Short answer: you can't.

Long answer: I don't recommend it.

And before you close this tab thinking this is just another gloomy article about the job market's future, let me tell you why this seemingly bad news might be the best you receive in your professional life.

The traditional resume no longer serves to secure employment in today's context. Period. As more people invest in certifications, bootcamps, and master’s degrees, less than 3.8% of workers have contingent jobs. The great promise of the freelance economy hasn't moved even a decimal in two decades.

The job market is undergoing such a profound transformation that quality job offers practically don't exist. What does work—and has always worked—is networking and professional reputation. They open more doors than any minimalist-designed resume and ATS-optimized keywords.

Why can't (or won't) companies hire?

Small and medium-sized businesses face financial and administrative hurdles that turn each hiring into a nightmare, a true Russian roulette. A concrete example: If someone wanted to pay you 1 million Chilean pesos, they'd actually need 1.8 million. Why? Deductions, insurance, taxes, saving for your vacation, for your likely replacement while on leave, and the cushion for potential severance when they need to let you go. I'm not saying it's right or wrong, but it is what it is.

This impossible math leads companies to face significant barriers that make them prefer outsourcing, project-based work, or simply never hiring, continuously cycling through interns and fixed contracts. (A travesty, but who am I to judge?)

On the other hand, large companies adjust their structures and reduce personnel. The reason? Perpetual growth is not realistic. To keep investors happy in a finite world, the only variable they can optimize is operational efficiency. Translation: do more with fewer people.

The unicorn everyone seeks (and no one finds)

Today's employers are looking for versatile profiles with diverse skills and adaptability. But let’s be honest: they’re looking for unicorns. They want a designer who can code, make videos, understand marketing, and ideally know something about accounting. All for the salary of one.

The key is to become a problem solver who delivers concrete solutions. Your personal narrative should start by explaining how you impact the organization, the business, the people. Not about your degrees, but the transformations you have achieved. Not the tools you master, but the problems you have solved. How do you take things in your area from A to B?

Countries with the lowest unemployment value those who master real trades: science, technology, engineering, medicine, and transportation. Not "brand evangelists" or "happiness managers."

The only people who should be looking for traditional jobs are those who need to farm experience. Like in video games: you need to level up, learn mechanics, understand the meta. But once you've mastered your area, staying in the same place is a waste of your potential.

When you feel you've learned a lot, or you've mastered your professional area, it's time to find friends with similar pains to yours, but from a totally different field of expertise. The goal? Create your own projects, businesses, solutions that multiply the value each one brings; a designer who understands the programmers' issues. An accountant who gets the creatives' frustrations. A doctor who sees the inefficiencies of the health system.

When you bring together these diverse but complementary perspectives, the possibility arises to create something genuinely innovative.

The theater of phantom job offers

But there’s something even more sinister: many of the job offers you see aren't even real. 40% of companies admitted to posting fake job offers in 2024, and three out of 10 currently have "ghost jobs" active. They're not scams; they're legitimate companies posting vacancies they have no intention of filling.

Why do they do it? 60% say it's to make their employees believe help is coming and their workload will be relieved. More sinister yet: 62% publish these ghost jobs specifically to make their employees feel replaceable. It's corporate psychological terrorism.

According to Revelio Labs, a job posted in 2024 has half the chance of resulting in a real hire compared to 2020 (Yes, during the pandemic). In 2019, there were eight hires for every 10 jobs posted. Today, fewer than four.

The most cynical part: seven out of 10 managers who post these phantom jobs consider it "morally acceptable". 85% even interview candidates with no intention of hiring them, wasting their time, money, and hope.

Your CV is gold: use it to create, not to beg

If you've developed your entire career to have a great CV, congratulations. Now let's leverage it, but not to keep applying to 100 jobs a day. It's time to create your own projects with talented people like you. Those collaborations multiply your professional value in ways no traditional job can match.

Companies are laying off people like you, but at the same time, require people like you for a reduced number of hours per week. How would it be if the same company that pays you 10 for working 40 hours per week now pays you 7 to achieve the same goals, but working just 10? Maybe you’d have time for another 3 clients like this one.

During this end of the world, there's still much to create and resolve. Please, don't pursue speculative real estate investment or reselling Chinese products with a logo. In modern life, if something bothers us, it's time to make the version that doesn't.

Resilience and the ability to learn quickly are crucial, but not to adapt to mediocre jobs. They are essential for creating solutions that the world needs and that traditional companies—those sinking today—are too slow to develop.

The era of superpowers

Nobel laureate Daron Acemoglu estimates AI will increase GDP by just 1.1% over 10 years, mainly affecting routine jobs that account for 5% of the economy. AI will never replace us in the sense that no individual is replaceable, but it does open a new level of competitiveness.

The AI era means people literally have creative superpowers. Our role is better than ever: iterate, evaluate, show that things are happening in your head. You are capable of making good decisions directing the work of an army of virtual assistants.

If you're going to use AI to make generic videos or soulless copy, go ahead, good luck with that. But if you use it to compete with Hollywood's audiovisual hegemony, to democratize education, to solve public health issues, a bright future awaits.

Apologies if this feels like clickbait, but as I always say, I didn't make the rules. Traditional employment is dead. The perfect CV is irrelevant. Job security is pure nostalgia. The era of employment is over forever.

What does exist is the opportunity to create real value by solving real problems. To team up with other professionals (ideally with people you like and trust) and build the companies that boomers are too clumsy to imagine. To use your accumulated experience to move away from another average job and instead multiply your impact by creating something of your own.

The final advice, then, isn't to find a job. It's to create the conditions where the value you generate is undeniable, tangible, and yes, profitable. The Anthropocene has brought us many problems (cough) opportunities. It's time we build the solutions.