Applied to hundreds of UX jobs without success? Consider this your UX job search intervention

Sarah Doody [00:00:00]: Whatever you do, you are an expert at that, but what you’re not an expert at is getting hired. Full stop. Whether you like it or not. Because when was the last time you had to do a job search. Right? Maybe it was a year ago. Maybe it was two years ago. Maybe it was ten years ago. To be an expert at something, you’re doing it all the time.

Sarah Doody [00:00:20]: Right? Hey there. I’m Sarah Doody, host of the career strategy podcast. Many professionals are seeking more impact, flexibility, growth, and let’s face it, getting paid what they’re worth. But how do you unlock this in your career? It starts with strategy. I’m taking you behind the scenes of what’s working for my career coaching clients. You’ll hear strategies and actionable, yet sometimes against the grain, advice for how you can be the CEO of your career and stop dreading Mondays. Ready to level up your career? Let’s get after it. Have you applied to 100 or 200 jobs and not received an interview or an offer yet? If so, this episode is for you, and consider this your job search intervention.

Sarah Doody [00:01:12]: Because if you’ve applied to 100 or 200 jobs so far and not been hired, chances are you’re thinking to yourself, what else can I do, and maybe I should leave this industry entirely? First of all, I want you to know you don’t have to jump ship. Just because your job search has not worked out so far doesn’t mean you can’t salvage it. So today, let’s do your job search intervention. Now how did this episode come to be? Frankly, my team and I were talking behind the scenes about the themes and trends that we see with people who either join our UX job search accelerator or who are considering it and have, frankly, a million questions, understandably. So one person recently said to Becca, who maybe you’ve talked to on the phone or on LinkedIn, but Becca said this person, and we won’t say their name, they said, I’ve sent out 100 to 200 applications with no answer. I should have started sooner. Regret. Right? I should have started sooner.

Sarah Doody [00:02:24]: We hear this all the time as well, where people think to themselves, it’s not gonna be that difficult. I have enough time to get hired. And then three months go by and six and twelve and eighteen months, and they’re still not hired. And they’re still thinking it might just work out if I keep doing it on my own, if I keep going about whatever I’ve been doing so far. Eventually, it’s gonna work out. Eventually, the numbers are going to work out. And your job search is not a numbers game. Your job search is a strategy game.

Sarah Doody [00:03:03]: So if this sounds like you, if this sounds like I am reading your mind right now, then I want to talk to you. So let’s be real. If you’ve sent out 200 resumes and not been offered an interview, let alone a job, then we have to admit that something is wrong. Like it or not, we need to drop our egos and just acknowledge from a data standpoint, something is not working. And the thing is, you can’t get clear on what the root problem is without hitting pause, without taking time to reassess and reevaluate what’s not working, what is working, what’s in your control, what’s not in your control, what can you do with the time you have available to you. And that is what we’re gonna do in this intervention episode, let’s call it. Alright. So you need help.

Sarah Doody [00:04:04]: And sometimes, it’s helpful to think of situations that are not related to your job search. So let’s imagine you’re trying to sell your house, and your house has been on the market for two years, and it still hasn’t sold yet. Well, guess what? That would mean something needs to change. Right? And likely, if your house had not sold even after six months or one year, you would have done something because you’d be thinking to yourself, my house hasn’t sold yet. Maybe I need to change my approach. Right? Maybe you’d get a new realtor. Maybe you would have someone do some staging to make it look better or take better photos. But you wouldn’t just wait and think to yourself, I’ll just I’ll see what happens.

Sarah Doody [00:04:50]: And one year goes by and two years goes by, etcetera. Right? That that wouldn’t make sense. Same thing. Maybe you’re struggling with mental health. Right? And maybe you are reading a bunch of books or kinda piecing your own plan together, or maybe you also have a therapist. But after one year, if you were still not feeling like yourself, if you were still suffering from whatever symptoms that were impacting you, you would probably think to yourself, something’s not working. Maybe I need a second opinion. Maybe I need a different approach.

Sarah Doody [00:05:33]: Right? You wouldn’t just continue to spend time and money on books or on therapy or whatever and just think to yourself, well, eventually, time will be on my side. Right? If you were the CEO of a start up and you launched your beta and after, I don’t know, four months, zero people signed up to your beta, you wouldn’t just sit there and think to yourself, well, let’s just keep doing what we’re doing, and maybe in six months or in eight months, people will join our beta. Right? No. You’d be thinking to yourself, oh, shit. People have not signed up yet. It’s been four months. Something is broken. Right? That is what a CEO would do.

