Ghosting, Grinding, and Getting Screwed: Job Search in 2026

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You're listening to HR's most dangerous podcast, Chad Sowash and Joel Cheesman are here to punch

the recruiting industry right where hers.

Complete with breaking news, branch of opinion, and loads of sirens.

Bop-a-lop boys and girls, it's time for the Chad engine's podcast.

Oh, yeah, it's the podcast.

Your bartender warned you about, hey boys and girls, it's the Chad and cheese podcast.

I'm your co-host, Joel Cheesman joined, as always, Chad Sowash is in the house as well

as J.T.

O'Donnell, you know her in lovers, we welcome Jillian O'Malleyer to the show.

She's an expert in employment branding, workplace culture, and talent attraction, Jillian

welcome to HR's most dangerous podcast.

Thank you for having me.

She sounds excited, Chad.

She sounds excited.

She's right.

Well, Jillian, a lot of our listeners probably won't know you, although you have a huge following

on the socials, give us sort of a little bit about what makes Jillian tick.

Yeah.

So I've been doing the employer brand talent marketing thing for about 10 years now.

I did most of it at KRT marketing to start and then recruit X, but I was doing in-house

marketing and brand before that, but mostly I'm just, I am really, really big on talking

about stuff that no one's very comfortable talking about.

Oh, you're at the right place.

Yeah.

Welcome.

Nice.

But outside of that, I just, I hang out with my daughter all the time.

I'm a single mom.

We do all kinds of stuff.

She's a competitive dancer, so my weekends are really consumed with sitting in dark rooms,

with really loud music.

They're not me.

They're not me.

Yeah.

They do not belong to me.

They do not belong to me.

That's just called Tuesday at my house, sitting alone in the dark.

Exactly.

It's basically like going to a rave every single weekend that you paid an absurd amount

of money for, and it's only kind of fun.

I Joel, being a competitive dancer, yeah, that's, that's a, that's a great thing.

That's a great thing.

I'm also the songbird of my generation in case you ever want.

I've heard that.

I've heard that.

Some wordy entertainment.

Yeah, entertainment value.

Well, we're here because you got some problems with the job market as does JT and Chad

and I don't have nearly the experience with searching for a job as, as you to do with

your own experiences as well as people you talk to.

Right out of the gate, I mean, we've heard over and over, right?

And it comes from a variety of people who have jobs.

They don't understand the market, right?

And just people are bitching and moaning and what are they whining about?

So this first video sets us up perfectly because I don't think that a lot of people like

Joel and I both talk about this.

We understand what we read.

We understand BLS data.

We understand, which isn't always great.

But also a lot of the other data points from like the Aspen text and what not.

So we have to do a lot of research, but most individuals in our industry do not do that.

So let's roll that first video and like set this up.

All right, let's go.

So something that I'm realizing, people who aren't currently in this job market are not

understanding.

That I want to spell out very plainly for you.

And we say there are no jobs.

We're talking about jobs in general, like legitimately, any kind of job.

There are more jobs seekers than jobs.

And that is not just white color jobs.

That is not just mid-management jobs.

That is not just leadership level jobs.

Those are jobs.

And you hear someone say, I've applied to 500 jobs this year and not heard back from

any of them.

Do you honestly think that's only 500 jobs only in their niche at their level?

I've applied to 600 jobs.

There is no way in hell that there have been 600 jobs that are like director level or above

for employer brand and talent marketing.

No, I have been applying all over the place to anything that even remotely aligns with

my experience.

Okay, say more 500 jobs.

And for those that don't know, Jillian, you're currently looking for jobs.

You're coming at this from the perspective of applying and seeing firsthand what's going

on.

So for those that aren't doing that, give us sort of a day in the life of job searching

right now.

Yeah, absolutely.

So I'll just kind of set scene.

I was laid off in November of 2024.

So we're at 15 month, 15 and a half months of job seeking.

And so really what it looks like is you're going through, you're searching for jobs, not

just going to LinkedIn and indeed you are contacting your network.

You are reaching out to people.

You are looking, for me, I'm looking at anything that's agency related within recruitment

marketing.

You are tailoring your resume, making sure that at the very least you're hitting some

of the keywords that you can see in the job description and making sure they're highlighted

on your resume.

Sometimes you're doing a cover letter, sometimes you're not doing a cover letter and you're submitting

it via the career site to the ATS.

So then what's happening is sometimes you get a rejection within 25 minutes.

Sometimes you get a rejection at 3 a.m. on a Sunday.

