Application materials · Level Starter · Job hunting Applications Strategy
Application order: which to try first
A dozen targets and no idea about order.
Prompt
One criterion: can a hiring manager tell in twenty seconds that you have done this job. Actions and results, never adjectives.
Task: A dozen targets and no idea about order.
[Before you start, do three things]
1. Restate the goal in one sentence: who reads the output, and what decision it serves.
2. If I have not given you the following, ask me. Do not assume:
- target list and fit
- how prepared I am
- timeline
- fallback options
3. Say how you plan to do it (at most 5 steps) and wait for my go-ahead.
[Go through each of these]
- three tiers: practice, primary, safety
- apply to practice ones first to refine materials
- apply to primary ones after materials settle
- one point to emphasise per company
[Process]
1. Read the job description and extract the three things they screen for
2. Rewrite each experience as context, my action, result
3. Delete unverifiable adjectives
4. Mirror their vocabulary without inventing
5. Name the weakest link
[Output]
Rewritten material, what was cut, what evidence is missing.
[Do not]
- Never invent experience or numbers
- No 'expert' or 'proficient'
- Never one resume for every role
- Do not present duties as achievementsWhat to state before it starts
Leave these unsaid and the model fills them with an assumption. Most 'wrong answers' start here.
- target list and fit
- how prepared I am
- timeline
- fallback options
Go through each of these
Where this kind of work most often goes wrong. Already in the prompt, so you do not have to remember it.
- three tiers: practice, primary, safety
- apply to practice ones first to refine materials
- apply to primary ones after materials settle
- one point to emphasise per company