Tell it what you've been doing — applications sent, response rate, materials, strategy — and get an honest assessment of what's broken and how to fix it.
Most job search advice is generic: “tailor your resume,” “network more,” “follow up.” That’s not helpful when you’ve been doing all of that and still hearing nothing. This prompt gives you a specific, honest diagnosis based on your actual situation — not generic tips, but a targeted assessment of what’s most likely going wrong and what to fix first.
Fair warning: it won’t sugarcoat things. That’s the point.
Copy this into ChatGPT, Claude, or your AI tool. Fill in the brackets honestly.
I need a brutally honest diagnosis of my job search. Don't be nice — be useful. Tell me what's most likely going wrong and what to fix first.
**How long I've been searching:**
[e.g., "6 weeks," "4 months," "just started last week"]
**How many applications I've sent:**
[Total number, and roughly how many per week]
**How many responses I've gotten:**
[Rejections, interview invitations, ghosted — break it down as best you can]
**What types of roles I'm targeting:**
[Job titles, industries, seniority level. Are you staying in your field or changing careers?]
**How I'm finding jobs:**
[LinkedIn, Indeed, company websites, recruiter outreach, referrals, etc. What percentage comes from each?]
**What my application looks like:**
[Do you tailor your resume for each job? Use a cover letter? How much time do you spend per application?]
**My resume (paste it if you can):**
[Paste your current resume. If you can't, describe: format, length, what's in the summary, whether you include metrics]
**Networking activity:**
[Are you reaching out to people? How many conversations per week? Informational interviews? Referrals?]
**How quickly I apply after a job is posted:**
[Same day? Within a week? Whenever I get around to it?]
**Anything else that might be relevant:**
[Career change? Employment gap? Specific industry challenges? Overqualified concerns? Just started and want a sanity check?]
**Instructions:**
1. **Calculate my conversion rates.** Based on applications sent vs responses vs interviews, tell me where I am compared to healthy benchmarks:
- Application → interview: healthy is 5-10%. Below 3% means something specific is wrong.
- Interview → offer: healthy is 10-15%.
- If I haven't provided enough data, tell me what to track and come back in 2 weeks.
2. **Diagnose the top 3 problems.** Based on everything I told you, rank the most likely reasons I'm not getting results. Be specific — not "your resume needs work" but "your resume has no metrics and your summary is generic, which is why ATS is filtering you out." For each problem:
- What the evidence is (from what I told you)
- Why it matters
- How much it's probably costing me in conversion rate
3. **Give me a prioritized action plan.** For each problem, give me the single most impactful thing I can do this week to fix it. Not a long list — one action per problem, in priority order. The first action should be the one with the highest expected impact.
4. **Tell me what I should STOP doing.** If I'm wasting time on something that isn't working (e.g., mass-applying without tailoring, spending hours on cover letters for jobs I'm not competitive for, applying to 3-week-old postings), say so directly.
5. **Give me a reality check on my timeline.** Based on my profile and the roles I'm targeting, how many more applications should I expect to send before I get an offer? Is my current pace fast enough, or do I need to increase volume or change strategy?
**Important:**
- Be direct. I'd rather hear hard truths now than waste another month doing the wrong thing.
- If my resume is the problem, tell me specifically what's wrong with it, not just "it needs improvement."
- If I'm targeting the wrong roles, say so and suggest alternatives.
- If my approach is fundamentally broken (e.g., I'm sending 50 generic applications a week with no networking), tell me that clearly.
- If I'm actually doing everything right and just need to be patient, tell me that too.Takes your background and preferences, extracts your strongest skills, and suggests specific roles and industries where those skills are in demand.
Turn a generic resume into one that actually matches the job. Pulls the right keywords, reorders your experience, and cuts the fluff.
Paste in a few job postings and get back a prioritized list of which software skills to put on your resume, ranked by how often they appear.
Tailored resumes, cover letters, interview prep, and outreach messages. All delivered to your inbox, no prompts needed.