting you need help.

But the people who know you probably like you, and most of them want to help. The worst realistic outcome is a no, and a no is expected and fine. People are busy for all sorts of private reasons, and they may never tell you why. It's about their life, not you.

Ada Chen Rekhi, an executive coach, names the misconception directly: people assume asking for advice is one-sided. It isn't. Helping someone feels good, especially when it only takes a few minutes and you later hear how it turned out.

> "A big misconception that people have when they're really getting into this work of asking for advice or input from other people... is often that it's really one-sided. Right? I'm asking you for help and you're getting nothing out of it. The reminder that I would have for all of you is that it feels really good to help someone."
>
> — Ada Chen Rekhi, executive coach and co-founder of Notejoy. Lenny's Podcast, "How to make better decisions and build a joyful career" at [9:37](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N64vIY2nJQo&t=577s)

### Why helping you is in their interest

Being known as someone who connects good people is a good reputation to have. When someone meets a person who's clearly good, they're usually keen to introduce them, because it reflects well on them.

Don't let that turn into pressure. Moving someone from "sure, I guess" to "I have to introduce you to my friend" isn't hard:

- Show up on time.
- Smile, and be appreciative and enthusiastic.
- Tell the best truthful version of your story.
- Make clear what you can offer.

A little effort here gets people making introductions for you without being asked twice.

### Who to network with first

Order your list by how well you know people.

**Strong ties first.** Close friends, former teammates, people who've seen your work. You can be honest with them about your uncertainty, they'll cheer you on, and early wins build confidence. But they share most of your network, so they're rarely your best leads.

**Then weak ties.** Acquaintances, former colleagues you haven't spoken to in years, friends of friends. These are usually the most valuable conversations, because they know people you don't. The sociologist Mark Granovetter called this "the strength of weak ties" in 1973, and his finding that people often hear about jobs through acquaintances rather than close friends has held up since. Practice on warm ties, then go lukewarm, then weak.

**Then cold, through affinity.** Your network is bigger than you think. Your university and grad school alumni, everyone who has worked at any of your former companies, your running group, your gym, the parents at your kid's school. Anything alum-shaped gives you a reason to reach out.

**AI prompt: Build my outreach list**

```text
Help me build a networking list for my job search.

My story: [YOUR TWO-SENTENCE STORY]
Target companies or kinds of companies: [LIST]

Here are the groups I belong to or have belonged to: [schools, past employers, communities, clubs, online groups, industry associations, etc.]

1. For each group, suggest where to find people from it who work at or near my targets (alumni directories, LinkedIn filters, Slack communities, etc.), with the exact search or filter to use.
2. Suggest five kinds of people I'm probably forgetting about.
3. Give me a simple table template to track: name, how I know them, tie strength (strong / weak / cold), what I'll ask for, date contacted, outcome, intros offered.
```

### Match the ask to the relationship

The weaker the tie and the less sure you are of your direction, the more you should ask for advice rather than a role.

Asking a stranger to refer you for a job you're not qualified for makes you look clueless. Asking the same stranger "you made the move from consulting to product; how did you decide?" makes you look thoughtful, and often ends with them offering to help anyway.

This is hard to judge about yourself, which is why the [story work](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/) matters. The best forcing function is reading the reactions on your early calls.

When you're unsure, Phyl Terry's "golden question" is the best advice ask I know. Terry wrote *Never Search Alone* and has run job search councils for thousands of people. He sends job seekers on a "listening tour" of people they trust, and gives them one question to ask: *If you were in my shoes, how would you approach this?* It asks for their judgment without asking them to decide on the spot whether to vouch for you.

> "People are terrified to do the listening tour... I asked them to ask a golden question: If you were in my shoes, how would you approach this? I call that the golden question. It really opens the conversation."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Lenny's Podcast, "Land your dream job in today's market: negotiation tactics, job search councils, and more" at [25:07](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH3nzRdwYPA&t=1507s)

### Read the room, then fix the story

Networking is a learning loop. Every conversation tells you whether your story is landing.

| Good signs | Warning signs |
| --- | --- |
| They nod, say "that makes sense" and move on | They look skeptical or ask lots of clarifying questions |
| They volunteer a name or offer an intro unprompted | They say "let me think about who might know" and nothing follows |
| They repeat your story back accurately | They describe you as something you're not aiming for |
| They tell you a company that fits | They suggest something completely different |

If you keep getting warning signs, the problem is usually the story, not the delivery. Go back and narrow it.

### Record your calls

Ask if you can record "for my own self-improvement." It signals a growth mindset, and framed that way, almost nobody says no.

Afterwards, review the call, or have an impartial AI do it. What did they ask? Where did they seem confused? How did you deliver your main points? Did you actually make the ask? You'll learn more from one listen-back than from ten calls you only remember. (Work Coach does this review automatically if you want it done for you.)

### What to say on a networking call: two goals

**1. Get them to like you.** People help people they like. Be enthusiastic, on time, confident and lively, someone they'd want to be associated with. If you're on path one, project confidence fully. Never lie or fake it: put the best truthful version of yourself forward. This gets easier with reps.

**2. Make it easy to help.** Go in with a specific ask and a forwardable blurb ready to send.

Marc Baselga, co-host of Supra Insider, describes getting exactly this kind of note from a friend who'd just been laid off. Instead of "connect me to all these people," it explained what happened, what he was looking for and what he was doing in the meantime. The ask was light, and that made him want to help.

> "Even your ask was just so light... You literally just walked me through the situation, gave me a very detailed update... It was so easy for me to help him. Just getting that update made me want to help him too."
>
> — Marc Baselga, co-host of Supra Insider. Supra Insider, "How I landed a director role in six weeks (with Eric Posen)" at [15:56](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yu6IoUaMDZw&t=956s)

### End every conversation with an ask

Most people do this badly, or skip it. Every call ends with an ask, whatever path you're on. If you're seeking advice, the advice is part of the ask, but there's usually a person, company, role or resource to ask for on top. You can't stay in advice mode forever.

- **If they don't offer, ask directly.** "Would you be open to making a couple of introductions for me?"
- **The more specific, the better.** Name people or companies you've already found, for example by browsing their LinkedIn connections before the call. Your homework is what makes it easy for them.
- **A specific ask is a prompt, not a ceiling.** People forget who's in their network. Naming one person jogs their memory and they'll surface others. Lead with a name, then ask: "Who else comes to mind?"

**The ask, word for word**

"This has been really helpful, thank you. I noticed you're connected to Priya Shah at Northwind. Would you be open to introducing me? I'd love to hear how her team thinks about growth. And is there anyone else who comes to mind I should talk to?"

**Compounding is the whole point.** If every call yields two introductions, you go from "I have no network" to having too many people to talk to, fast. Almost nobody thinks about networking this way. The risk isn't running out of people. It's not asking for enough, and not being proactive enough afterwards.

How many conversations is enough? Andrew Yeung, who hosts tech networking events in New York, gives a simple target for anyone actively searching: at least five new conversations a week.

> "If someone's job seeking, my advice is five new people every week, at least five new conversations every week. If someone is in a job... and they're looking to slowly accelerate their career, maybe it's one new person every week."
>
> — Andrew Yeung, former Google and Meta product leader, founder and event host. Level Up with Ethan Evans, "Be a High-Value Connector & Networker with Andrew Yeung" at [33:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uO0dI_tCvUU&t=2024s)

### How to ask for an introduction: the double opt-in

A **double opt-in introduction** is one where both people agree before they're connected. Your contact first asks the other person whether they're willing to talk, and only connects you once they say yes. That way, everyone who gets on a call with you actually wants to be there.

If your contact doesn't say that's how they'll do it, check: "Would you mind asking them first if they're up for it? I'll send you a short blurb you can forward."

Phyl Terry is blunt about why. Anyone sent to him through an intro he didn't agree to is, in his words, someone he doesn't want to speak to. His fix is the same as ours: ask your contact to get permission first, and write the request for them in their voice so it costs them nothing.

> "What I want you to do is say, Aakash, would you mind actually asking them permission to introduce us? ... I'm going to even give you the template to make your life easy. Here's my attempt in your voice to ask this other person permission to introduce them to me. Make it easy for everybody."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "Never Search Alone: Phyl Wrote the Book" at [55:37](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnBX7uc14tw&t=3337s)

### Write a forwardable intro email

A **forwardable email** is a short note about you, written so your contact can forward it without editing. It's the key to a good intro. Send your contact an email they can read, think "great," and forward in one click. Frame it as "here's a blurb you can easily forward." You don't need to add "feel free to edit."

What it has to do:

- **Say why the recipient should take the call.** You're selling.
- **Sound like the introducer**, so it's not too salesy.
- **Show the introducer understands** what's interesting from the recipient's side and what you have to offer.
- **Make the introducer look good** for connecting high-quality people.

**Forwardable intro email template**

Subject: Intro to Maya Chen?

Hi Priya, would you be up for a quick intro to Maya Chen? She ran growth for the consumer app at Ledgerly, where she took week-one retention from 31% to 44% by rebuilding onboarding, and she's now looking at senior growth roles in fintech. Given what you mentioned about activation being Northwind's big focus this year, I think you'd get a lot out of 20 minutes with her. Happy to connect you if you're up for it.

**AI prompt: Write a forwardable intro blurb**

```text
Write a short email I can send to my contact so they can forward it to someone they're introducing me to.

Me: [YOUR TWO-SENTENCE STORY, plus 1–2 specific results]
My contact (the introducer): [NAME, how they know me]
The person I want to meet: [NAME, ROLE, COMPANY, anything I know about their priorities]
What I want from the conversation: [e.g. 20 minutes on how their team approaches X]

Rules:
- Write it in the introducer's voice, in third person about me, so they can forward it unchanged.
- Under 100 words. One concrete result, one reason this person in particular would find the conversation worthwhile.
- Warm but not salesy. No adjectives like "amazing" or "rockstar".
- End by offering to connect us if they're up for it (double opt-in).

Give me two versions: one more formal, one more casual.
```

### Follow up the same day with a thank-you

Most people skip follow-up, which is why doing it well stands out.

- **Send a thank-you the same day**, including the forwardable blurb for any intros they offered. Send it even if they couldn't offer anything.
- **After you meet the person they introduced you to, close the loop with the introducer** in one short sentence: "Talked to Priya today, great conversation, she's introducing me to her VP." Make them glad they did it.

Sam Lessin, a partner at Slow Ventures, says the thank-you should be short and genuine: we met, I got something out of it, thank you for your time.

> "Follow up with gratitude, like you should send people thank you notes. It shouldn't be long, it shouldn't be ridiculous. But like, we met, I got something out of it. Thank you for taking your time. It's always appreciated."
>
> — Sam Lessin, partner at Slow Ventures and former VP of Product at Facebook. Lenny's Podcast, "How to show up in any room with a low heart rate: Silicon Valley's missing etiquette playbook" at [1:06:14](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtKJ3A6DWTs&t=3974s)
- **Telling everyone when you land the job** comes later, in [step seven](https://howtogetajob.tech/offers/#close-the-loop-with-everyone-who-helped).

**Thank-you email after a coffee chat**

Subject: Thank you, and the blurb for Priya

Thanks again for the time today. Your point about Northwind hiring for the self-serve motion completely changed how I'm pitching myself. As promised, here's a short blurb you can forward to Priya. And no pressure on the others you mentioned, but I'd be grateful for any of them.