A lot of people got rejections on Christmas Day, which I thought was really interesting.

Sometimes you hear absolutely nothing at all.

That's actually the vast majority.

You apply to something and you're like, well, it was nice meeting you, never hear from

you again.

And then what's happening is if you do manage to get through and usually what I found

is the jobs that you get through are not the ones that you're just like applying to.

But someone, you had an employee referral, you had some kind of an in.

So you're going through, you get an actual interview and then you do another interview

and then another one and then another one and then another one.

And it's three and a half months later, you've had five to six interviews for the job.

And then three and a half months later they go, so we actually decided to change the parameters

entirely.

And do you have this totally niche experience?

I went through a process where I didn't hear for a month and then I just checked in and

said, hey, interested where you are in the process.

And because it was in the beauty industry, they said, yeah, we're, we liked you, but we

decided that we also need someone who has like pro-stilist experience.

So a decade of brand leadership and be a licensed hair stylist to do this job.

And I went, got it.

Well, in this time frame, I could have gotten my damn license for a new sales.

I see.

Jesus.

That's happening or what's also happening because this has been really common for me as you

go through the multiple rounds and the multiple months and they go, yes, so we decided we're

just not going to fill it.

We changed our minds.

We don't want to do this anymore.

And you're like, that was four months, awesome, nice to meet you.

And that's, that's just what it's been.

It's 90 to 95% of what you apply to.

You don't hear a word.

A bunch, you just get the automated rejection email.

And then when you go through the process, it is multiple months, multiple rounds of interviews

and assessment and assignment, jumping through hoops, and then the job just disappears.

So JT, expound upon this.

Yeah.

I mean, we can go back and look at the great recession.

We can go back and dissect times when there were more job seekers than jobs, right?

But I think this one is particularly unique.

We're sitting in this perfect storm moment.

So not only are we in an economic time where there's a lot of restructuring, but you have

this thing called AI that's making every executive try to figure out what headcount should

look now in the future and oh, by the way, it better be less because, you know, the people

governing them are saying, you better be doing something with AI or you aren't doing

your job, right?

You have this perfect storm moment where companies don't want to hire.

And the marching orders publicly are contract, you know, cut down, cut down, cut down.

So that is putting every company in this very strange holding pattern and it's not uncommon

for them to be going through the paces and then say, well, do we really need this headcount?

Like what if I need that for something else?

And so Gillian's story, sadly, is one that I hear over and over and over again.

The problem is that when you are at the level that Gillian's at and others and every executive

out there, we somehow believe that we're supposed to be able to do this ourselves and that

the way that we're doing this is very strategic.

Historically, about the nine month mark of being unemployed is when that more executive level

person will go, you know what, something's not working here, right?

Because you can justify it over those first three months, six months, but you get to nine

months and you start to go, I'm coming up on a year, something's not right.

That's when people start to realize that the way to get those jobs is completely different

now.

You really want, aren't sitting on a job board.

They will never be on a job board.

And it's not who you know because too many of your friends are holding on to jobs, job

hugging and actually secretly don't want to help you get a job because they're afraid

you might outshine them or whatnot.

So if it's not who you know anymore, it's who knows you.

So you have to change your entire approach to getting work right now and it's a visibility

game, very intentional visibility game.

Is it also that they're not hiring as much at the executive level because those salaries

are so much higher?

So instead of having a VP or what have you, they might just go ahead and have a director

consume everything and take responsibility for everything that the VP used to do.

So they'll eliminate a high pay salary.

And again, that job might be posted.

Next thing, you know, they're like, you know what, no, we're not, we're not going to

do that.

Is that been happening?

Have you seen from, you know, your applications, Jillian?

Is that like they're just ghosting or vanishing?

I've definitely seen that with anything that's, you know, because where I was, I was at

the VP level at recruits.

And so I'm applying to director and above stuff.

Those don't seem to really exist.

But then what you are seeing is you'll see the manager level thing and you're reading

through it and you're like, that is a director level role.

There is so much that this job is doing.

You're acquiring 10 years of experience, but you're calling it a manager so that you

can pay a third of what that role, you know, three years ago was being paid.

And are they able to do that because of there's so much more supply than demand or because

AI will give you this, like, be able to, JT's talked about it before with a list literally

pressing down the wages and you press down the wages by the title.

And we've also talked about resume Botox where you take skills off to make yourself more

marketable to those jobs.

Is that something?

Yeah, no, you get, you get, it's like the story of Goldilocks can't be too little.

