Experiments

Job search plannerA job search is a funnel.
Here is the arithmetic.

The worst part of a job search is that it feels like a series of personal rejections when it is actually a funnel with known conversion rates. Twenty applications producing one interview is not a verdict on you; it is roughly the market rate for cold applications, and knowing that in advance changes how the twentieth one feels.

Free, no sign-up. Worked out in your browser, nothing sent anywhere, and the result imports into EvyOS.

80 applications
about 16 weeks at 8 a week, including process time
Applications80
First conversations8
Interview processes4
Offers1
Per application, chance of an offer
1.3%
Weeks of applying
10
Plus process time
about 6 weeks
Total, realistically
16 weeks

80 applications for one offer

At your rates, one offer takes about 80 applications, 8 first conversations and 4 interview processes. That is arithmetic, not a judgement — and the twentieth rejection means the same thing as the second.

No stage is below par

Every conversion is at or above the typical rate, which means the funnel is not broken — it is just long. The lever here is volume and warmth, not fixing a stage.

All cold applications

Referred applications convert several times better at the first stage, which is where your funnel is widest and therefore where leverage is highest. Ten messages to people you already know is usually worth more than fifty more applications.

This result contains something worth keeping.

Send it to EvyOS →

Nothing has left this device. The link carries the result in the part of a URL browsers never send to a server, and you will see exactly what it is going to create before anything is saved.

Share this

Only the link and that one line are shared. Nothing you typed goes with it.

✦ How to use it

Three things that make it work.

1
Use your real numbers if you have them

Twenty applications in is enough to beat the defaults.

2
Find the bottleneck

Each stage fails for a different reason and needs a different fix. Working on the wrong one is common.

3
Set the weekly pace and stop counting

The funnel needs volume. Judging yourself per application is what makes people stop at twelve.

This does the arithmetic. Given the rates you are actually seeing — or sensible defaults if you have not started — it tells you how many applications an offer needs, how long that takes at your weekly pace, and which stage is the actual bottleneck.

The bottleneck is the useful part. A low application-to-screen rate is a CV problem; a low screen-to-interview rate is a positioning problem; a low interview-to-offer rate is a preparation problem. Those need completely different weeks.

✦ The limit

An answer is not a record.

This works something out and then forgets it. It cannot tell you whether the number moved, because it has no memory of the last time you ran it and no idea what you did in between. Every calculator on the internet has that limit, and if it has never bothered you then this one is yours for free for good.

EvyOS is the same structure with the work recorded against it. Send the result across and it becomes real goals, tasks or habits with their dates — then the next answer is computed from what actually happened rather than from what you remember typing.

Questions

Job search planner, answered.

For cold applications to a competitive role, somewhere between 50 and 150 for one offer is normal, and this works out your own number from your own rates. The point of the figure is that the twentieth rejection means exactly what the second one did.
Compare each rate against the typical one. A low application-to-conversation rate is a CV and targeting problem; a low conversation-to-interview rate is positioning; a low interview-to-offer rate is preparation. They need completely different weeks and people frequently work on the wrong one.
Yes, and specifically at the first stage, which is where the funnel is widest — so it is where any improvement has the most leverage. Ten messages to people you already know is routinely worth more than fifty additional cold applications.
Because processes run for weeks after the application goes in. Even a search where you apply for four weeks does not produce an offer in four weeks, and planning without that gap is why people panic in week seven.
Fewer and better, past about ten a week. Volume beyond that tends to mean the same CV everywhere, which lowers the first-stage rate and makes the whole funnel longer rather than shorter.

Keep the answer.
And the record of doing it.

Goals, projects, tasks, habits and skills in one system, with the work logged against what it belonged to.

Start for free