The [forwardable intro email guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/forwardable-intro-email/) has more templates, including what to send once you're connected.

### Cold emails for informational interviews

With no introducer, the message has to earn the reply on its own. Lead with the shared affinity and ask for advice, never for a role or an introduction.

- **Channel:** email first, ideally from an alumni directory or community. If you can't find an email, use a LinkedIn connection request with a note.
- **Craft it, don't mass-send it.** It's obvious when someone put in effort. But don't over-research either. Scan their LinkedIn, find one thing that shows you did your homework ("saw you moved from consulting into product"), then make the ask.
- **About five sentences:** the affinity, the one homework detail, who you are, the advice ask, a low-pressure close.
- **Volume:** more than you'd send to friends, but you can't and shouldn't email a thousand people. Start small and ramp up.
- **Expect a low hit rate, and don't judge yourself by it.** Most people either skip cold outreach or do it badly and quit. Very few people in any alumni group ever get asked for advice. The successful-but-not-famous alum is almost never approached, and is often delighted to be. Measure the enthusiasm of the people who reply, not the silence of the ones who don't.
- **Follow up once** if you hear nothing, about a week later.

One caveat for very busy or senior people: some of them will answer a sharp written question but won't take a 15-minute call with a stranger. Jules Walter, a product leader at YouTube, found some of his mentors through cold messages that asked one very clear question. Lenny Rachitsky adds in the same conversation that he has no time for coffee chat requests but will answer a real question quickly. If your target is famous, ask the question in writing and let the call be their idea.

> "You have to show the person that you're going to make really good use of their time. So you have to give really specific context."
>
> — Jules Walter, product leader at YouTube and co-founder of the Black Product Managers Network. Lenny's Podcast, "Leveraging mentors to uplevel your career" at [1:01:48](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zn2JNbZwf00&t=3708s)

**Cold email for an informational interview (alumni)**

Subject: Fellow Michigan alum, quick question about your move into product

Hi Sarah,

I'm a fellow Michigan alum and saw you moved from consulting into product at Stripe a few years ago. I'm a product manager who was just laid off from a fintech startup, and I'm trying to decide between going big-company or staying early-stage. Your path is exactly the one I'm weighing, and I'd really value fifteen minutes of your perspective on how you made that call. Happy to work around your schedule, and thanks either way.

Dan

If you can only reach them on LinkedIn, cut it down to fit a connection note:

**LinkedIn connection note to an alum**

"Hi Sarah, fellow Michigan alum here. I'm a PM weighing big-company versus early-stage, and your move from consulting into product at Stripe is exactly the path I'm considering. Would you have 15 minutes to share how you decided? Thanks either way."

**AI prompt: Draft a cold outreach email**

```text
Help me write a cold email asking for advice (not a job or a referral).

Shared affinity: [e.g. same university, same former employer, same community]
About them (from LinkedIn or their bio): [PASTE OR SUMMARIZE]
About me: [YOUR TWO-SENTENCE STORY]
What I want advice on: [the specific decision or question]

Rules:
- About five sentences: the affinity, one specific detail about them that shows I did my homework, who I am, the advice ask (15 minutes), a low-pressure close.
- Don't ask for a job, a referral or an introduction.
- No flattery beyond the one specific detail. No "I hope this email finds you well."
- Plain and warm, like a person wrote it.

Also write a two-sentence follow-up I can send if I don't hear back after a week.
```

### Questions people ask about networking

#### How do you network when you don't know anyone?

You know more people than you think. Start with former coworkers and classmates, then use affinity: alumni of your schools and former employers, and communities you belong to. Ask for advice, not a job, and end every call by asking who else you should talk to.

#### How many networking conversations should you have a week?

If you're searching full time, aim for at least five new conversations a week, the target Andrew Yeung gives above. The number matters less than ending each one with a specific ask, so it leads to more.

#### How do you ask for an informational interview?

Lead with what you have in common, show you did one minute of homework, and ask for fifteen minutes of advice on a specific question. The [informational interview guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/informational-interview/) has email templates and the questions to ask once you're on the call.

**Before you move on**

- Your list is ordered strong ties, then weak, then cold through affinity.
- You've had your first three conversations with people who like you.
- Every call ended with a specific ask, and you sent the blurb the same day.
- You're reading the signals and adjusting your story.
- You've sent your first batch of cold emails, asking for advice.


---

## Step 5: Turn conversations into applications

_Between a good conversation and an interview sit a handful of small steps people fumble. The referral, the tailored application, the tracker and the recruiter screen._

Time: About 30 minutes per application. Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/applying/

### Do cold applications work?

Rarely. For most roles, so many people apply that a cold application is a lottery ticket. Eric Posen landed a director of product role six weeks after a layoff. The roles he wanted had 500-plus applicants on LinkedIn, so he put almost all his effort into his network. Think about it from the hiring manager's side: with five hundred cold applicants and four referrals, who gets looked at first?

> "Cold applying is dead. I really think it's dead. ... Just try to think a bit from the perspective of the hiring manager. If you have five of those candidates and you have four or five referrals, who are you going to prioritize?"
>
> — Eric Posen, product director who landed his role six weeks after a layoff. Supra Insider, "How I landed a director role in six weeks" at [18:43](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yu6IoUaMDZw&t=1123s)

That doesn't mean never apply cold. Alex Rechevskiy, a career coach and former Google group PM, says his clients' callbacks come from both cold applications and outreach. He still calls outreach "the name of the game," with far higher callback rates, but his point is fair: if you only network, you'll miss things.

> "All the time we get like, I actually got a callback from a cold application. ... So it's always half half. If you're only doing cold applications, of course, you're missing out. If you're only doing networking, you're probably also missing out."
>
> — Alex Rechevskiy, former Google group PM and career coach. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "How to Land a $700K AI PM Job: Full 66-Min Roadmap" at [39:06](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nbu9JNPDig&t=2346s)

So: take every opportunity, apply to roles you find even when you have no contact, and set a weekly goal. Just expect warm applications to convert far better, and spend your time accordingly. Cold applications do better in a few situations: smaller companies with fewer applicants, very specialized roles, and structured early-career programs.

### How to ask for a referral

You get here two ways. Either you spotted a role and then found someone who works there, or someone you talked to brought the role up. Either way, ask them to refer you.

Don't treat this as a bigger ask than an introduction. Most of the time there's little judgment involved, and many companies pay referral bonuses, so people are usually glad to be asked. Do it well, the same way you'd make any other ask: specific, easy to say yes to, easy to say no to.

Not all referrals are equal. Posen found the best ones came from people who work directly with the hiring manager and would message them, not just drop his resume into the referral system. A few of those let him skip the recruiter screen entirely.

> "The most effective referral will be somebody who directly works with the hiring manager. Not just someone who's going to drop your resume into the ATS referral system, but somebody who will ping the hiring manager on their internal Slack and say, hey, I have a really good fit for this role."
>
> — Eric Posen, product director who landed his role six weeks after a layoff. Supra Insider, "How I landed a director role in six weeks" at [22:13](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yu6IoUaMDZw&t=1333s)

So when you can, ask for both: "Would you be comfortable submitting a referral? And if you know the hiring manager, would you be open to sending them a quick note too? I've written something you can paste."

**Referral request message template**

"I'm applying for the Senior Product Operations role on the marketplace team (link below). Would you be comfortable referring me? We worked together on the Atlas launch, so you saw the cross-functional planning that's at the center of this role. I've included the posting, my resume and a short paragraph you can use. Totally fine to say no if you'd rather not, or don't feel you know my work well enough."

For templates for every kind of relationship (a close coworker, a former manager, someone you barely know), see the [referral request guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/referral-request/). Include everything they'll need in one message: the job link and requisition number, your tailored resume, two or three results that match the role, and a short paragraph about you in the third person that they can paste into the referral form.

### Tailor your resume to the job description

Budget about 30 minutes per application to tailor your resume to the job description, with AI help. This isn't a rewrite of your resume.

The goal is to think through what's top of mind for the company right now, and how that shapes the job description and the role they're actually hiring for. A company that just did layoffs framed as "we need to be more nimble and sell differently" is hiring for the world it's moving toward. Show them you already live in that world.

Diego Granados, an AI product manager at Google, describes the job description as a cheat sheet: the company is literally telling you what they want to see.

> "You have to give them exactly what they're looking for. You go and read the job description. ... Think of the job description as a cheat sheet. They're giving you an exam. You have the cheat sheet."
>
> — Diego Granados, AI product manager at Google. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "AI PM @ Google: Crack the Job Search" at [3:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t4hisfA97pE&t=208s)

Then read your resume and ask: does it point toward that north star, and does it back it up?

- Reorder bullets so the most relevant evidence comes first.
- Use their language for things you've genuinely done.
- Adjust your summary line so it speaks to the role.
- Cut anything that distracts from the match.

How well people do this varies, and that's fine. The better you do it, the more success you'll have, but don't boil the ocean. Thirty minutes, then send it.

**AI prompt: Tailor my resume to this company**

```text
I'm applying for this role:
[PASTE JOB DESCRIPTION]

Company: [NAME]. Here's anything I know about their current situation (recent news, funding, layoffs, strategy, what people there told me):
[PASTE OR "nothing yet"]

My base resume:
[PASTE]

1. In 4–5 bullets, describe what's top of mind for this company right now and what that means for this role. Separate what you can source from what you're inferring.
2. Name the 3 things the hiring manager most needs this person to do in the first six months.
3. For each, point to the evidence in my resume that best supports it, or tell me it's missing.
4. Suggest specific edits: a new summary line, which bullets to move up, wording changes that use their language for things I've actually done, and what to cut. Don't invent experience or numbers.

Keep it to what I can do in 30 minutes.
```

### Keep a job application tracker

You don't need a system, just a sane spreadsheet or folder. For every opportunity, track:

| Column | Why |
| --- | --- |
| Company and role | Obviously |
| Source | Referral, intro, recruiter reached out, cold application |
| Date applied | So you know when to follow up |
| Current stage | Applied, screen, interviews, offer, closed |
| Resume version | So you know which one they're holding when they call |
| Contacts | Everyone involved, including whoever referred you |
| People to update | Anyone who helped, so you can close the loop at each stage |
| Next step and date | The single most useful column |
| Notes | What you learned in each conversation |

Set a weekly goal for how many applications you'll send. The tracker is also how you'll see what's working: if warm applications turn into interviews and cold ones don't, that tells you where to spend next week.

[Download a free job application tracker template (CSV)](/tracker.csv). It opens in Google Sheets, Excel or Numbers. The [tracker guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/job-application-tracker/) explains each column and a weekly review routine.

### How to pass the recruiter phone screen

The recruiter screen, usually a 20 to 30 minute phone screen, has one goal: get to the next round. The recruiter should finish the call thinking "this person's great, let's move them forward." You're there to give them evidence, not to gather information for yourself.

Don't treat it as box-checking. Anneli Scopazzi, who has recruited at Figma, Notion and Palantir, points out that recruiters sit in the debriefs with hiring managers. If you treat the call as a formality, you'll probably still pass, but you lose the chance to have the recruiter argue for you.