It can't be too much.

It needs to be just right.

Just right.

So that's how you have to tie yourself into that.

I will, to answer your question, though, Joel, there are flattening of organizations right

now.

There's far less men in general roles.

But also all the trends start in tech and tumble everywhere else.

This year in 2026, in the tech world, average no longer cuts it.

You know, you need to be the best of the best of the best and you need to be leveraging AI.

You need to be like a CMO running, running it.

So the expectation level of what is expected from you has skyrocketed.

They are literally saying there's no room for average because there's enough AI tools.

I want above average using AI to do the work of 20, 30, 50 people.

So that is coming in hot right now and that's going to have that trickle down effect that's

going to hurt even more people.

If you really want to play at that higher level now, you are going to have to think and

act and talk so knowledgeably that it is undeniable that you're worthy of that.

Is that realistic or is that the powers that be saying, look, AI, everyone's doing AI?

We need to push it.

We need to get people that have this.

But we're also seeing stories where people are exhausted with doing so much more that

AI is supposed to do for you and they're taking on more like it.

So my question is, is it realistic that companies have this expectation that you're going

to be a unicorn because of AI in a market like this?

It is think about supply and demand, right?

Right now they sit in the driver's seat.

So they absolutely can just expect that of their folks.

Now the pendulum always swings and eventually to swing in another direction and that might

change.

They might then start to hire additional help to deal with the AI fatigue.

There's also a real genuine belief and if we just look at how we've all watched AI evolve

over the last year, right, it's been insane what it used to be able to do to what it can

do now.

That kind of perfection isn't going to stop, but that's why I do believe, you know, the

Microsoft executive that said all that white color tasks, tasks can be automated and people

are like, oh no, they will be.

They will be.

So you have to be the brain behind the bots going forward to have a job.

Jillian, we read a lot about lazy apply and AI apply.

So you said none of that in your commentary.

There was no like I've cranked up the AI on applying thousands of jobs an hour.

Have you thought about that?

Did you vote against like in your journey?

Did you sort of explore that and say, no, that's that's not what I want to do.

Or are you to a point where like, you know what, I'm going to let's go.

Let's try.

I voted against I am so I talk a lot about AI in my content and one of the things that

I've had to be very clear on is like, I am not anti AI at all.

I actually absolutely see it as a tool to help people move forward.

I'm against the worship of it and they're like, oh, it's going to do everything.

It's going to fix everything.

You just like, yeah, you do this like automatic applied because what's happening is I was

just talking with someone who leads recruitment for a hospital and they're, you know, they're

trying to fill a lab tech role in their hospital.

And they were like the number of forklift driver applications I've been getting is insane.

And I don't understand it.

And I was like, oh, those are people using AI tools where they're just like matching

random keywords and saying, like, yeah, let's let's apply you to this lab tech role because

here's five words that have nothing to do with the role that matched.

So I'm not really into using AI that way.

I have used it through the process.

I've used it to like take the job description, take my resume and be like, where do I tighten?

Where do I tweak?

Where do I make sure that I'm, you know, highlighting the right aspects of my experience to better

align with this role.

But yeah, I mean, recruiters are saying that where the sheer volume that they're getting

and so much of it is just garbage.

It's no one that's even remotely qualified for the role than what that's doing is it's

watering down the folks that are because you're just like, I can't scroll through a thousand

resumes so everybody gets a second of my attention, which is why we need those these tools at

the top of the funnel because all of this is happening.

Now we have to be able to smartly on the TA side of the house, we have to be able to

really have the requirements for the job.

We have to ensure those individuals meet those requirements and hopefully they're being,

you know, self validated by the by the actual job seekers now that this whole fick

or things happening.

So at the end of the day, I mean, we've got to start installing tech to be able to scale

along with the lazy apply craziness that's happening.

Do you think that in again, you talked about the 25 minutes to 3 a.m. or the black hole?

I think obviously the black hole is the worst out of all of them.

But does it really bother you in 25 minutes or even after hitting a no on a question that

demonstrates that you might not be qualified or they don't think you're qualified?

Do you think like if you got an instantaneous, sorry, but, you know, you're not for us,

is that is that a bad thing or is that really a good thing?

I think a lot of times it's a bad thing because I'm really discerning about the way that

I apply, even though I'm at like 600 applies, I'm very discerning about what I go for because

I want to optimize my chance as much as possible.

I got a 25 minute rejection after using an employee referral code.

Like, I had an employee at the company who was like, I can refer you in.

