I was talking to a colleague today when I heard the career center at my college recommends applying to 30-50 jobs per day as a senior. To me, this was a really shocking number. I probably could not apply to 30 jobs in a day even if I had the whole day to myself, locked in a room with no responsibilities.

I think a lot of career advice I hear these days feels just like this. "No one reads anything," "just submit a bunch of applications with AI," "tailor your résumé with keywords so the machine picks it up." In this era of automation and economic upheaval, people are trying desperately to figure out how to get a job in the old system when, in fact, the old system is in the process of falling apart.

Then there's the grifters: Handshake in my emails sending me "fresh new jobs" that are no longer accepting responses with a posting that is woefully out of date, Indeed buying Glassdoor and ruining any chance they have of independently and honestly discussing salary/working conditions, and finally the endless LinkedIn premium pop-ups. Maybe the best way to make money is to not get a job, but to tell people that you have jobs for them... If only they buy our new subscription offering!

I don't want to say that all of this advice, or all of these tools are completely useless. I certainly tailor my résumé based on the application, but I don't do it to fight keyword bots. I think what this kind of career advice misses is that one of the most important things you need as a young person is finding a job you actually want to work. You need to have a clear destination, and you need to take steps towards that dream career.

I want to provide a version of career advice that has been most effective in my anecdotal experience for finding a job that is specific and related to what you are looking for. In my experience as a college student navigating the job market, the best method for finding work you love is about setting yourself up to find people, giving them an opportunity to reach out to you, and having a place to give prospective recruiters a way to understand who you are and what you stand for.

1. The best jobs are the kind that come looking for you.

In my college career, the best job offers I've gotten have come from my "weak ties." It's certainly true that I got fewer opportunities this way, but the opportunities I did get were a much better fit.

For example, my summer research group. I got this offer after talking to one of my professors about wanting to work in the nonprofit software space. He ended up talking about another professor at the college (who I never had but had read a research poster about) and recommended we talk. I ended up joining that student cohort during the year and working little by little on the software in my free time. I soon learned that there were slots open for a paid summer research internship program. I applied, and was accepted with his recommendation.

The moral of this story is that you should tell people the kind of jobs that you want. Especially people in your field/department. This is one of the best ways to find opportunities that really mesh well with your values. Plus, it will help that you already have a recommendation before you even think about writing the application.

2. Talk to everyone!

"Networking" is such a terrible word. It is basically a zhuzhed-up word that means "talking." You are already networking all the time without realizing it. All the social events you go to, all of the birthday parties, movies, plays... All of these are great opportunities to network. Especially if you are a 20-something-college-student, you are probably going around and meeting new people all the time, and having little conversations.

This probably sounds like bad dating advice—because it is bad advice if you're trying to date—but if you feel even a tiny bit of connection, recognition, or understanding with a stranger you really need to give them your email address. I find that business cards^[1] are a great way to do this, especially if you have a blank area to write what you connected about and give them a good prompt to email you about later.

Much like in dating, it's important that you give them information rather than asking for their information. Even though it does mean you might get fewer successful contacts, it means that they can make the decision of whether to reach out to you. If they throw away your card, no harm, no foul!

This is also a slick way to have people reach out to you with more pertinent information. Instead of sending emails like "hi :)" they will send you emails like "Disability Advocacy Group - Need Website - Will Pay." As much as I love an adorable "hi :)" email, I am making the Mr. Krabs dollar sign eyes when I get the second email. You will be surprised how well this strategy works. I definitely was (that second email was real, by the way!)

3. Show me the real you.

There's one more thing that you miss when doing a traditional application. I think a lot of people really under-appreciate the value of the little "portfolio website link" box.

Think: Most of the application is designed and formatted by the employer. Your beauty and uniqueness has a 200-character limit and the text box you're writing it in WILL delete your hard-fought answer if you so much as click at it the wrong way. So, there's a huge amount of power in creating your own website. Obviously, or you wouldn't be reading this right now!

If you are reading this article, you should create your own website right this instant. Get an HTML coding book from your local library. Or, you can stick it to the librarians and use ChatGPT—though I definitely think the book version is more informative, there are many easy to follow guides that are full of pictures and examples.

Even if you think you don't know how to code, you have to try. I am saying this because it really has the power to change your life for the better. Start small, just with a layout of your name, a photo if you are comfortable, a description with your goals and interests, and finally a couple of important links to the places you already create.

The difference between having your own capital-H HTML website and having a social media or a linktree or a canva page is that you are completely in charge. It is the way that YOU decide how you should look on the internet. It also says a lot about who you are as a person, not just in the explicit content, but in the choices you make with the design, the fonts, the colors, etc.

It also is something that you own financially. No one else will put tracking code on it, no one else will advertise their service on it, it is entirely run by you. This might sound expensive, but actually the website you're reading this on costs me exactly $10 each year. That's not even $1/month, which will probably shock you if you've ever gotten a squarespace ad on a podcast.^[2]

Once you have a basic website, you can expand it with a portfolio, about pages, blog posts, and anything else you can think of. Then, you can show off who you really are, and all of the work you do that isn't necessarily résumé worthy.

It doesn't need to be perfect. You don't even need to think it's good. Honestly, there are many parts of this website that I feel need work, but when I show it to people they tend to be impressed and don't notice the flaws. You will always be your own worst critic, and having your own website at all is really a power move in the business world, even if it is just a short description and a link to your résumé and portfolio.

You will be not just the boss of your own place on the .net, you will be The Boss when people look at your website and see how cool it is. Try it!

You got this!

Hopefully some of this advice was helpful to you^[3]. I know it is really difficult to figure this stuff out when you're just entering the job market at this time.

Here are some action items for you to really put this into practice:

• Reach out to someone that can connect you to your dream job: email a professor, message an alum on LinkedIn
• Design your business cards, even if you don't print them. You can find templates online, my college also offers affordable print services for college-branded cards. Yours might too, and if not you can always visit Staples or print them online.
• Create an about page with HTML, even if you don't publish it. Check out "CoderDojo: Build Your Own Website"... it's literally the book I learned to code with when I was younger. Owning your site is power!

Most importantly, remember that everything will work out eventually. Think carefully about what your dream job/best career looks like, and make sure that you are working towards it, and not just treading water.

Please let me know how it goes! You got this!

AI Disclosure: Claude Opus 5.5 was used in the research process for writing this post. The prose is my own. I used (some of) the "compound writing" skills published by Every to form interview prompts/places to expand and update the article, but all the words were written by me and not generated by an LLM, consistent with my policy. I also asked Claude Sonnet 5.5 to perform research to fact-check and ground this post in truth and research. I decided not to include the exact sources within the article because I felt that it works better as an anecdotal/personal narrative piece than a presentation of generational job trends.