> "If your experience is perfectly aligned, that recruiter, unless you say something really offensive, is going to pass you forward. But it does risk the opportunity for that recruiter to champion for you, because the recruiter is in these debriefs with the hiring managers."
>
> — Anneli Scopazzi, founder of Boulevard Recruiting, formerly in recruiting leadership at Figma, Notion and Palantir. Supra Insider, "How top PM candidates leverage recruiters to their advantage" at [16:57](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfOu-RcdI8U&t=1017s)

#### Act like a candidate who's in demand

Confident candidates don't grill the recruiter about timelines and process details. It can read as desperate. A well-run recruiter will tell you the next step anyway, and it's fine to ask if they don't. Urgency can come up later in the process, not here.

#### Answer "What are your salary expectations?"

Ask what the range for the role is. Many postings now include one, so reference it if it's there. You don't have to say what you make now or what you want. There's only downside: say a number too low and you've capped yourself, say one too high and you might be screened out.

In a growing number of US states and cities, employers have to post salary ranges and can't ask about your pay history, so you're on solid ground. Hold firm, politely.

Josh Doody, author of *Fearless Salary Negotiation*, has a script for "what are your salary expectations?" that you can use nearly word for word:

**How to answer 'What are your salary expectations?'**

"That's a good question. I don't really have a number in mind right now. I want this move to be a big step forward for my career in terms of responsibility and compensation. I look forward to hearing what you suggest when we get to that stage."

> "That's a good question. I don't really have a number in mind right now. ... I want this move to be a big step forward for my career in terms of responsibility and compensation. I look forward to hearing what you suggest when we get to that stage."
>
> — Josh Doody, author of Fearless Salary Negotiation. Supra Insider, "Fearless Salary Negotiation with Josh Doody" at [19:51](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_frb647TnY&t=1191s)

If they keep pushing, point to the market rather than a personal number:

**If they push**

"My understanding is that the market range for this role and level is roughly X to Y. I just want to make sure this role is in that range."

You're not committing to a number, and you can keep the range generous. If they push a third time:

**Last resort**

"I'm genuinely flexible and more focused on fit right now. I'd rather not anchor on a number before we've both decided it's a match, but I'm confident we'll land in the market range if we get there."

Online applications often ask the same thing in a required "desired salary" field. Leave it blank or write "Negotiable" if the form allows it. If it insists on a number, use the posted range, or the market range for the level if nothing is posted. The [salary expectations guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/salary-expectations/) covers every version of the question.

#### Questions to ask the recruiter

Each one should leave the recruiter more excited about you. The recruiter isn't an expert on the team's work, so ask what they can answer: who specifically they're looking for. Don't ask what the job description already says. Ask them to confirm your read on the one or two areas where your fit is strongest, such as experience level, industry, technology, type of work or a specific skill.

**A good recruiter-screen question**

"The posting reads like a zero-to-one role, which is where I've spent most of my career. When the hiring manager pictures the ideal person, is it someone who's done that specific motion before, or are they weighing something else more heavily?"

A fill-in version: "The posting reads like [your read on the role], which is [your matching experience]. When the hiring manager pictures the ideal person, is it [that], or are they weighing something else more heavily?"

#### Send a thank-you email

Same day, two or three sentences. Thank them, restate your interest in one line, and mention something specific from the call.

**Before you move on**

- Every role you want has a referral attempt, ideally from someone who knows the hiring manager.
- Each application got 30 minutes of tailoring to what the company needs now.
- Your tracker is up to date, including who to update at each stage.
- You have a script for the salary question you're comfortable saying out loud.
- You have one or two recruiter questions ready for each role.


---

## Step 6: Interview like you practiced, because you did

_Interviewing is a learnable test. The people who practice out loud do well again and again. Here's how to prepare, how to answer, and how to come across._

Time: 2 to 20+ hours per round. Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/interviews/

### Interviewing is a learnable test

Like the SAT, interviewing rewards practice. The people who practice score well every time, and the people who wing it are surprised again and again.

It's tempting to resent the format, since interviews are an artificial way to judge how someone will do a job. Mike Curti, a product leader who recently went through a search himself, lost a role he really wanted early on because he wasn't yet practiced. He decided he couldn't change the rules of the game, so he'd learn to play it. Things improved.

> "It happened to me more than once... This is the universe we live in. I'm not going to be able to change the rules of the game, right? So I need to learn how to play the game. So that's where I spent my time and things improved."
>
> — Mike Curti, product leader, formerly at Wayfair, fresh off his own job search. Supra Insider, "Why PM hiring is broken and how to fix it" at [36:28](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDNbG_PEv-c&t=2188s)

So err on the side of over-preparing. This is the one place in your search where spreading yourself thin is the wrong call. Give big interview loops the time they deserve. They rarely collide, so you can afford to.

### How long to prepare for an interview

A rough guide. Err high, and scale up for difficulty and for roles you care about most.

| Stage | Prep time |
| --- | --- |
| Recruiter screen | 2 to 3 hours |
| Hiring manager | 5 to 7 hours |
| Final loop | 10 to 15 hours |
| Big-tech loop | 15 to 20+ hours |

### Start with the company

Before you prepare yourself, find out what you're preparing for: what they screen for, how the process runs, and what types of questions to expect.

- **Glassdoor and other review sites**, for interview reports and question examples.
- **AI summaries** of the company's interview process, checked against the sources above.
- **Anyone in your network who works there** or recently interviewed there. This is the best source by far, and another reason [networking](https://howtogetajob.tech/networking/) matters.
- **Job seeker communities** on Slack, Discord and Reddit for your function.

Paid interview-prep packs and coaching sessions exist for specific companies. For a loop you really care about, they can be worth the money.

### Build a behavioral interview story bank

Your first story is your answer to "tell me about yourself," and you already wrote it in [step two](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/#write-the-story). For the rest, go through the job description line by line. Every requirement should have a story from your experience behind it. Write each story down in a few bullets, using the answer structure below.

Most companies ask variations of the same behavioral questions: a time you led without authority, disagreed with your manager, failed, dealt with a difficult colleague, made a decision with incomplete data, changed your mind. Eight to ten strong stories can cover nearly all of them, because one good story can answer several questions.

**AI prompt: Build my story bank from a job description**

```text
Help me prepare a story bank for an interview.

Job description:
[PASTE]

My resume:
[PASTE]

1. List the 6–8 requirements or competencies this interview will most likely test, in priority order.
2. For each, suggest which experience from my resume is the best story to tell, and the backup. If nothing in my resume fits, say so plainly; that's a gap I need to prepare for.
3. List the 10 behavioral questions I'm most likely to be asked for this role, and map each to a story.
4. For my two weakest areas, tell me the gap question I should expect and how to answer it honestly.

Don't invent details about my experience. Where you need more, ask me.
```

### Practice out loud with mock interviews

Reading over your notes is not practice. Writing out answers isn't really practice either. Gayle Laakmann McDowell, who wrote *Cracking the PM Interview*, says the biggest mistake candidates make is preparing alone, in writing. Interviews are interactive. Do mock interviews, even with a friend.

> "People do too much preparation in this very solo style thing of, I'm going to take a question and I'm going to write down my answer, which is usually a mistake... Even just getting a friend to do a mock interview with you. Interviews are interactive."
>
> — Gayle Laakmann McDowell, author of Cracking the PM Interview. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "Cracking the PM Interview: She Wrote the Book" at [0:24](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kmvrlSghI8w&t=24s)

Recording yourself helps too. Most people have no idea how long they talk until they hear it. A two-minute answer in your head is often eight minutes out loud.

You can practice for free with the voice mode in any AI chatbot, using the prompt below. If you want structured scoring and feedback on your delivery, Work Coach runs mock interviews too.

**AI prompt: Run a mock interview with me**

```text
You're going to interview me for this role. Use voice mode if you can.

Role and company: [ROLE] at [COMPANY]
Job description: [PASTE]
Interview stage: [recruiter screen / hiring manager / final loop / specific round, e.g. product sense]
My resume: [PASTE]

Rules:
- Ask one question at a time and wait for my answer. Mix behavioral questions with questions specific to this role.
- Follow up the way a sharp interviewer would: ask for specifics, push on vague claims, and ask what I'd do differently.
- If I ramble past two minutes, interrupt me politely, the way a real interviewer would.
- After 5 questions, stop and give me feedback on each answer:
  - Did I lead with the result in the first sentence?
  - Was it specific, with numbers and my own actions (not "we")?
  - Did I include what I learned or would do differently?
  - Length, filler words, hedging.
  - The single biggest thing to fix.
- Then ask whether I want to redo my weakest answer.
```

### Watch yourself back

Practice only helps if you can see what to fix, and almost nobody has watched themselves interview. You'll notice things in five minutes of playback that no amount of rehearsing in your head will show you: the answer that wandered for four minutes, the "we" where there should have been an "I," the moment you lost the interviewer.

**Record every mock interview.** Most interviews happen on video calls now, so record on video. You're checking what you said and how it came across on camera.

**For real interviews, ask to record.** People ask whether they can use a tool to record a real interview. You can, as long as you ask first. At the start, say:

**How to ask to record an interview**

"Do you mind if I record this, just for my personal use, so I can keep improving?"

Most interviewers say yes, and the question itself works in your favor: it's a strong signal that you have a growth mindset. Never record without asking. Laws on recording conversations vary, and it's a bad way to start a relationship anyway.

If they say no, that's fine. Debrief instead: within fifteen minutes of hanging up, write down every question you were asked and what you said, as close to word for word as you can, and mark the answers you'd change.

When you watch or read it back, look for:

- **Length.** Any answer over about two minutes, and where it started to drift.
- **The first sentence.** Did it state the result, or start with background?
- **The question.** Did you answer what they asked, or the question you'd prepared?
- **"We" versus "I."** Can they tell what you personally did?
- **Hedges and filler.** "Kind of," "I guess," "just," "sort of," long pauses filled with "um."
- **Their reactions.** Where they leaned in, and where they redirected you. A redirect is a nudge (see [curveballs](#handle-curveballs)).
- **How you look on camera.** Eye line near the lens, decent light, energy at the start, and a smile when you say hello.

Keep a running list of patterns across interviews, and fix one at a time. It's usually the same two or three habits every time.

You can do this yourself with the checklist above, or paste a transcript into any AI with the prompt below. A tool built for it saves the tedium: [Work Coach](https://work.coach) reviews mock interviews and calls you have permission to record, and gives you an impartial read on how you came across.

**AI prompt: Review my interview transcript**

```text
Here's a transcript (or my best reconstruction) of an interview for [ROLE] at [COMPANY]:
[PASTE]

Review it like a candid interview coach:
1. For each answer, tell me its approximate length, whether the first sentence stated the result, and whether I answered the question actually asked.
2. Flag every place I said "we" where the interviewer couldn't tell what I personally did.
3. List my filler words and hedges, with counts.
4. Point out moments where the interviewer seemed to redirect me or lose interest, and what they were probably looking for instead.
5. Name the two habits that hurt me most across the whole interview, and give me a specific drill for each before my next interview.

Be direct. Quote my own words back to me.
```

### Answer with the result first (a better STAR method)

Frameworks like STAR (situation, task, action, result) are fine, but plain STAR has two problems: it front-loads the boring context, and it hides your judgment. Fix both.