Here's the code, you know, to show that you are aligned with me.

And it was an employer brand director role.

It was, I mean, it was just my resume regurgitated into a job description.

So I was like, at the very least, I could get into an interview and I could move it forward

and in 25 minutes, I was out.

So you think it's like bias against that employee, maybe?

I didn't even think about it that way.

It's very knowing that person very likely.

So be discerning, wouldn't it?

We've run into this too on sort of the TA side is that when you've set up your knockout

questions, your filters too extreme, you're kicking out a ton of people.

And I hear this a lot from like TA folks where they talk about a talent shortage right

now.

And it's like, that's not the frame.

It's a talent access issue.

You're not being able to access the right talent because you're giving all these AI

resumes or your ATS is set up in a way that it's deprioritizing people based on random

unnecessary things.

There is not a talent shortage.

Some of the most talented people I know are looking for work right now.

It's an access issue.

JT?

Yeah.

Well, I just think you're going to see the demise of ATS systems as we know them because

it is forever broken.

Like, if you just hear the pain and suffering, she's gone through as a job seeker, the way

to fix it is to not have the process that way anymore.

Right.

Why should be people spending all this time applying only to be auto rejected?

Like, if we know that's what it's creating, that needs to stop.

We need to change how that works.

Funny story.

Again, I think ATSs are going to die.

One of my clients just got a brand new job back channeled into the company applied, right?

But back channeled in, got the job offer.

And then HR went and said, oh, you never finished your application in the system, right?

So could you just go back and complete the application for this job in the system because

we need that to cross the teeth and thought the eyes.

She got an auto rejection notice that she didn't get the job out, forwarded to the manager

said, is this a thing you, he's like, no, no, just disregard.

It was just a formality to have you in the system.

So, you know, you hear stories like that and you know that unfortunately the technology

these companies have spent a lot of money on and I get it.

It's legacy and tech debt are obsolete now.

And there are new and better ways to build systems for finding the right talent that

like Jillian is so rightly saying it's an access issue.

We need to change how you get access to the right talent.

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Does anyone notice this?

I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

I think a lot.

I mean, not not all of it, but there's also a good part of that is that the town acquisition

admins, they're not experts in actually the process and or the tech that they're putting

together, right?

So they're building tech stacks and they're in charge of it.

And to be quite frank, they really don't know what the hell they're doing.

So therefore, this is what's happening because I've been in, I don't know how many times

tech stacks talking through process methodology, why are you doing this?

What is here?

And the admins there, and they have no fucking clue.

And it's like, holy shit, I mean, you guys are bitching about the applicant tracking

system being the problem.

It could be to some extent, but you know, there's a shared responsibility that's happening

here.

And for some reason, you know, there's a lot of finger pointing that's happening.

And but I do agree much of the newer tech today, it's a lot more seamless.

It is quicker.

And to be quite frank, I would rather receive personally.

Thanks, but no thanks in a few seconds so I can get that.

It's going to hurt for a minute.

I get it.

But waiting and waiting and waiting, I'd rather do that than 25 minutes.

oddly enough, and Jillian, I'll ask you this question, they recently did a test where people

could have a, hey, we've seen that you might be a potential match for this job.

Can we have a, this is a bot?

We're not real, but we can't have a conversation with you.

Can we ask you a few questions on base and that will tell you if you're moving forward,

right?

versus the other group just got an auto rejection if they weren't a fit.

The people who went through this, they had the conversation, the bot said, hey, for these

reasons you're not moving forward, all of those people said, that's fine.

Even though they knew it was a bot, it was the way that it went, they could accept versus

this no idea why auto rejection that looks like everyone else.

So think about that.

We have that now and people aren't using it.

Well, if you take a look at the eightfold Fickra like lawsuit, it's almost like pushing

toward where if you do get booted, they need to provide you with the transparency of why.

And I think that's fair and I can almost guarantee you, Jillian, you think that's fair too.

I think everybody would just to know like if I didn't get a car loan, I wouldn't know

what that why and that's only fair that I understand that.

So I don't know.

It just seems like it's all moving that way, but I don't know how fast it'll get there.

Yeah, I think the interesting thing that I keep seeing is there's obviously there's a lot

of like swabbling between job seekers and recruiters on social media and the recruiters

like, well, what do you want us to do?

We can only hire one person for this job and everyone's like, yeah, we're aware of how

jobs work.

We understand that we got it.

But the thing that job seekers keep saying is like, I don't feel like a human being in

this.

