technical-job-search

Technical Job Search

Helps software engineers with discrete job search tasks: job description analysis, CV tailoring, cover letter writing, offer evaluation, and follow-up emails.

Job Description Analysis

When given a job description, extract and structure:

Must-haves (explicitly required or repeated multiple times):

• Technical skills, years of experience, specific domain knowledge

Nice-to-haves (preferred, a bonus, or mentioned once):

• List these separately. Candidates often disqualify themselves over requirements that are actually optional.

What the role actually solves (inferred from the description):

• Summarize in 2-3 sentences what business problem this hire addresses

Red flags to surface:

• "Wear many hats" with no clarity on scope — risk of undefined ownership
• 10+ must-have technologies for a single role — unrealistic bar or poor team planning
• No mention of team size, tech stack, or what the role ships — may indicate disorganization

CV / Resume Tailoring

When tailoring a CV to a specific job description:

1. Match language exactly — use the same terminology as the JD, not synonyms. If the JD says "distributed systems", do not write "large-scale systems".
2. Lead with impact — every bullet should have a result: "Reduced P99 latency by 40%" not "Worked on performance improvements".
3. Quantify everything possible — users, QPS, team size, cost saved, revenue impact.
4. Cut what does not match — a two-page CV tailored to the role beats a four-page generic one.
5. Mirror the seniority signals — entry roles want "built", senior roles want "designed", staff and principal roles want "drove" or "defined".

Do not keyword-stuff. Write for the hiring manager reading it, not for an ATS parser.

Cover Letter Writing

A cover letter should answer three questions in under 300 words:

1. Why this company? Something specific — a product, a technical challenge they have written about, a problem space you care about. Not "I admire your mission."
2. Why you? One or two concrete things from your background that directly match what they need. Link to the specific role, not your full career history.
3. Why now? What is your motivation at this point in your career? One sentence.

Format: three short paragraphs. No preamble ("I am writing to apply for..."). No summary of your CV.

Avoid:

• Restating your CV in prose form
• "I am passionate about..."
• Generic company praise ("a leader in the industry", "innovative company")
• Going longer than one page

Offer Evaluation

When evaluating a job offer, compare across these dimensions:

Compensation

• Base salary: check against market rate for role, level, and location (levels.fyi, Glassdoor, Blind, Comprehensive.io)
• Equity: current valuation, vesting schedule (4-year with 1-year cliff is standard), dilution risk for early-stage companies
• Bonus: target percentage vs actual historical payout
• Total comp = base + expected bonus + annualized equity value

Role clarity

• Scope: what does "owning" this role actually mean vs what is already decided?
• Team: size, structure, who you report to, tenure of the team
• Growth: what does the next level look like and how long do people typically take to get there?

Company health

• Stage: runway, revenue, growth rate — ask directly if not public
• Engineering culture signals: PR review process, incident postmortem culture, on-call burden
• Remote or hybrid reality: written policy vs actual practice

Red flags in an offer

• Pressure to decide in under 48 hours — a reasonable window is one to two weeks
• Equity with no clear liquidity path for a company that has been private for 10+ years
• A role described as greenfield that turns out to have 6 months of existing unmaintained code

Get everything in writing before accepting.

Follow-up Emails

After an interview, send a follow-up within 24 hours:

• One sentence thanking them for the time
• One sentence referencing something specific from the conversation (a problem discussed, a question they asked)
• One sentence reaffirming interest, if genuine

Do not write multiple paragraphs. Do not restate your qualifications. Do not follow up more than once if there is no reply.