1. **Hook.** Open with one sentence that states the result. "I launched a product that reached 100,000 weekly active users in four months."
2. **Situation and task.** Briefly. Only the context needed to understand why it was hard.
3. **Action.** What *you* did, specifically. Say "I," not "we," for the parts that were yours.
4. **Result.** The number, the outcome, what changed.
5. **Reflection.** What you learned, and what you do differently now.

The reflection is the part most people skip, and it's where your judgment shows. Robert Hamilton, an interview coach and former Meta and Google PM, puts it in gym terms: the lesson is the gym membership, and changing how you work is actually going to the gym. Say what you do differently now.

> "We all learn things all the time, and we don't apply them systematically... It's like buying the gym membership, right? You still got to turn up. So the learning is the gym membership. Going to the gym is the upgrade."
>
> — Robert Hamilton, interview coach and former Meta and Google PM. Supra Insider, "What PM candidates get wrong about behavioral interviews" at [19:16](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAq_Ee0_JAA&t=1156s)

Practice until each story sounds natural, not scripted. The substance of the story matters most. Delivery comes with reps.

### Answer gap questions honestly

"Have you managed people?" when you haven't. "Have you worked in healthcare?" when you haven't. Never lie or paper over it. Say it plainly, then tell a story that shows the same work without the title.

**How to answer 'Have you managed people?' when you haven't**

"I haven't had direct reports. What I have done is lead a six-person project team across engineering, design and support for the billing migration. I ran the weekly planning, gave feedback to two junior PMs, and handled the conversation when one person wasn't delivering. So I've done most of the work, without the title."

Gap questions are predictable from the job description. Prepare them in advance.

### Prepare for the stumpers

Most "hard" interviews are preparable: case interviews, take-home assignments, technical screens, product sense, system design. These have known formats and a lot of free practice material. Practice them relentlessly, the way MBA students drill cases.

### Handle curveballs

Sometimes you'll get a question you truly can't prepare for. That's a test of how you think when you're nervous and out of your depth. Show that you ask good questions, reason through the problem out loud, and are coachable.

When the interviewer nudges you, take the nudge. Ben Erez, a former Facebook PM who now coaches candidates, says an interviewer who interrupts or redirects you usually isn't being aggressive. They're telling you you're not giving them the signal they need yet, and giving you another chance.

> "Some people tell me, I hear Facebook interviews are really aggressive and argumentative... they interrupt you and ask you to change direction... That's not them interrupting you. That's them nudging you. That's them telling you you're not giving them the signals that they need."
>
> — Ben Erez, co-host of Supra Insider, former Facebook PM and interview coach. Supra Insider, "Why PM hiring is broken and how to fix it" at [19:24](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dDNbG_PEv-c&t=1164s)

Take a breath. Think out loud. Silence is fine: "Give me a second to think about that" reads as composure, not weakness. The stress is the test.

### How you come across

You have to clear a bar of competence. But past that bar, being likable is the much easier lever, because people want to work with people they like.

Ethan Evans has interviewed more than 2,500 people as an Amazon VP. He says the top two factors in any interview are appearance and enthusiasm. If you seem judgmental of the company, like they have to sell you, you'll turn them off. He goes into every interview wanting the offer, even when he's already decided he doesn't want the job.

> "The number one and two factors in any interview are appearance and enthusiasm... People want to work with people that want to work with them. So if you seem very judgmental of the company and like you have to sell me on it, you're going to turn them off."
>
> — Ethan Evans, retired Amazon VP who has interviewed more than 2,500 people. Lenny's Podcast, "Taking control of your career | Ethan Evans (Amazon)" at [36:31](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GB0P0_nFPTA&t=2191s)

Concretely:

- Smile, and use their name.
- Be genuinely curious about their work.
- Match their energy.
- Never badmouth a former employer or colleague, even when asked about a conflict.

### Questions to ask at the end of an interview

Same principle as the [recruiter screen](https://howtogetajob.tech/applying/#the-recruiter-screen): a couple of really good questions that leave them more excited about you, aimed at who specifically they want and what success looks like. A few that work at the end of an interview:

- "What would make someone exceptional in this role in the first six months, beyond what's in the job description?"
- "What's the biggest problem this team needs solved right now?"
- "What do the strongest people on your team have in common?"
- "How will you measure whether this hire worked out a year from now?"
- "What's something about the team or the work that surprises people when they join?"

Then end with: **"Do you have any feedback for me on this interview?"** It shows a growth mindset, and it flips the dynamic. How they handle an unexpected request for feedback tells you a lot about what working with them would be like. Some interviewers are told not to give feedback. Take what you get and don't push.

Anneli Scopazzi suggests an even more direct version for the hiring manager: "What are your hesitations about me?" (You'll also see it phrased as "Do you have any reservations about hiring me?") It's scary, but you're still in the room and can address the concern before the debrief. She used it herself at Palantir and thinks it kept her in the process.

> "I really like the tip to ask at the end of the interview, what are your hesitations about me? And I did that at Palantir and he answered and I had the opportunity to respond and I think that's what kept me in the process."
>
> — Anneli Scopazzi, founder of Boulevard Recruiting, formerly in recruiting leadership at Figma, Notion and Palantir. Supra Insider, "Inside the new recruiting reality: fewer hires, higher bars" at [42:07](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kEb3cJIN7wM&t=2527s)

She adds a caveat: don't ask every interviewer the same question, because they compare notes. Ask the hiring manager, and the recruiter.

### After the interview: thank-you email and follow-up

- **Send a thank-you email the same day.** Short, specific, one line about something you discussed.
- **Update your tracker**, and tell anyone who referred you how it went.
- **If you have to chase, chase lightly.** You're making sure you didn't fall through the cracks, not trying to change the outcome. A company that doesn't follow up at all is a red flag in itself. Sometimes it's just the recruiter. Sometimes it's a sign of broader dysfunction.

**Thank-you email after an interview (short)**

Subject: Thank you

Hi Maya, thanks for the conversation today. I keep thinking about your point that activation, not acquisition, is the constraint this year, which is the problem I most want to work on. I'm even more excited about the role than when we started. Best, Jordan

**Follow-up email after an interview with no response**

Hi Sam, I wanted to check in on the senior PM role. I really enjoyed meeting the team last week and I'm still very interested. Is there anything else you need from me, and is there an updated timeline? Thanks, Jordan

If you don't get the job, it's still worth one line asking for feedback. Many companies won't give it, but the ones that do often tell you something useful.

**Before you move on**

- You know the company's process and what each round screens for.
- Every requirement in the job description maps to a story in your bank.
- You've done at least two mock interviews out loud, with a person or an AI.
- You've watched or read back at least one, and know the two habits you're fixing.
- Every story opens with the result and closes with what you learned.
- You have your gap answers and your questions ready.


---

## Step 7: Negotiate the offer, then close the loop

_The moment they make an offer, the power shifts to you. Use it calmly: find out what can move, ask once across everything, and leave every company glad they met you._

Time: A few days to a week. Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/offers/

### The power shifts

Until the official offer, you're one of many candidates moving through a funnel. The moment they make an offer, that flips. They've named the person they want, and now they want to close you.

Why it flips:

- **The hiring manager needs someone in the seat.** Every week without one hurts their team.
- **The recruiter is measured on funnel metrics:** applications, screens, interviews, days to close, and above all, how many offers get accepted. Once the company has picked you, a no from you is a miss for them.
- **The recruiter works for the hiring manager, not for you.** Be friendly, but remember whose interests they represent.

The flip side of that metric is that recruiters push for a fast yes. You can almost always ask for more time. Aakash Gupta, a former VP of Product at Apollo, estimates hiring managers grant it around 80% of the time. Use the time well, for example to get informal references on the company and your future manager from people who've worked there.

> "A lot of product leaders are really good at negotiation but somehow think that they can't ask for more time. You definitely can ask for more time once they've decided to make you the offer... Just keep asking for more time and use that time to get those back channel references."
>
> — Aakash Gupta, former VP of Product at Apollo. Supra Insider, "The Product Leadership Job Search with Aakash Gupta" at [50:06](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zi24yxDxeZM&t=3006s)

**How to ask for more time to consider a job offer**

"I'm really excited about this, and I want to give it the attention it deserves. Could I have until Thursday to review the full package and get back to you?"

None of this gives you license to do whatever you want. It gives you the confidence to find out which parts of the offer can move, and to ask how they can make it a yes.

### Know your market

In an ideal world you'd have several offers in flight, so they play off each other. You won't always be there, and how much leverage you have depends on the market. In 2026, most white-collar hiring is a buyer's market: employers have the edge. Know which one you're in.

Either way, know the market range for the role and level. Use salary data sites, posted ranges for similar roles (many US states now require them), and people in your network at similar companies. There's almost always room to negotiate, and not negotiating is itself a signal, especially at senior levels.

Ethan Evans, who set pay for a lot of people as an Amazon VP, says recruiters almost always leave room in an offer, because they expect you to ask. Taking the first number, in his words, makes you "pretty much a sucker."

> "A lot of times, by the way, a recruiter just gives you an initial offer because they're expecting you to ask for more. Recruiters almost always hold some room in their offers... If you take the first offer, you're pretty much a sucker because negotiation is expected."
>
> — Ethan Evans, retired Amazon VP. Ethan Evans on YouTube, "Former Amazon VP Teaches Salary Negotiation" at [14:33](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5a_CBkvXmY&t=873s)

### What you can negotiate besides salary

An offer has more parts than salary:

- Base salary
- Bonus, commission or other incentive pay
- Equity, and its vesting schedule
- Signing bonus
- Start date
- Title and level
- Sometimes: vacation, remote flexibility, relocation, a learning budget

Companies differ in which of these they can move. Base salary is often tied to a band. Signing bonuses and equity are often more flexible, because they're one-time or long-term costs that don't reset the band, which makes them the natural place to ask when base is maxed. Evans has traded salary for an extra week of vacation.

#### Title or salary: which matters more?

Titles come with pay bands. Know where you'd sit in the band. A product manager at the top of the band who gets promoted to senior often sees little or no raise, because they were already paid like one.

Sometimes a higher title at a slightly lower salary is the better deal. If you perform, the pay gets fixed, and the title compounds into your next role. You're optimizing for two things at once: the best offer now, and where you'll be six to twelve months in if it goes well.

### Negotiate on the phone, not over email

Negotiate live, on the phone or a video call, not over email. You learn far more from someone's voice than from their writing, and they'll usually want a call anyway. Use email only to confirm what you agreed. If they insist on email, make exactly the same ask in writing: warm, specific and once.

They'll put pressure on you. "I need to think it over" is always available, and nobody serious will hold it against you.

**Call one: the offer comes in.**

- Thank them, and be genuinely excited.
- Ask how flexible the parts are: base, bonus, equity, signing, level, start date. "Which of these have the most room?"
- Ask, innocently: "Is this as high as you can go?"
- Say you need a little time to think it over, and agree on when you'll get back to them.

**Call two: your one ask.** After you've seen the whole offer and thought about it, make a single request that covers everything: "If you can get to 130 with a 20 signing bonus, I'll sign today." More on this below.