I don't feel like a person.

Like I send these out and I just feel like I'm being rejected with no real explanation.

One of the big triggers that people, I have found that job seekers have in like the

automated email that they get back is we went with a more qualified candidate because

then these job seekers are like, but you reposted the job a month later.

You didn't go with a more qualified candidate, just remove that sentence from your automated

emails.

It is triggering the hell out of people, but it's just this idea of feeling totally

dehumanized through the process because we all know you submit a resume, right?

Your resume is supposed to be like concise and this and that, like, how do I fit 15 years

of expertise into a sheet of paper?

And I fit it in in a way that a computer will say, okay, you get to see a human being

now.

The humans will see you now.

And that's the thing that people just, they can't quite figure out how to do it.

And then you've got, you know, a lot of scammers that are reaching out, they're like, well,

I can show you how to pass the blah, blah, blah score that all the ATSs use and try

and educate people.

And like, that's not a thing.

It's not a thing.

Yeah.

You're coming about dehumanizing sort of sets up another video that we wanted to share

with everyone.

So let's watch that real quick.

I'll call it out, the design director from Crunchy Roll, James Something.

Posting about James.

If you have a green banner, you look desperate and you're just repelling people and this

is really like dating and nobody wants the desperate person and like, sorry, hot take.

Directly after a post that I had worried was about someone actually saying goodbye to

all of us who had a green banner.

And so I commented and let him know that he's a piece of shit and he responded with a bunch

of snark because that's what people are going to do.

So then I posted and I laid it all out bare.

And I'm going to lay it all out bare here too, which is that shame is a fucking weapon.

Shame is a weapon and we have gotten too comfortable sitting behind our keyboards, sitting

behind our phones, not connecting to the fact that there are other human beings on the

other end of this consuming our content.

So Jillian, as we have as Gen Xers, I think most of us, Jillian is probably a millennial.

Elder millennial.

Yeah.

Been taught that our job is us, right?

You know, we lived to work.

We lived to work and it seems as if, especially in a time like this, when so many people do

not have work that they are desperate and to be quite frank, I mean, so talk a little

bit more about that because the desperation itself, it's a human reaction, right?

Yeah.

I'm a big believer in that there is actually no reason to moralize any of this.

We need jobs to survive.

Shockingly not all of us are trust fund babies who can just live off of someone else's

money.

We need jobs to survive and not just that we need them to survive, but a lot of us, we

get something from working.

We get something that fuels our brains, that fuels our soul.

We find ways to do something that feels right to us and feels like we're succeeding.

And when you're not working and when your whole job is searching for work, which doesn't

pay either, so you're in survival mode, there is a desperation that happens.

But then what we've done is we've completely moralized it.

One of my big things that I've talked about is like, when did we shift the shame of a

layoff from the company doing the layoff to the person who's been laid off?

Because I can remember a time when if a company was doing layoffs, it was, that was their

desperation.

Like we have to do this to stop from totally shuddering and we're so sorry, it is a last

resort.

And it was really a reflection of the company being mismanaged or whatever it might

be.

And now it's so common.

I mean.

Now it's good business.

I won't go into the number of layoffs I've seen at the companies that I've worked at.

But yeah, it's just a way of managing budgets and managing head counts and doing all of

this.

You know, we'll sit there and you'll be on a Zoom call with your manager and they'll

be like, it's not personal.

It's business, you know, don't take this personally.

It's just what we had to do.

But then you go through and you apply and people go, what's that gap?

What's that gap in your resume?

Why have you been unemployed for so long?

Why did you get laid out?

Why was your job eliminated?

How useless a human being are you in the kind of work that you do that why should we

hire you?

And, you know, even though no one's obviously saying it to that extreme, that is the underlying

current with a lot of interviews with a lot of this process because people generally

speaking just lack emotional intelligence.

So that house, that house that's been for sale for a year, people just eventually go

to what's wrong with the house, like something's wrong with it just becomes this like endless

cycle of the longer I'm unemployed, the longer I'm unemployed because people feel like

there's something wrong with me.

I'm curious about the mental health question.

There are people listening to this that are unemployed.

They don't have a VP level job, they don't have the experience that you have and they

look at you and go, my God, if she can't get a job, what hope is there for me?

So I'm curious what you and JTN who you talked to a lot of people as well, what kind of

message do you give them when they are so frustrated, when they get door shut in their

face time and time again, how do you deal with that mentally and what advice would you

give others?