Sarah Doody [00:06:21]: And if your job search is not working after applying to 200 jobs, it’s the same as the startup CEO. Right? It’s a sign that something is not working, and you need to change your strategy. You really don’t want to just cross your fingers and hope the tides change because it didn’t change after 50 applications. It didn’t change after 75 applications. It didn’t change after the ninety ninth application. So that is our reality that we really need to address. Now I said this is an intervention, so we’re gonna come with solutions too. But what is likely happening here, it’s really a matter of you’re too close to the problem.

Sarah Doody [00:07:10]: And one of the tricky things with these scenarios is that there may be people around you that see the problem, but they might be too nice to tell you the truth. Right? Or maybe they just frankly don’t know how to help you, or maybe they are too busy. Right? Maybe you’ve asked your friends or former colleagues or mentor or teacher or old boss or something like that for help. And maybe they say they’re gonna help, but they don’t. Why is that? Because they’re human. They’re busy. They have their own job. They have their own life, etcetera.

Sarah Doody [00:07:47]: And even with the best intentions, sometimes people just cannot help you. And it’s not their fault because this problem is not theirs to solve. It’s your problem to solve, and it’s your opportunity to take ownership and grow not just professionally, but also personally. Because growth doesn’t come from doing the same thing 100, two hundred, three hundred times and not getting the outcome you want. Right? Growth comes from accepting the reality of a situation even if it means you’ve been wrong and whatever you’re doing isn’t working. And it’s accepting that and then looking at that as an invitation to look inward, to learn something, to pivot, to change your approach, and maybe have a different outcome. Right? And career strategy lab, my UX job search accelerator, it doesn’t have to be the thing that you decide to join or do or program you follow. I don’t care.

Sarah Doody [00:08:59]: There’s lots of other avenues to get external advice and structure and feedback and accountability, etcetera. But I’m just gonna talk through the lens of career strategy lab because that’s what I live and breathe, frankly. But whatever you do decide to do as your pivot, whatever advice you decide to follow and hopefully to implement, there are some things I want you to consider. So let’s talk about facts. Right? It’s really, really important when we are stuck that we separate emotions from facts. Earlier today, I had a call with an attorney, and I said a few things and made a few points, and then I said to her, if you think, Sarah, you’re speaking from, like, a very emotional place right now and let me tell you the facts, I said, tell me that. And she said, no. I totally see where you’re coming from, and you are speaking from the facts.

Sarah Doody [00:09:59]: And, you know, we went on with the conversation. But sometimes it is very helpful to gut check because it is so easy to let our emotions take over. So facts. What are the facts of this scenario? Fact number one. Right? Whatever you’re doing isn’t working because you’ve not received offers and or interviews. And now, sure, the job market may not be the best. Right? There may be a lot of competition. There could be layoffs.

Sarah Doody [00:10:30]: There could be problems that are impacting our job search that are outside of our control. And I wanna highlight outside of our control because we can’t control the job market. We can’t control that a bunch of government employees were recently laid off and, you know, coming into the job market. Right? We can’t control those things. But we also have to recognize the part of the problem that is us. That is our actions, our mindset, etcetera. And so I challenge you to think about things such as your confidence. Is your confidence being affected and changing how you show up in interviews? Is your confidence impacting how you show up on LinkedIn? Are you using LinkedIn to vent all your grievances and frustrations with the job market and recruiters and hiring managers and the world, etcetera? And if so, what first impression is that giving? Right? It’s it’s not giving a great first impression.

Sarah Doody [00:11:39]: Another thing to think about is, are you articulating your story and your value clearly? Do you actually believe the story you tell? Or when you read your resume, are you thinking, I don’t believe that, and I still have these imposter thoughts and doubts going through my head. Right? Are you potentially underselling yourself? Right? Are you playing small? Are you maybe allowing what former bosses, managers, colleagues, etcetera, said to you in a previous job or a toxic workplace to belittle you, and the remnants of that are not allowing you to speak in your true power and thus articulate the real amazing work and talent that you have to offer because you’ve been made small by jerks in the past, to be frank. And is your resume or LinkedIn and portfolio really, really what you need to stand out in 2025. Right? There is competition. You cannot sound like everyone else. Your resume, your portfolio cannot be cookie cutter. It can’t sound like wrote it all because guess what? People can spot that from a mile away, and that is not going to be a first impression. Alright.

Sarah Doody [00:13:03]: So here’s another truth because I said we’re talking about facts. The truth is you are likely an expert in whatever you do, right, in experience design, in UX research, in UX writing, in content strategy, product design, project management, product management, information architecture, whatever you do. You are an expert at that, but what you’re not an expert at is getting hired. Full stop. Whether you like it or not. Because when was the last time you had to do a job search? Right? Maybe it was a year ago. Maybe it was two years ago. Maybe it was ten years ago.