**AI prompt: Plan my offer negotiation call**

```text
Help me prepare for a salary negotiation phone call.

The offer: [base, bonus, equity and vesting, signing bonus, title/level, start date, anything else]
The role and location: [ROLE, LEVEL, CITY or REMOTE]
What I know about the market range: [DATA, SOURCES, POSTED RANGES]
Other offers or processes in flight (be honest; I won't bluff): [DETAILS or "none"]
What matters most to me, in order: [e.g. base, title, start date]
My walk-away point: [OPTIONAL]

1. Tell me whether this offer looks low, fair or strong for the market, and what you're basing that on. Flag what you're unsure about.
2. Draft talking points for call one: thanking them, asking how flexible each part is, asking "is this as high as you can go?", and asking for time.
3. Draft my single final ask for call two, in the form "If you can do X, I'll sign," covering all the variables at once. Give me a primary version and a fallback that trades across variables.
4. Write responses for: "this is our best offer", "we need an answer by Friday", and "what number would make this work?"

Tone: warm, enthusiastic about the role, firm on substance. No bluffing about competing offers.
```

### Negotiate with the recruiter or the hiring manager?

My advice: keep the money conversations with the recruiter, calm and friendly, and save your future manager's goodwill. If things get stuck, your manager can step in and save the day, and that's a good way to start a working relationship. (At a startup without a recruiter, the founder plays both roles. Same calm tone, more care.)

Phyl Terry, author of *Never Search Alone*, strongly disagrees. He wants you negotiating live with the hiring manager whenever the company allows it.

> "Strongly, strongly want you to do it either in person or over the phone, live with the hiring manager. Now some companies won't let you do that, you have to talk to the HR person or whatever, but as much as you can, work with the hiring manager."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Lenny's Podcast, "Land your dream job in today's market: negotiation tactics, job search councils, and more | Phyl Terry" at [1:02:42](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH3nzRdwYPA&t=3762s)

His version starts with what you need to succeed in the role, such as budget, team and support, before you talk about money, so the hiring manager goes to bat for you internally. That's good advice, and it's compatible with mine. Talk to the hiring manager about scope and what success needs. Keep the back-and-forth over numbers with the recruiter, so your first real negotiation with your future boss isn't about your own pay.

### Don't move the goalposts

The most annoying thing a candidate can do is ask for things one at a time: first base, then once that's settled, equity, then the start date. Every new ask reopens the deal and burns goodwill.

Ask early how flexible each variable is, see the whole offer, then state your preferences across all of them at once.

### Push hard on substance, stay warm in tone

The company wants you. In an ideal negotiation you ask for something and they say no. That's healthy: it means you didn't leave anything on the table. It's fine to keep going until "this is the best we can do."

Salary compounds over a career, and changing jobs is the moment to move it. Most people are nervous and don't push hard enough. Phyl Terry cites a long-running figure that people who ask for more money get it the large majority of the time. It's lower in a tough market, but you can still ask.

> "87% of the time, Lenny, when you ask for more money you get [it]. Now, that's a longitudinal statistic, meaning over many years. It's going to be lower in a moment like this, but you can still ask."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Lenny's Podcast, "Land your dream job in today's market: negotiation tactics, job search councils, and more | Phyl Terry" at [1:00:11](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH3nzRdwYPA&t=3611s)

Being likable and negotiating hard don't conflict. There's a big difference between "take it or leave it" and "do you have any room to improve this?"

#### Will they rescind the offer if you negotiate?

Almost never. It's very rare for a company to pull an offer because someone asked what's possible. Josh Doody, who has coached many people through negotiations, has never seen a big or medium-sized tech company do it. By the time they make an offer, they've spent a lot of money and time on interviews.

> "I can think of two examples of job offers that I've seen that went away when the person negotiated... But I've never seen a big tech company or even a medium tech company pull a job offer. And that's with a lot of reps. They just don't do it."
>
> — Josh Doody, author of Fearless Salary Negotiation. Supra Insider, "Fearless Salary Negotiation with Josh Doody" at [26:38](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_frb647TnY&t=1598s)

### Make one final ask: "X gets it done"

After a couple of rounds, once you sense where their ceiling is, make one final request. They went from 100 to 120; you say, "130 gets it done." How much to ask for depends on the market range and on how far they've already moved, so there's no magic percentage. Ask for a number you can justify and would happily sign at. They can say no. If you frame it with real interest in the role, as working with them rather than squeezing them, it won't get the offer pulled.

Doody does the same thing, and he makes it explicit that it's the last request: one thing, and if they can say yes, you're done.

> "I send subtle indicators to the recruiter that this isn't going to go on forever. So I'm not going to ask you for 36 things. I'm going to ask you for one thing. And if you can say yes to that one thing, we're done."
>
> — Josh Doody, author of Fearless Salary Negotiation. Supra Insider, "Fearless Salary Negotiation with Josh Doody" at [33:44](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_frb647TnY&t=2024s)

**If you say a number gets it done and they hit it, you sign.** Don't keep asking. That's the fastest way to turn a great start into a bad one.

### Competing offers, deadlines and asking for more time

- **Never lie about having other offers.** It's easy to check, and it's a terrible way to start.
- **If you have a real deadline on an offer elsewhere**, tell your top-choice companies, even before they've made an offer, so they can speed up. You're looking out for yourself and avoiding being forced to accept for lack of alternatives. Only do this when you're late in their process and have a good relationship with the recruiter.
- **Only one offer, nothing else cooking?** Negotiate exactly the same way. Market range, warm tone, keep going until they say no.

### Play the long game

You never know what happens next. Offers get rescinded for reasons outside anyone's control, like a hiring freeze or layoffs. Or you accept somewhere else, hate it, and come back six months later to a company that says "great, let's do it."

So advocate for yourself warmly and reasonably, and leave every company thinking: reasonable, good to deal with, we'd love to work with them if things change.

### How to accept a job offer

Be enthusiastic. Settle the start date and any other details before you sign. The last thing you want is "Yes, I accept!" followed by "Oh, one more thing..." Set yourself up to start well.

Once you've agreed on the phone, confirm it in writing:

**Accepting a job offer by email after negotiating**

"Thank you, I'm thrilled to accept. To confirm what we agreed: a base salary of $130,000, a $20,000 signing bonus and a start date of November 3. I'll sign as soon as the updated offer letter comes through. I'm really looking forward to working with the team."

### How to decline a job offer

However you feel about them, thank them, say you're sorry it didn't work out, and that you hope to work together in the future. You never know. Do it the same day you decide, because they're probably holding a backup candidate. Leave everyone thinking: gracious, worth the time we invested, I'd work with them anytime.

**How to decline a job offer (email example)**

"Thank you so much for the offer, and for the time you and the team put into the process. After a lot of thought, I've decided to accept another role that's a closer fit for what I'm focused on right now. It was a hard call. I really enjoyed getting to know the team, and I hope our paths cross again."

### Close the loop with everyone who helped

Once you've signed, tell everyone who made an introduction, took a call or referred you. Your tracker has the list. Keep it short and sweet, with real appreciation. These are the people who got you here, and the ones you'll call next time. Some day soon, someone will ask you for an introduction. Say yes.

**Closing the loop**

"Quick update and a big thank you: I've accepted a senior PM role at Northwind, starting November 3. Your intro to Priya was the conversation that got things moving. I really appreciate you taking the time. If I can ever return the favor, please ask."

**Before you move on**

- You know the market range and which parts of the offer can move.
- You negotiated on the phone, warmly, and made one final ask across all variables.
- If they met your number, you signed.
- You declined other offers the same day, graciously.
- Everyone who helped you heard from you within a week.


---

## Guide: The forwardable intro email, for job seekers

_The single most useful email in a job search is one you write for someone else to send. Here's how to ask for an introduction and make it effortless to say yes._

Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/forwardable-intro-email/

Most advice about forwardable emails is written for founders raising money. The same tool works even better in a job search, because the people you're asking are usually friends and former colleagues who already want to help.

A forwardable intro email is a short note you write about yourself, in the third person, that your contact can forward to someone else without editing. You send it right after they agree to introduce you. They forward it to the other person and ask, "Interested?" You only get connected once that person says yes.

### What a forwardable email is

A **forwardable email** is a self-contained message your contact can pass along in one click. It explains who you are, why the recipient should talk to you, and what you're asking for, so the person making the introduction doesn't have to write anything.

It matters because the bottleneck in most introductions is the introducer's effort. They mean to help, then it sits in their inbox for a week because writing a good intro takes thought. If you've already written it, the intro happens the same day.

### What a double opt-in introduction is

A **double opt-in introduction** is an intro where both people agree before they're connected. Your contact checks with the other person first, privately, and only puts you in touch once they say yes. You opted in by asking; they opt in by agreeing.

Phyl Terry, author of *Never Search Alone*, is blunt about why this matters. People introduced to him without his agreement are, in his words, people he doesn't want to speak to. His fix is to ask your contact to get permission first, and to write that request for them in their voice.

> "What I want you to do is say, Aakash, would you mind actually asking them permission to introduce us? ... I'm going to even give you the template to make your life easy. Here's my attempt in your voice to ask this other person permission to introduce them to me. Make it easy for everybody."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "Never Search Alone: Phyl Wrote the Book" at [55:37](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnBX7uc14tw&t=3337s)

The upside for you: everyone who gets on a call with you actually chose to be there.

### How to ask for an introduction

Ask at the end of a conversation, when it's going well. Name the person if you can, because a specific name is far easier to act on than "anyone you know."

**How to ask for an introduction, word for word**

"I noticed you're connected to Priya Shah at Northwind. Would you be open to introducing me? If it's easier, I'll send you a short note you can forward to her first, so she can decide if she's up for it."

If they say yes, thank them and send the forwardable email within the hour, while they still remember the conversation. If they hesitate, let it go gracefully and ask who else comes to mind. The [networking step](https://howtogetajob.tech/networking/#end-every-conversation-with-an-ask) covers the ask in more detail.

### The forwardable intro email template

Write it in the introducer's voice, about you in the third person. Keep it under 100 words. It needs four things:

1. **Who you are, in one line**, with one concrete result.
2. **Why this particular recipient** would find the conversation worth their time.
3. **What you're asking for**, with a time box: 20 minutes, a specific topic.
4. **An easy out**: "Happy to connect you if you're up for it."

**Forwardable intro email template**

Subject: Intro to [your name]?

Hi [recipient], would you be up for a quick intro to [your name]? [He/She/They] [what you do], most recently [one concrete result]. [They're] now looking at [the specific next thing], and given [something specific about the recipient or their company], I think you'd both get a lot out of 20 minutes. Happy to connect you if you're up for it.

Send it with one line on top for your contact: "Here's a blurb you can forward to Priya, so she can decide whether she's up for it. Thanks again." You don't need to add "feel free to edit." If they want to, they will.

### Three forwardable email examples

#### A former colleague introducing you to a hiring manager

**Forwardable email: former colleague to hiring manager**

Subject: Intro to Maya Chen?

Hi Sam, would you be up for an intro to Maya Chen? We worked together at Ledgerly, where she ran growth for the consumer app and took week-one retention from 31% to 44% by rebuilding onboarding. She saw your senior growth PM opening and it lines up closely with what she did for us. I'd vouch for her. Happy to connect you if you're up for it.