Yeah, I just tell people, full on, like, it is not easy and you have to name that, you

have to name how difficult this is.

You cannot silver lining your way through something that's not only hard and it's just

like rejection after rejection after rejection, but it's also about your survival, your

ability to be housed, your ability to be fed and part of it is accepting that it's really

hard naming that for yourself instead of constantly feeling like you have to stay positive

and stay positive and just acknowledging that even though it's absolutely personal for

you because it's about your ability to survive, it isn't personal in the sense that it's

a reflection of who you are.

And I've run into it too.

I mean, being someone with like the work ethic that I have and the drive that I have

being unemployed for 15 months, I have had so many moments where I'm like, what the fuck

is wrong with you?

Like, what is happening here?

What, like, where did you, where did you screw up 20 years ago that you got to this point

and you do that because you got nothing but time to think about your situation, try and

get out of your situation and I'm a big believer in like being vocal helps.

You have to vent it out of you.

The video that you showed, one of the big things about that was people have to go to LinkedIn

when they're looking for work.

That's where you network.

That's where some of the jobs are, but that's where the recruiters are.

And so, you know, posting content and talking about things and making sure, you know, JT

to your point, making sure you're being seen by the people who can help you get a job.

But then you go on and you see these engagement bait hot takes from employed people going

like, I don't know.

You look really desperate with that green banner and it's gross.

It's like, oh, I'm sorry that I'm advertising that I need work just like the rest of us.

I don't understand why you're more like this.

Not to mention the algorithm has proven that once you click that thing on, you actually

get more, you get more noticed.

Yeah.

I see when you hear that and I'm sure that you probably have individuals that you're

talking to, that first and foremost, one event to you, go figure.

And secondarily, they're like, oh, should I use this green banner thing?

I've heard things about it.

What have you heard?

So, in full transparency in my own program where we coach people, we advise not to turn

on the green banner, but there is an open to work button that turns on the signal that

recruiters are allowed to contact you.

Okay.

And the most important thing, whether you choose the green banner or not is to choose one

of those two options because that actually is telling the algorithm to include you in

recruiter searches.

Yeah.

A lot of people don't even know that that's like a fundamental thing.

If you don't want to be in recruiter searches, don't turn either of those on.

And do you advise that because of the desperation factor or is it something else?

Because sadly, hiring is discrimination.

Okay.

And when a recruiter has visually a list of 50 candidates on the screen and they see

some with a green banner and some with not, some are absolutely jumping to that green

banner first.

But for every one recruiter like that, there's arguably one to two that are skipping

over because the way they're evaluated on their job is bringing the best match.

So when they go to their boss and the boss says, why are you bringing me people who are

between jobs?

You know, I'm someone who wants to hire employed.

Again, horrible discrimination.

Don't shoot the messenger.

Yeah.

But then that's the recruiter just trying to keep their own job.

So once again, it's so unfortunate.

It's not fair.

But it is how we advise them.

The part of your question that I think is so important, Joel, is the mental health piece

of it is how to get out of that.

You know, 20 years of doing this, you would believe I've had people come to me 18 months

out of work, four years out of work, you know, and the mental thing I have to do is break

their patterns.

So believe it or not, one of the reasons we put you in and say, okay, here's a seven

day jump start, 15 minutes a day is to actually give you easy wins that make you have dopamine

hits and start to get you out of that slump because the truth is, and I bring this book

up every time on this podcast, Alfie Cohn's Punish by Rewards explains how we have all become

extrinsed and motivated and defined by our jobs in this country.

So that is ingrained in us that we feel guilty, we feel bad if we aren't producing.

So if I know that's true, my psychological fix is to have you do something just a little

bit each day and have a win and all of a sudden what you're producing.

Fast forward to what we're all talking about now, which is documenting yourself.

You just said it.

If you really want to be found on LinkedIn, it's not turning that banner on our office,

nothing to do with it.

It actually has to do now with their algorithm update where you're posting your industry

and skill sets so we can understand who you are.

Here's the cool thing about that.

When you learn how to do that correctly, you have to start thinking about your craft,

you have to start talking about your craft.

It fires your brain on all cylinders.

I can tell you hands down, my clients will tell you the reason creating content changed

it and they went from unemployed 18, 24 months to landing a job was they got back into

talking confidently.

They had to create content that created context so then when they started getting interviews,

they weren't fumbling like, oh my gosh, this is my first interview in 18 months.

They're like, heck yeah, I love what I'm talking about in my feed now.

Let's talk some more.

