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Franco Pacho

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With the current state of… not just the industry but the whole world, applying to a game job (or any job for that matter) has become rather bleak, and it can take quite a toll on every job hunter; understandably so.
With lots of unrealistic qualifications to cover, writing five or more iterations of your resume to fit the roles, and waiting for —if it ever comes— the follow-up email after the application, job hunting has turned into an exercise of resilience.
You must go through all this while still curating your own portfolio and trying to figure out life.

But what if you don’t?

It might sound like wrong advice (in fact it sounds just plain dumb), but if we consider the mental and emotional effort it takes to search for a job, it might as well be a job in itself!

And I’m not alone in this sentiment, many career advisors tell you to look at job hunting this way. That said, perhaps the best advice you can hear if you find yourself in this position is: do not crunch and burn yourself out before you even start.

Let me explain.

By not scheduling and giving yourself time to breathe between applications, you are basically weaponizing your own passion for games against you, to the point of distraught and frustration, working overtime to get a breakthrough and conditioning your mind to a high level of stress. And as we are all aware, we are beasts of habits.
Imagine getting the job you wanted but the only way you know how to function is through stress; sure, the high of getting the job will cheer you up, but as it wears off you will already be tired and overworked.
Maintaining an unhealthy relationship with your personal workflow before you put it to good use will only result in your dreams transforming into nightmares.

Always remember that the best you can do about it is to organize and plan your efforts. Be strategic with your resumes and their scope to trim down the number of iterations. Modularize your cover letters to mix and match them, hell, sometimes even give yourself a break from writing one. pick your battles wisely.

Slow and steady wins the race!