#### A friend introducing you to someone at a target company

**Forwardable email: friend to someone at a target company**

Subject: Quick intro? Ops person interested in Gridline

Hi Alex, would you be open to an intro to my friend Jordan Reyes? Jordan has spent six years running supply planning for a 40-city marketplace and is looking at operations roles in energy companies. Gridline keeps coming up, and I thought 20 minutes with you on how your ops team works would help Jordan figure out whether it's a fit. Happy to connect you if you're up for it.

#### A career changer asking for advice

**Forwardable email: career changer**

Subject: Intro to a former agency colleague?

Hi Dana, would you be up for a quick intro to Chris Patel? Chris spent eight years in agency account management, where clients kept renewing because Chris kept their projects on track. Chris is looking at a move in-house and trying to decide between customer success and partnerships. You made almost the same move, so I think 20 minutes of your perspective would be really useful. Happy to connect you if you're up for it.

Notice the third one asks for advice, not a job. When you're changing careers, that's the right ask. People are much quicker to give perspective than to vouch for a fit they can't judge yet.

### Subject lines that get forwarded

The subject line has to make sense out of context, because it's going to land in a stranger's inbox. Keep it short and specific.

- Intro to [your name]?
- Quick intro? [Role] interested in [company]
- Intro: [your name], [one-line description]
- [Mutual contact] suggested we talk

Avoid "Networking request" or "Job opportunity." They read like spam and say nothing about why the recipient should care.

### What the introducer does

You're asking your contact to do three small things:

1. Forward your blurb to the other person with a line like "Interested?"
2. Wait for a yes.
3. Reply-all to connect you both.

That's it. Marc Baselga, co-host of Supra Insider, describes what makes it easy from the helper's side: an outreach note that gave him context and a light ask, rather than a list of people to connect him to. The lighter the ask, the more he wanted to help.

> "Even your ask was just so light... You literally just walked me through the situation, gave me a very detailed update... It was so easy for me to help him. Just getting that update made me want to help him too."
>
> — Marc Baselga, co-host of Supra Insider. Supra Insider, "How I landed a director role in six weeks (with Eric Posen)" at [15:56](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yu6IoUaMDZw&t=956s)

If a week goes by with no word, a gentle nudge is fine: "Just checking whether you had a chance to send that note to Priya. No worries if it's not a good time."

### Reply once you're connected

When the introduction arrives, reply the same day. Thank the introducer and move them to BCC, so they can see you followed up without getting every scheduling email.

**Reply to an introduction email**

Thanks, Sam (moving you to BCC). Hi Priya, great to meet you. I'd love 20 minutes to hear how your team thinks about activation this year. Would Tuesday or Thursday afternoon work? Happy to work around your schedule.

Offer specific times or a scheduling link, and do the logistics yourself. You're the one asking.

### Close the loop with the introducer

After the conversation, send your contact one short sentence: "Talked to Priya today, great conversation, and she's introducing me to her VP." It takes a minute, and it's how you become someone people are glad to introduce again.

Sam Lessin, a partner at Slow Ventures, says the thank-you should be short and genuine. A few lines is enough.

> "Follow up with gratitude, like you should send people thank you notes. It shouldn't be long, it shouldn't be ridiculous. But like, we met, I got something out of it. Thank you for taking your time. It's always appreciated."
>
> — Sam Lessin, partner at Slow Ventures and former VP of Product at Facebook. Lenny's Podcast, "How to show up in any room with a low heart rate: Silicon Valley's missing etiquette playbook" at [1:06:14](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KtKJ3A6DWTs&t=3974s)

When you land a job, tell everyone who made an introduction. The [offers step](https://howtogetajob.tech/offers/#close-the-loop-with-everyone-who-helped) has an example.

**AI prompt: Write a forwardable intro email**

```text
Write a forwardable intro email my contact can send to someone they're introducing me to.

Me: [YOUR TWO-SENTENCE STORY, plus one specific result]
The introducer: [NAME, how they know me and my work]
The recipient: [NAME, ROLE, COMPANY, anything I know about their priorities]
What I'm asking for: [e.g. 20 minutes on how their team approaches X, or advice on a career move]

Rules:
- Third person about me, in the introducer's voice, so it can be forwarded unchanged.
- Under 100 words. One concrete result. One reason this recipient specifically would want the conversation.
- End with a double opt-in line, like "Happy to connect you if you're up for it."
- No hype words like "amazing", "rockstar" or "superstar".
- Give me three subject line options that make sense to a stranger.

Then write the one-line note I send the introducer along with it.
```

### Questions people ask

#### What is a forwardable email?

A short, self-contained email about you, written so your contact can forward it to someone else without editing. It says who you are, why the recipient should take the conversation, and what you're asking for.

#### What does double opt-in mean for introductions?

Both people agree before they're connected. Your contact checks with the other person privately first, then introduces you only if they say yes, so nobody ends up in a conversation they didn't choose.

#### Should the forwardable email be in first person or third person?

Third person, in the introducer's voice. It's going out under their name, so it should read like they wrote it.

#### What if my contact wants to write the intro themselves?

Let them. Send the blurb anyway as raw material. Most people will use it, and the ones who rewrite it still benefit from having the facts in front of them.

#### How do I ask for a referral instead of an introduction?

A referral is a stronger ask: your contact submits you for a specific role and puts their name behind you. The [referral request guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/referral-request/) has message templates. If you're not sure the person knows your work well enough, start with an intro or an [informational interview](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/informational-interview/).


---

## Guide: Informational interviews and coffee chats that lead somewhere

_An informational interview is a short conversation where you ask for perspective, not a job. Done well, it's the most reliable way into a company you don't know anyone at._

Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/informational-interview/

Most guides to informational interviews are written for students. If you've been working for years, the mechanics are the same, but the ask is sharper and the conversation can go much further.

An informational interview, or coffee chat, is a 15 to 30 minute conversation where you ask someone about their work, their company or their career path. You ask for advice, not a job. To get one, send a short, specific email or LinkedIn note, prepare a few good questions, end with an ask, and send a thank-you the same day.

### What an informational interview is for

You're trying to learn something and build a relationship at the same time. Good outcomes include:

- **Perspective** on a role, a team or a career move you're weighing.
- **Signal** on whether your story makes sense to someone in the field.
- **Introductions** to other people, often the most valuable result.
- **A referral**, sometimes, once they know you and your work.

Bob Moesta, who co-created the Jobs to Be Done framework, sends people to have these conversations with others in roles they're curious about. They show you what a job is really like before you apply, and they're practice talking about yourself.

> "Distill your skills, distill what gives you energy... go wide and find many different industries that can do it, go talk to friends, people who have these jobs and start to realize what they are and narrow down to one area."
>
> — Bob Moesta, co-creator of Jobs to Be Done and author of Job Moves. Lenny's Podcast, "How to find work you love" at [33:20](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2wypVv9wZtI&t=2000s)

### How to ask for an informational interview

Lead with what you have in common, show you did a little homework, say who you are in one line, and ask a specific question with a time box. About five sentences.

**Informational interview request email**

Subject: Fellow Michigan alum, quick question about your move to product

Hi Sarah,

I'm a fellow Michigan alum and saw you moved from consulting into product at Stripe a few years ago. I'm a product manager who was just laid off from a fintech startup, and I'm trying to decide between going big-company or staying early-stage. Your path is exactly the one I'm weighing, and I'd really value 15 minutes of your perspective on how you made that call. Happy to work around your schedule, and thanks either way.

Dan

#### Informational interview subject lines

- Fellow [school] alum, quick question about [specific thing]
- [Mutual contact] suggested I reach out
- Question about your move from [X] to [Y]
- 15 minutes on how [company] approaches [topic]?

#### A LinkedIn connection note under 300 characters

If you can't find an email, a connection request with a note works. LinkedIn caps notes at a few hundred characters, so cut to the affinity and the question.

**LinkedIn note to reach out to alumni**

Hi Sarah, fellow Michigan alum here. I'm a PM weighing big-company vs. early-stage, and your move from consulting to Stripe is the path I'm considering. Would you be open to 15 minutes of perspective sometime? Thanks either way.

With busy or well-known people, ask the question in writing and let the call be their idea. Jules Walter, a product leader at YouTube, found some of his mentors through cold messages that asked one very clear question.

> "You have to show the person that you're going to make really good use of their time. So you have to give really specific context."
>
> — Jules Walter, product leader at YouTube and co-founder of the Black Product Managers Network. Lenny's Podcast, "Leveraging mentors to uplevel your career" at [1:01:48](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zn2JNbZwf00&t=3708s)

### How to prepare

Spend 15 minutes, not two hours.

- Read their LinkedIn and anything they've written or said publicly.
- Write down the one thing you most want to learn.
- Have your [two-sentence story](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/#write-the-story) ready, because they'll ask what you're looking for.
- Look through their connections for one or two people you might ask to meet.

Show up on time, be warm and keep to the time you asked for. If you asked for 15 minutes, offer to stop at 15.

### Questions to ask in an informational interview

Pick four or five. You won't get through more in 20 minutes, and the best conversations follow their answers rather than your list.

1. **If you were in my shoes, how would you approach this?** This is Phyl Terry's "golden question," and it's the best single question I know.
2. What does a great first year look like in your role?
3. What do people who are good at this job do that others don't?
4. What's changed about your team or company in the last year?
5. What would you want to know about someone before recommending them for a role like this?
6. When you made the move from [X] to [Y], what surprised you?
7. What do you think I'm underestimating about this kind of role?
8. Who else should I talk to?

Terry, author of *Never Search Alone*, sends job seekers on a listening tour of trusted contacts with that first question. It asks for their judgment without asking them to decide, on the spot, whether to vouch for you.

> "People are terrified to do the listening tour... I asked them to ask a golden question: If you were in my shoes, how would you approach this? I call that the golden question. It really opens the conversation."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Lenny's Podcast, "Land your dream job in today's market: negotiation tactics, job search councils, and more" at [25:07](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH3nzRdwYPA&t=1507s)

### End the coffee chat with an ask

Every conversation ends with an ask, even when the whole call was advice. The most useful one is usually an introduction.

**How to end an informational interview**

"This was really helpful, thank you. You mentioned the team at Northwind is hiring. Would you be open to introducing me to Priya there? I can send you a short blurb to forward. And is there anyone else you think I should talk to?"

If they agree to introduce you, follow the [forwardable intro email guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/forwardable-intro-email/). If it turns out they know your work well and a role is open, it may be time for a [referral request](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/referral-request/).

### Thank-you email after a coffee chat

Send it the same day. Name one specific thing you learned, and include the forwardable blurb if they offered an intro.

**Thank-you email after a coffee chat**

Subject: Thank you

Hi Sarah, thanks so much for the time today. Your point about picking the manager over the company size really reframed how I'm thinking about this. I'll let you know where I land. And as promised, here's a short blurb you can forward to Priya if she's up for it.

Dan

Ada Chen Rekhi, an executive coach, points out that helping someone feels good to the helper, especially when they later hear how it turned out. So when you act on their advice, tell them.

> "A big misconception that people have when they're really getting into this work of asking for advice or input from other people... is often that it's really one-sided. Right? I'm asking you for help and you're getting nothing out of it. The reminder that I would have for all of you is that it feels really good to help someone."
>
> — Ada Chen Rekhi, executive coach and co-founder of Notejoy. Lenny's Podcast, "How to make better decisions and build a joyful career" at [9:37](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N64vIY2nJQo&t=577s)

### Follow-up email if they don't respond

Send one follow-up about a week later, then let it go. Most silence is busyness, not a no.