Sarah Doody [00:13:42]: To be an expert at something, you’re doing it all the time. Right? You’re, like, living and breathing it. And as a candidate, you’re not an expert at getting hired because it’s not something you do every day. That is why it may be time to get help from the people who are experts at helping people get hired. Right? Because you want to learn from the people who are helping people get hired every single day. Right? The people who live and breathe that. Right? In the same way that if I’m hiring a user researcher, let’s say, and you only do a UX research project every four years versus someone else who does it full time, guess who I may want to talk to? I may want to learn from or hire that person who does UX research all the time versus the person who just does it every four years. Right? Because who’s the expert? More than likely, the person who is doing it more frequently because they have more experience.

Sarah Doody [00:14:49]: Thus, they have more expertise. Right? And I get it. You might be thinking to yourself, okay. That’s easy for you to say. Right? I agree. I’m not an expert at getting hired, but who the heck am I supposed to listen to? Because how do I know if I can trust those people on LinkedIn, on Instagram, wherever, who say that they know the exact formula to get hired? Right? They know exactly what recruiters and hiring managers want to see. They know the seven laws of what makes a resume work. Right? You know what I’m talking about.

Sarah Doody [00:15:25]: You see these crazy posts out there. And the thing is it’s tricky. Right? You have to vet who you listen to. And one tip I will give you, and it’ll only be the one tip about this, is look for the receipts. Look for the receipts. Are they actually helping people get hired? If so, then you might wanna listen to them. Right? Especially if they’re helping people get hired in your industry. Because, sure, you can probably get resume help from a lot of people out there, but having someone tailored to your industry could help you create an even stronger resume than kinda just the generic resume person you find on LinkedIn.

Sarah Doody [00:16:08]: So you’re an expert in what you do. You’re not an expert in getting hired, which is why you’ve applied to 100 or 200 jobs, or your job search has been going on for six months, twelve months, eighteen months, etcetera. And there is support out there if you choose to accept it, and you need to look for the receipts of the people that you’re going to invite to help you with your job search. And it is totally possible to change the trajectory of your job search. I’ve seen this happen so many times, like I said at the beginning, with people who come to me and say, I’ve applied to a hundred jobs, a 50 jobs. I’ve been trying to get hired for two years, three years, etcetera, etcetera. And then they change their approach, and they end up getting hired. But they don’t get hired because they kept doing the same thing.

Sarah Doody [00:17:05]: Now another thing I wanna point out is that this whole journey of getting hired, sure, you want to get hired, but this isn’t just about what you want. It really is about who are you and who are you becoming. Right? Because the fact that you have stuck it out for so long in your job search tells me that you’ve already proven that you’re not gonna give up. Right? You’re not a failure because you kept going. You’ve applied to a 200 jobs. That shows me that you are persistent, but you are someone who also needs to pause to look at the data and make a strategic change. And so the intervention moment here is really for you to ask yourself, am I going to change? Am I going to do something different? Or am I just going to keep going down the same path that I’ve been on for however long you’ve been on it? It’s really a fork in the road here. And if you are wanting to do something differently and you also maybe have listened to every episode of this podcast or maybe you just found this one and it’s the first one you’ve listened to.

Sarah Doody [00:18:23]: But maybe you’ve heard about my UX job search accelerator, or you’ve a friend told you about it, or a former boss or something like that. If you want to learn more or if you’re thinking to yourself, I wanna pursue that, then I’d love to talk to you. The best way to talk to me is on LinkedIn. I will leave my LinkedIn in the show notes of this episode, so you can just click it and find me or just search me. It’s very easy. Just search Sarah Doody, d o o d y, on LinkedIn, and I would be happy to chat about the role that my team and I can play in your job search intervention. Because you’re not broken, you just don’t know a better way, and that’s not your fault because this isn’t stuff you are taught in school. Right? This isn’t a course that’s in college or high school or that your previous company taught you or your boss.

Sarah Doody [00:19:21]: This is important stuff that is overlooked in the education of life, frankly. So I am cheering for you. I cannot wait to talk to you if you want, and I’ll see you on another episode. Talk to you soon. Thanks for listening to the career strategy podcast. Make sure to follow me, Sarah Doody, on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, or LinkedIn. If anything in today’s episode resonated with you, I’d love to hear about it. Tag me on social media or send me a DM.

Sarah Doody [00:19:54]: And lastly, if you found this episode helpful, I’d really appreciate it if you could share it with a friend or give us a quick rating on Spotify or review on Apple Podcasts. Catch you later.