Finally the role I wanted. Here are some of my horror stories…

So as the title suggests I finally was able to land a job in the engineering field after around 493 applications. I wanted to share some of my experience with the later stages when I started to get more success and seeing interviews.

I left my previous role in April of this year due to my hours being drastically cut due to my companies decision to move me to a remote role from in office. (Sidebar: After I “quit” or was forced out, my department completely fell apart as I was the only one who created technical documentation for any and all our project managements needs and nobody could match my previous work or new how to edit pdf’s I guess. Bunch of guys in their late 50’s who barely could work excel let alone bluebeam) My background is in engineering specifically construction based design with an emphasis on structural engineering but I am a Mechanical Engineer with 6.5 years of experience. I honestly felt pretty secure that I would easily land a job and I was terribly wrong.

I started applying for any and all jobs that remotely met my standards and that I thought I was qualified for. After 125 applications I had landed 4 phone screens and one interview which did land an offer but they tried to bait and switch the role where I would have to relocate from the midwest to a small town in Maryland.

After this point it was nearly the end of summer and I really started ramping up my applications. I started shooting for jobs out side of my skill set and stopped making cover letters. I also stopped trying to tailor my resume to meet the jobs. (Odd I know). After around another 200 applications with 0 return I was pretty beat down.

Finally came this Sept/Oct I put zero effort into any of my applications and magically the companies started pouring in. I had gone from 4 months of nothing to 12 separate phone screens and 5 interviews. Nothing changed from my end some roles I reapplied for online. But these were some of the most predatory jobs I had ever had the dissatisfaction for interviewing for.

Interview #1: They used the STAR method but would consistently cut me off before I got an Action or Result like they were trying to hit a PB on rainbow road. No offer and AI response for not being selected on the next round.

Interview #2: A large construction firm in the US that rhymes DE JUNN. The role I applied for was in office role that had little travel mentioned but after the interview went really well. They offered me a different role than I applied for and hit me with 70% travel to be expected. “You don’t even need to have a home or apartment since you are on the road most the time. We cover travel expenses and you can just get a storage unit for your things” (Mind you in my interview I mention I have a family and small children)

Interview #3: One of the Major Ag Business Companies in the Midwest was hiring an engineer to review construction documentation for their project managers. Overall the job was fine sounding until the second part of the new interviewer explained how I looked and sounded like one of the “sissy liberals who like border hoppers”. Exact words that I responded with isn’t this a recorded interview in teams… What prompted this? I asked about working environment like is the office open seating or is there assigned desk because of how large their office is.

Interview #4: I applied for a role as a design engineer at a manufacturing plant. “Are you familiar with this program?” “Well on my resume I have used it in the past and I have X certifications” “Oh I don’t have a copy of your resume. Can you email me one? Man you are too overqualified for this position, this is gonna be a waste of both our time we are interested in someone looking for entry level engineers.” “For a position listed with needing 6 years of experience in design work? And labeled as a mid level role?”

Interview #5: The interviewer consistently called me the wrong name throughout the interview. I assumed it was just some clerical mistake but then they started asking me information on my resume that wasn’t there. Found out after 25 mins this person had the entirely wrong resume and application in front of them and blamed me for not making sure I wasn’t the person they thought.

After I got my offer for my new job I reached back out to some of the recruiters who helped organize interviews and asked them what parts stuck out from my applications and resumes that led to me getting these interviews. I found out that of all the people who responded to me none of them reviewed my cover letters and that my resumes were sorted with an algorithm and then given a grade by someone or something depending how closely I matched their job descriptions. This was from multiple different companies.

Shit feels so awful right now. Chins up to everyone applying and the right people will get you and fuck all the AI sorting BS out there right now.