**Follow-up email after no response**

Hi Sarah, just floating this back up in case it got buried. I'd still really value 15 minutes of your perspective on the big-company vs. early-stage question. No worries at all if now isn't a good time.

How many should you do? Andrew Yeung, who hosts tech networking events, suggests at least five new conversations a week while you're actively searching. Track them in your [job application tracker](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/job-application-tracker/).

**AI prompt: Prepare for an informational interview**

```text
I have an informational interview (coffee chat) coming up. Help me prepare.

The person: [NAME, ROLE, COMPANY, and anything from their LinkedIn or public writing]
How we're connected: [e.g. same university, introduced by a friend, cold outreach]
My situation: [YOUR TWO-SENTENCE STORY and the decision I'm weighing]
What I most want to learn: [ONE THING]

1. Give me 6 questions tailored to this person, starting with "If you were in my shoes, how would you approach this?" Make each specific to their path, not generic.
2. Suggest one specific ask to end with (an introduction, a resource or a next step), based on what I've told you.
3. Draft a 3-sentence thank-you email I can send the same day, with a placeholder for the most useful thing they said.
```

### Questions people ask

#### Is an informational interview the same as a coffee chat?

Yes, for practical purposes. "Informational interview" sounds more formal and "coffee chat" more casual, but both mean a short conversation where you ask for perspective rather than a job.

#### Should I ask for a job in an informational interview?

No. Ask for advice and, at the end, for an introduction or a next step. If they offer to refer you, say yes. Asking a stranger for a job in the first conversation usually ends the relationship there.

#### How long should an informational interview be?

Ask for 15 to 20 minutes and respect it. If the conversation is going well, they'll offer to keep going.

#### Do I need to send a thank-you email after an informational interview?

Yes, the same day. Keep it short and specific, and include anything you promised, like a forwardable blurb.


---

## Guide: A free job application tracker, and how to use it

_A job search generates dozens of threads at once. A simple spreadsheet keeps them from falling through the cracks, and shows you where to spend next week._

Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/job-application-tracker/

You don't need an app to run a job search. You need one place where every opportunity and every person lives, and a habit of looking at it once a week.

A job application tracker is a spreadsheet with one row per opportunity: the company, the role, where it came from, the current stage, the next step and the people involved. Download the free template below, open it in Google Sheets or Excel, add a row every time something starts, and review it weekly.

### Download the free template

[Download the job application tracker (CSV)](/tracker.csv). It has the columns below and one example row you can delete.

#### Open it in Google Sheets

1. Go to Google Sheets and create a blank spreadsheet.
2. Choose **File > Import > Upload** and select the CSV you downloaded.
3. Pick **Replace current sheet** and import.

You can also upload the CSV to Google Drive and open it with Google Sheets.

#### Open it in Excel or Numbers

Double-click the CSV, or use **File > Open**. Then save it as a normal workbook (.xlsx or .numbers) so your formatting sticks.

Once it's open, freeze the header row and turn on a filter. That's all the setup it needs.

### What each column is for

| Column | What goes in it | Why it matters |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Company | The company name | Obvious, but sort by it to catch duplicates |
| Role | The exact job title | Recruiters juggle many roles; use their wording |
| Link | The job posting URL | Postings disappear. Save a PDF too for roles you care about |
| Source | Referral, intro, recruiter reached out, cold application | The most important column for learning what works |
| Date applied | When you submitted | Tells you when a follow-up is due |
| Stage | One of the stages below | Lets you filter to what's active |
| Resume version | Which file you sent, e.g. v3-growth | You'll need it in front of you when they call |
| Contacts | Everyone involved, with their role | The referrer, the recruiter, interviewers |
| People to update | Who helped and should hear what happens | So you can close the loop at every stage |
| Next step | The single next action | The column that keeps things moving |
| Next step date | When it's due | Sort by this every morning |
| Notes | What you learned in each conversation | Interview prep, gold for the next round |

The two columns most people skip are **Source** and **People to update**. Source is how you learn where your effort pays off. People to update is how you stay someone others want to help.

### Stages to use

Keep the list short and consistent so filters work:

1. **Researching**: you've found it but haven't applied or reached out.
2. **Reaching out**: you're looking for a contact or waiting on a referral.
3. **Applied**: submitted, waiting to hear.
4. **Recruiter screen**: first call scheduled or done.
5. **Interviewing**: hiring manager or later rounds.
6. **Offer**: you have one.
7. **Closed**: rejected, withdrawn or accepted. Note which in Notes.

### Track people, not only applications

In a good search, most of your rows start as conversations, not applications. Add a row for every [informational interview](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/informational-interview/) and every [introduction](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/forwardable-intro-email/) too, with "Researching" or "Reaching out" as the stage. When a conversation turns into a role, the history is already there.

The People to update column is what makes [closing the loop](https://howtogetajob.tech/offers/#close-the-loop-with-everyone-who-helped) easy at the end. When you accept a job, filter for every name in it and send each person a short thank-you.

### A weekly review that takes 20 minutes

Pick a time, like Friday morning, and go through the sheet:

1. **Sort by Next step date.** Anything overdue? Do it or reschedule it.
2. **Filter to Applied with no response in 10 days.** Send one short follow-up, or move it to Closed.
3. **Update People to update.** Did anything happen that a referrer or introducer would want to hear?
4. **Count the week.** New conversations, new applications, new screens. Compare to your goal.
5. **Pick next week's targets.** Five new conversations is a good default for an active search.

### See what's working

After three or four weeks, the Source column tells you something. Make a simple count: for each source, how many rows reached the recruiter screen or beyond?

If referrals and intros are turning into screens and cold applications aren't, that's your answer for where next week's hours go. Eric Posen, who landed a director role six weeks after a layoff, saw this clearly: the roles he wanted had hundreds of applicants, and almost all his interview processes came from referrals. The [applying step](https://howtogetajob.tech/applying/#why-cold-applications-rarely-work) has his clip.

If nothing is turning into screens, the problem is usually upstream: the [story](https://howtogetajob.tech/story/) or the [resume](https://howtogetajob.tech/resume/), not the volume.

### Other tools

Notion and Airtable work fine if you already live in them, and dedicated job search apps add browser extensions and reminders. The columns matter more than the tool.

**AI prompt: Turn my notes into tracker rows**

```text
Here are my messy notes from this week's job search (calls, emails, applications):
[PASTE NOTES]

Turn them into rows for a job application tracker with these columns:
Company, Role, Link, Source, Date applied, Stage, Resume version, Contacts, People to update, Next step, Next step date, Notes

Rules:
- Stage must be one of: Researching, Reaching out, Applied, Recruiter screen, Interviewing, Offer, Closed.
- Source must be one of: Referral, Intro, Recruiter reached out, Cold application, Conversation.
- If something is missing, leave the cell blank rather than guessing.
- Output as CSV I can paste into Google Sheets.

Then list anything that looks overdue or missing a next step.
```

### Questions people ask

#### What should a job application tracker include?

At minimum: company, role, source, stage, next step and next step date. Add the resume version you sent, the people involved and notes from each conversation, and you'll be prepared whenever someone calls.

#### Is there a free job application tracker for Google Sheets?

Yes. Download the [free CSV template](/tracker.csv) and import it into Google Sheets with File > Import > Upload. It works the same way in Excel and Numbers.

#### How many jobs should I apply to per week?

There's no magic number, and volume alone rarely fixes a search. Set a weekly goal for conversations and applications together, then use your tracker to see which sources lead to interviews and shift your time toward them.

#### Should I track networking conversations too?

Yes. Most good opportunities start as conversations, so give each one a row. It keeps your follow-ups on schedule and shows you which people and introductions are paying off.


---

## Guide: How to ask for a referral, with message templates

_A referral moves your resume from a pile of hundreds to the top of the stack. Here's how to ask for one without it feeling like a favor you can't repay._

Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/referral-request/

Asking for a referral feels like asking for a lot. It usually isn't. Many companies pay employees a bonus for referrals, most referral forms take five minutes, and people generally like vouching for someone good. The hard part is making the ask easy to say yes to.

**The short answer:** name the exact role, say why this person in particular can speak to your work, include everything they'll need in one message (the job link, your resume and a short paragraph about you they can paste), and make it easy to say no. With people who barely know you, start with a conversation, then ask.

### Why referrals matter so much

Popular roles get hundreds of applicants. Eric Posen, who landed a director of product role six weeks after a layoff, put almost all his effort into his network for exactly this reason.

> "Cold applying is dead. I really think it's dead. ... Just try to think a bit from the perspective of the hiring manager. If you have five of those candidates and you have four or five referrals, who are you going to prioritize?"
>
> — Eric Posen, product director who landed his role six weeks after a layoff. Supra Insider, "How I landed a director role in six weeks" at [18:43](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yu6IoUaMDZw&t=1123s)

From the hiring manager's side, a referral lowers risk. Ethan Evans, a retired Amazon VP, describes the choice between people you know and people you don't. Someone vouching for you moves you into the first group.

> "I have a role. It's a big important role on my team. I need to hire somebody for it. And I have two choices: people I know and people I don't. Now, from a risk viewpoint, who am I going to default to? Knowing someone gives such a huge leg up."
>
> — Ethan Evans, retired Amazon VP. Aakash Gupta's podcast, "This Ex-Amazon VP Makes $950K in Retirement" at [1:13:35](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z95pArx8M_c&t=4415s)

### Ask for both: the referral and a note to the hiring manager

Not all referrals are equal. Posen found that the best ones came from people who work directly with the hiring manager and would message them, not just drop his resume into the referral system. A few of those let him skip the recruiter screen.

> "The most effective referral will be somebody who directly works with the hiring manager. Not just someone who's going to drop your resume into the ATS referral system, but somebody who will ping the hiring manager on their internal Slack and say, hey, I have a really good fit for this role."
>
> — Eric Posen, product director who landed his role six weeks after a layoff. Supra Insider, "How I landed a director role in six weeks" at [22:13](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yu6IoUaMDZw&t=1333s)

So when your contact knows the hiring manager, ask for both: the formal referral, and a quick personal note. Offer to write the note for them.

### What to send with a referral request

Do the administrative work yourself. Put everything in one message:

- The exact job title and link, plus the requisition number if there is one.
- Your resume, tailored to this role, as a PDF.
- Two or three results that match what the role needs.
- A short paragraph about you, written in the third person, that they can paste into the referral form or a message to the hiring manager.
- Any deadline you know about.

The third-person paragraph is the part most people skip, and it's the part the referrer actually uses.

**Referral blurb they can paste**

"I worked with Jordan for three years at Northstar. Jordan led the operations redesign for our enterprise onboarding, cutting median launch time by 18 days. The Senior Product Operations role looks closely aligned with that work, and I'd recommend a conversation."

Tell them to edit it so it only says what they personally know. A referral in their words is worth more than your best draft.

### Referral request message templates

Adjust the details, but keep the shape: the exact role, why them, what you've attached, and an easy out.

#### A close friend or former coworker

**Referral request message template (former coworker)**

"I saw the Design Lead opening at Acme and I'm applying this week. Would you be comfortable referring me? You worked closely with me on the mobile redesign, so you can speak to the research and cross-functional parts of the role. I've put the posting, my resume and a short paragraph you can use below. Totally fine to say no."