And they get the job.

Well, plus it's cathartic though too, right?

It's cathartic.

Yeah.

So I would say to anybody out there that's been out of it for a while, believe it or not,

talking about your industry and your skill set, recording the answers to those job interview

questions, giving hot takes on like what's happening in your industry.

That's really going to help you mentally and quite frankly, two for the price of one

because it's how recruiters are going to find you.

I'm curious, to me, it's a balance because when I watch Gillian's social media posts,

part of me says, wow, how sort of nice it must be to unload that.

And I'm sure for every asshole that that comments, there's someone that says, yes, I'm going

through the same thing.

Thanks for saying the quiet part out loud.

And part of me as an employer says, red flag.

Okay, face it.

Recruitment marketing is broken, 70% of paid recruitment media goes wasted, 93% of candidates

bounce off your job ads before they even apply for the job.

And this is not a talent problem.

No, it's not a data problem.

It's a targeting and experience problem.

The beauty of this is companies aren't trying to fix it.

They're transforming it with up to 80% more high quality applicants.

80% reduction in spend and 50% less recruiter time spent.

They're realizing what's possible with recruitment marketing that actually works.

So how do they do it?

Well, they chose Jovio and AI led high performance recruitment marketing platform built to eliminate

waste and drive more results with Jovio's AI agents.

Your job ads reach the right candidates while your career site, conversational AI and application

process drive better candidates and conversions.

What about those qualified candidates you've already bought and paid for and they're wasting

away in your ATS?

Well, Jovio also re-engages them.

Want to learn more about Jovio?

Cool.

Just go to jovio.com.

That's jovio.com.

It's Showtime.

Someone that's going to social media talking about these issues.

JT more for you, I guess.

What are your thoughts when you see those videos?

Is it a net positive that's happening or is she hurting herself by taking to social

media in that way?

The solution is to show your whole self.

Okay.

So if you become only the feed that talks about the injustices, then that's your brand.

And we try it.

You actually think about, is there a way for me to monetize off that?

Is that my true passion?

But if I'm really feeling the feed with the things that I know, like Jillian's talking

what she knows about employer branding, talent attraction, how AI is factoring into

it, and she's really feeling that feed with that knowledge, her having the occasional

post with how she feels about the job search is not, it's providing a more holistic perspective,

right?

Like a whole view of it.

But if it was only kind of the ranting or only that problem, then right, that's the

appointment.

Like, you know, people hear what they see.

That's what is going to be ingested and understood.

But to me, if you bring your whole self, it's less of an issue.

And that's been, you know, sort of an interesting thing with all this because I started posting

I did a very specific post on November 3rd, where I said, okay, I have played the game

the right way for a year now because I was just about at a year unemployed and I said,

so now we're going to shift and we're going to talk about what this is really like.

We're going to talk about it from the standpoint of someone who has been working in recruitment

marketing, employer brand, talent attraction for a while now and understands the other

side of it.

And I have gotten, you know, because I'm, I'm very honest, I curse a lot because that's

just who I am.

I do a lot of very niche pop culture references, but I've had a lot of people reach out and

they're like, you are making yourself unhierable, you are completely making yourself unhierable.

Nobody wants to hire someone like this.

And I've done a couple things with that.

I said, one, what I've done is I've created a massive filter.

This makes you uncomfortable.

Someone who, you know, I'm not being mean, I'm not being, you know, aggressive, but I am

speaking very honestly about like, hey, this doesn't work.

You're damaging your brand with the way that things are operating right now.

If that doesn't work for a company, that's not a company I'm going to fit with anyway.

Yeah.

Because this is how I, I mean, ask anybody who worked with me at recruiters like, yeah,

that's just what she's like.

Yeah.

That's how I show up in the workplace, which is I'm going to be really honest.

I'm going to talk about things that need to be talked about and I'm not going to be too

shy about doing that.

But the other thing is that, and I have, I'm going to be releasing this soon.

This has also been like a 90 day study of, because I'm into brand and that's what I do.

That happens when you develop a brand that is very rooted in honesty, that is very rooted

in not being performative, but being clear on who you are and what you want and what

does the performance of that look like?

And it's pretty remarkable what that can look like within 90 days with no dollars behind

it, nothing other than just like pure, this is my brand.

These are the stories I'm telling.

I do needs to align with this story that I'm trying to tell and what does that look like?

Can you give us a little taste of what we can extract from that?

Ooh, yeah.

So basically, I built a brand for myself that was very centered on who I am, but well-defined.