#### A former manager

**How to ask a former manager for a referral**

"I'm applying for a Director of Operations role at Acme. Since you managed me during the fulfillment expansion, would you be comfortable referring me, or introducing me to the hiring manager? The role centers on multi-site planning and team development, which were the core of our work together. Everything you'd need is below."

#### A LinkedIn connection you barely know

Don't open with the referral. They can't vouch for work they've never seen, and the ask puts them in an awkward spot. Ask for a short conversation about the team first.

**How to ask for a referral on LinkedIn**

"Hi Priya, we're connected through the Product Leaders group. I'm looking at the Growth PM role on your team and would love 15 minutes to understand how the team thinks about activation before I apply. Would you be open to a quick call this week or next?"

#### After a coffee chat or informational interview

If the conversation went well, ask at the end of the call or in your thank-you note the same day. The [informational interview guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/informational-interview/) covers the call itself.

**How to ask for a referral after a coffee chat**

"Thanks again for the time today. Hearing how the team runs experiments made me even more excited about the Growth PM role. If you feel you know enough about my background after our conversation, would you be comfortable referring me? I've attached my resume and a short paragraph you can use. If not, no problem at all, and I really appreciated the advice."

A good way to get there is Phyl Terry's "golden question," asked during the call: *If you were in my shoes, how would you approach this?* It asks for their judgment rather than an endorsement, and people who give advice often become invested in how it turns out.

> "People are terrified to do the listening tour... I asked them to ask a golden question: If you were in my shoes, how would you approach this? I call that the golden question. It really opens the conversation."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Lenny's Podcast, "Land your dream job in today's market: negotiation tactics, job search councils, and more" at [25:07](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH3nzRdwYPA&t=1507s)

#### A stranger at the company

Ask for advice, never a referral. A referral from someone who has never met you is weak, and asking for one makes you look like you don't understand how it works. Use the [cold outreach approach](https://howtogetajob.tech/networking/#cold-outreach) to get a conversation, then follow the coffee-chat template above.

### If they don't reply

Follow up once, after three to five business days, especially if there's a deadline. Then apply anyway. The person isn't responsible for your application, and many referral systems let them add a referral after you've applied.

**Referral follow-up message**

"Quick follow-up since the posting may close Friday. If you're comfortable referring me, everything you need is below. If time is tight or you'd rather not, I completely understand and I'll apply directly today."

### After they refer you

Tell them what happens: when the company responds, before a big interview, and when the process ends either way. Thank them whatever the outcome. If you track your applications (the [job application tracker guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/job-application-tracker/) has a template), add a column for who referred you so you remember to close the loop.

### A prompt to draft your request

**AI prompt: Draft a referral request**

```text
Help me write a referral request message.

The role: [TITLE, COMPANY, LINK]
The person I'm asking: [NAME, how I know them, how well they know my work, whether they know the hiring manager]
My background: [RESUME OR SUMMARY]
The 2–3 results most relevant to this role: [LIST]

Write:
1. A short message asking for the referral (under 120 words). Name the role, say why this person specifically can speak to my work, mention what I've attached, and make it easy to say no.
2. If they know the hiring manager, one sentence asking whether they'd also send a quick personal note, plus that note (under 60 words, in their voice).
3. A third-person paragraph about me (under 70 words) they can paste into the referral form. Only use facts I gave you.
4. A two-sentence follow-up for if I hear nothing in four business days.

Warm, plain and specific. No flattery, no "I hope this finds you well."
```

### Questions people ask

#### Is it OK to ask for a referral?

Yes. Many companies pay referral bonuses, and most people are glad to help someone they think is good. Make it easy to decline and nobody will hold the ask against you.

#### How do you ask someone to refer you for a job?

Name the exact role, say why they in particular can speak to your work, and send everything they'll need in one message: the link, your resume and a paragraph about you they can paste. With weak ties, have a conversation first.

#### How to ask for a referral on LinkedIn from a stranger?

Don't ask a stranger for a referral directly. Ask for 15 minutes of advice about the team or role. If the conversation goes well, ask for the referral at the end or in your thank-you note.

#### Should I apply before or after asking for a referral?

Ask first if you have time, because some referral systems work best before you apply. If the deadline is close, apply anyway and let them add the referral afterwards.

#### What if the referral doesn't lead to an interview?

Thank them anyway and keep them posted on your search. Referrals improve your odds; they don't guarantee anything, and the relationship matters more than any single application. Once you're past the referral, the next hurdle is [the recruiter screen](https://howtogetajob.tech/applying/#the-recruiter-screen) and [the salary question](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/salary-expectations/).


---

## Guide: How to answer 'What are your salary expectations?'

_The question shows up in the first recruiter call and on half the application forms you'll fill out. Here's what to say, word for word, and what to type in the box._

Web: https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/salary-expectations/

You'll be asked this early, usually by a recruiter in the first fifteen minutes, before anyone has decided they want you. That timing is the whole problem. Any number you give now is a guess about a job you don't fully understand yet, and it can only hurt you.

**The short answer:** don't give a number. Ask what the range for the role is, say you're focused on fit for now, and that you're confident you'll land somewhere fair if it's a match. If they push, point to the market range for the role rather than your own number. Save real numbers for after the offer.

### Why you shouldn't name a number first

There's only downside. Say a number that's too low and you've capped yourself, often without ever knowing it. Say one that's too high and you might get screened out of a job you'd have taken. Either way, you're guessing at the level, the scope and the company's pay bands, and the recruiter already knows all three.

Josh Doody, author of *Fearless Salary Negotiation*, makes the same point: naming a number means guessing at things you can't know yet. He has a script that politely declines to guess.

> "That's a good question. I don't really have a number in mind right now. ... I want this move to be a big step forward for my career in terms of responsibility and compensation. I look forward to hearing what you suggest when we get to that stage."
>
> — Josh Doody, author of Fearless Salary Negotiation. Supra Insider, "Fearless Salary Negotiation with Josh Doody" at [19:51](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_frb647TnY&t=1191s)

The question isn't a trap, and the recruiter isn't your enemy. They're trying to make sure nobody wastes time. You can help them with that without giving away your position.

### What to say on the phone screen

**How to answer 'What are your salary expectations?' (script)**

"That's a good question. I don't have a specific number in mind yet. I want this move to be a real step forward in responsibility and pay, and I'd rather understand the role better before anchoring on anything. What's the range you have budgeted for it?"

Then stop talking. Most recruiters will tell you the range, especially if it's already in the posting.

#### When the range is posted

Reference it. A growing number of US states and cities require employers to post pay ranges, so you'll often have one.

**When the salary range is posted**

"I saw the posting lists 150 to 185. That works for me as a starting point, assuming the scope is what I think it is."

This doesn't commit you to the bottom of the range. It confirms you're in the same ballpark and moves the conversation on.

#### When the range isn't posted

Ask for it directly. Anneli Scopazzi, a recruiter who has worked at Figma, Notion and Palantir, says candidates should feel comfortable asking "what is the range, what is the budget for this," and that recruiters don't find it a strange question.

If they won't share it, go to the next section.

### What to say if they push

Some recruiters ask two or three times. Hold firm, politely, and shift from your number to the market's number.

**If they push for a number**

"My understanding is that the market range for this kind of role at this level is roughly X to Y. I just want to make sure we're in that range. Is that consistent with what you have budgeted?"

Use real data for X and Y: posted ranges for similar roles at similar companies, salary sites, and people in your network who do the job. Make the range generous. You're describing the market, not committing to a number.

If they push a third time, this is the last resort:

**Last resort**

"I'm genuinely flexible and more focused on fit right now. I'd rather not anchor on a number before we've both decided it's a match, but I'm confident we'll land in the market range if we get there."

#### What if they ask what you make now?

You don't have to say. In a growing number of US states and cities, employers aren't allowed to ask about your pay history at all. Doody points to California and New York as examples. Wherever you are, a polite redirect works:

**When they ask your current salary**

"I'd rather focus on what this role is worth than on what my last one paid, since the scope is different. What's the range for this position?"

### What to put in the desired salary field on an application

Online application forms are blunter than recruiters. The field may be required, and it won't take a speech. In order of preference:

1. **Leave it blank** if the form allows it.
2. **Type "Negotiable" or "Open"** if the field accepts text.
3. **Enter the posted range**, or its midpoint, if the field only takes numbers and a range is posted.
4. **Enter the market range for the level** if nothing is posted, using the same research as above. If it only takes one number, use a number near the top of the realistic market range rather than the bottom.

Avoid entering 0 or 1 to dodge the field. A human may see it, and it reads as a game.

### After the offer, it's a negotiation

Everything above is about not anchoring early. Once they make an offer, the dynamic flips: they've chosen you and want to close. That's the time to talk real numbers, and to ask for more. Phyl Terry, author of *Never Search Alone*, cites a long-running figure that most people who ask for more get it.

> "87% of the time, Lenny, when you ask for more money you get [it]. Now, that's a longitudinal statistic, meaning over many years. It's going to be lower in a moment like this, but you can still ask."
>
> — Phyl Terry, author of Never Search Alone. Lenny's Podcast, "Land your dream job in today's market: negotiation tactics, job search councils, and more | Phyl Terry" at [1:00:11](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OH3nzRdwYPA&t=3611s)

[Step seven](https://howtogetajob.tech/offers/) covers how to negotiate the offer itself: on the phone, across all the variables at once, with one clear final ask.

### A prompt to prepare your answer

**AI prompt: Prepare my answer to 'What are your salary expectations?'**

```text
I have a recruiter screen coming up and want to handle the salary question well.

Role: [TITLE, LEVEL]
Company: [NAME, stage/size, location or remote]
Posted salary range, if any: [RANGE or "none"]
What I know about market pay for this role: [DATA, SOURCES, PEOPLE I'VE ASKED]
Location / pay-transparency notes: [STATE OR CITY]

1. Estimate a realistic market range for this role and level, and tell me how confident you are and what sources I should check myself. Don't present guesses as facts.
2. Write my first answer (no number, asks for their range), a second answer if they push (market range, not my number), and a final fallback.
3. Write what I should type in a required "desired salary" field on their application form.
4. Write a short, polite response if they ask my current salary.

Keep everything warm, short and natural to say out loud.
```

### Questions people ask

#### How do you answer salary expectations without giving a number?

Ask for their range first, say you're focused on fit, and that you're confident you'll land in a fair range if it's a match. If they push, cite the market range for the role and level instead of a personal number.

#### Should you say your salary expectations if the range is posted?

You can simply reference the posted range: "That range works for me as a starting point." It shows you've done your homework without committing you to the bottom of it.

#### What should I put for desired salary on an application?

Leave it blank or type "Negotiable" if you can. If it requires a number, use the posted range or the market range for the level, and avoid placeholder values like 0.

#### Is it bad to say "negotiable" for salary expectations?

On a form, no. It's common and expected. On a call, "negotiable" alone sounds evasive, so pair it with a question back: "What's the range you have budgeted?"

#### Can giving a salary expectation that's too high cost you the job?

It can get you screened out early, before anyone has seen enough to stretch for you. That's the main reason to let them name the range first. For how to ask for a referral so you skip some of this screening, see [the referral request guide](https://howtogetajob.tech/guides/referral-request/).