And what it looked like was with, like I said, with no dollars behind it, it's all pure

organic.

It's 2.8 million impressions across two platforms, 120,000 engagements and like comments,

likes, shares, all kinds of stuff.

And then I think it was, I have to go back and look, but it was like increasing my followers

by like 600% or something like that in 30 days or in 90 days.

Yeah.

Well, and that's what LinkedIn wants.

So we just talked about last week's show is that remember when everybody's like, oh,

that doesn't belong on LinkedIn.

I was always the guy.

I was like, fuck you.

This is my profile.

I'll post what I want to post, like it or not, right?

And we've moved more toward, we need transparency and we're asking that of employers.

They're being much slower than we are, obviously.

And I remember when Joel and I first started talking about people who were getting fired

on TikTok and they were actually recording it on TikTok and how that would impact them

later on down the road.

And from my standpoint, it's like this is just an evolutionary point of transparency for

the person and the company.

And I think we're going deeper down that rabbit hole.

And for me, I think that's great.

Yeah.

I mean, bad behavior thrives in silence, right?

That's what bad behavior means.

They need people to comply and to be quiet and to just put their heads down and take it.

And, you know, I'm big on like, I talk about this a lot, I'm not a cancel culture person.

I don't believe in that.

But I do believe in accountability.

I do believe in if you're doing something that is ultimately harming your brand.

I ran into this on LinkedIn.

I had a recruiter reach out to me and they just hit me with, I'm hiring for a role and

then just like a litany of questions about my experience.

And I went, hi, nice to meet you.

What company and what is the role?

Like can I see a job description?

And they basically were like, I'll ask the questions here.

What is your experience?

And I went.

People ask the questions.

Yes.

And I kind of said to them, I was like, so for context, there are a lot of scammers on

this platform who are just data mining.

So again, where do you work?

What is the role?

Because I will know better to start with, if it's even in my lane, and then we can have

a conversation about the more specific experience that you're looking for.

And then he came back with, well, you know what, best of luck to you.

This is why you're unemployed.

You're a problem.

Blah blah blah.

And I was like, asking questions is, yeah.

And then it turned in, I mean, he just crashed out on me to use the terms of the younger generation.

And he said, I know a lot of recruiters, I'll get you blacklisted.

No one will hire you.

Don't cheese.

And so I went, okay, great.

I'm going to take the screenshots of this private conversation because I figured out

where he worked.

And he said, and I'm going to post them because you're a recruiter.

You are responsible for most people's first introduction to your company's brand.

Oh, yeah.

And you have just damaged it.

Oh, son, that shit to us.

I just can't believe that Zippercrooter has failed her.

I just can't believe that Zippercrooter hasn't been there for you.

JT, I'm going to let you get the final word.

Oh, my gosh.

No, you know, I just think hurt people like to hurt people.

And so recruiters are reeling right now, right, clearly.

So when you see a recruiter go postal like that, sorry, postal service, it just means

that that person knows their jobs in trouble too, right, and so easy to take it out on you.

And that just tells you right there, the state of the union, about how messed up this whole

system is right now.

So hopefully people were able to learn a lot today and just focus on the activities that

will get them visible and get them talking to people, that sort of thing.

But yeah, just don't, don't keep doing it the way you've been doing it.

Right on.

Well, that was Jillian.

Malia, everybody, Jillian, for those that want to connect with you, maybe hire you, learn

more about your skills.

So where do you send them?

Yeah.

So you can find me on LinkedIn at Jillian or Malia, which is O M A L I O R. It's a weird

last name.

And then I also, I do a lot of employer branding, culture change, consultancy, which you

can find at JillianDesbranding.com.

Chad, JT, everybody hurts.

That's another one in the can.

We out.

But they don't have to.

They don't have to hurt.

Stop it.

They don't.

Well, thank you for listening to what's it called, a podcast, the Chad, the cheese,

brand.

They talk about recruiting, they talk about technology, but most of all, they talk about

nothing.

There's a lot of shout outs of people, you don't even know.

And yet you're listening, it's incredible.

And not one word about cheese, not one cheddar, blue, nacho, pepper jack, Swiss.

So many cheeses, and not one word.

So weird.

Anywho, be sure to subscribe today on iTunes, Spotify, Google Play, or wherever you

listen to your podcasts.

That way you won't miss an episode.

And while you're at it, visit www.jad cheese.com.

Just don't expect to find any recipes for grilled cheese.

It's so weird.

We out.