The Job Hunting Podcast

Behind the Hiring Curtain: What’s Really Happening

Episode 330 - Patrick Dunlop, organisational psychologist and Future of Work professor, shares what he learned from studying recruiters, what’s overhyped, what’s still painfully manual, and how experienced candidates can move with confidence through modern selection processes.Spend enough time around job seekers and you will hear the same diagnosis: “Hiring is broken.”Spend enough time around recruiters and you will hear a different one: “We’re drowning.”Both can be true. What has changed in the last few years is not simply the technology inside recruitment. It’s the volume, the noise, and the mismatch between what candidates think is happening and what is actually happening inside organisations.In my conversation with Professor Patrick Dunlop, an organisational psychologist at Curtin University, one theme kept resurfacing: the biggest misunderstanding is not about AI. It’s about realism. Hiring varies wildly from one organisation to the next, and much of what candidates assume is “automated” is still surprisingly manual, uneven, and dependent on human judgement.What follows is a structured, evidence-informed way to think about modern hiring if you are an experienced professional, particularly in your 40s and beyond.Read the full Blog on the Website31 Days of Action for Job SeekersFind Your Talents: Learn About Your Strengths, and Watch Your Career GrowJoin 5,000+ Readers of The Job Hunting Newsletter: Subscribe NowLear More About Renata's career coaching and coursesTimestamps to guide your listening:00:00 Understanding Assessment Tools00:52 The Importance of Job Analysis03:48 Designing Effective Assessment Processes06:53 The Role of Simulations and Case Studies09:59 Concerns About Psychometric Testing12:56 Faking in Assessments and Its Implications15:50 Cultural Differences in Assessment Responses26:44 Cross-Cultural Assessment in Personality Testing30:57 Candidate Experience and Recruitment Processes36:10 The Impact of AI on Job Applications39:04 Adapting to New Technologies in Job Search49:19 Future Trends in Recruitment and AssessmentLinks mentioned in this episode:Patrick Dunlop's LinkedIn ProfileAbout the host, Renata BernardeHello, I'm Renata Bernarde, the Host of The Job Hunting Podcast. I'm also an executive coach, job-hunting expert, and career strategist. I teach corporate, non-profit, and public professionals the steps and frameworks to help them find great jobs, change, and advance their careers with confidence and less stress. Watch the Episodes on YouTubeFollow Renata on Social Media:LinkedInInstagramFacebookX / Twitter

Executive Presence Without the Mould: Ageism, Culture, and Code-Switching

Episode 329 - We unpack what interviewers are really reacting to, how to show agility at any age, and how to stay authentic while adapting to different cultures and expectations. I understand why Brené Brown and Adam Grant can say “thumbs down” on executive presence and get a standing ovation. In their conversation on Dare to Lead, they frame executive presence as “party of one” and contrast it with leadership as a “collective capability.” It’s a compelling point, and a necessary correction for leaders who confuse charisma with competence or confuse performative confidence with real stewardship.But in my day-to-day work as a career coach for experienced corporate professionals, executives, and senior technical specialists, executive presence is not a fad, a buzzword, or an outdated corporate relic. It is a hiring variable. It’s the most searched term on my podcast’s website. And pretending otherwise leaves job seekers at the mercy of unspoken rules.That’s why I devoted Episode 329 of The Job Hunting Podcast to executive presence, alongside two experts who don’t treat it as a personality type or a costume: Dr. Alexa Chilcutt, executive coach and faculty lead for the Johns Hopkins Carey Business School’s Executive Education Business Communication Certificate, and Dr. Carl DuPont, Associate Professor of Voice at Johns Hopkins University’s Peabody Institute and Executive Education faculty at Carey.What I took from our discussion is this: executive presence is real because the question isn’t whether it exists. The question is whether we teach it responsibly, in a way that helps professionals be read accurately, without forcing them into a narrow mould.Read the full Blog on the Website31 Days of Action for Job SeekersFind Your Talents: Learn About Your Strengths, and Watch Your Career GrowJoin 5,000+ Readers of The Job Hunting Newsletter: Subscribe NowLear More About Renata's career coaching and coursesTimestamps to guide your listening:My websiteMy InstagramSubscribe to my newsletterGroup coaching wait listWork with Renata: All my courses and coaching servicesAlexa Chilcutt, PhDCarl DuPont, DMAAlexa and Carl's websiteAlexa and Carl's book - for 25% discount, enter the code Pres26 at checkoutLinks mentioned in this episode:00:00 Introduction to Executive Presence01:51 Defining Executive Presence04:43 The Importance of Communication07:36 Challenging Traditional Views on Executive Presence09:54 Navigating Ageism in the Workplace12:52 Cultural Dissonance and Code Switching28:33 Authenticity vs. Performance in Executive Presence32:27 The Evolution of Personal Branding34:22 Navigating Cultural Expectations in Professional Appearance37:42 The Role of Voice in Executive Presence41:23 Embracing Diversity in Professional Narratives46:52 The Art of Communication: Finding Your Voice52:03 Overcoming Barriers to Executive PresenceAbout the host, Renata BernardeHello, I'm Renata Bernarde, the Host of The Job Hunting Podcast. I'm also an executive coach, job-hunting expert, and career strategist. I teach corporate, non-profit, and public professionals the steps and frameworks to help them find great jobs, change, and advance their careers with confidence and less stress. Watch the Episodes on YouTubeFollow Renata on Social Media:LinkedInInstagramFacebookX / Twitter

Two Sports Psychology Tools That Make Job Searching Easier

Episode 328 - I borrow two tools from elite sport psychology: the difference between thoughts and attention, and the difference between internal and external focus. You’ll learn how to stop fighting your nerves and start directing your attention.Job searching can feel deeply personal, but the mechanics of it are closer to a high-performance environment than most people want to admit. You are assessed in real time. You are compared, often invisibly, against other candidates. You are expected to communicate with clarity, confidence, and restraint while navigating uncertainty, rejection, and the emotional weight of change.For experienced corporate professionals and executives, this becomes even more complex. The stakes feel higher, the stories are longer, and the margin for error can seem smaller. Many of the people I work with are excellent at their jobs, yet they find the job search uniquely destabilising. That’s not because they are not capable. It’s because job hunting creates a different cognitive and emotional context than most leadership roles do.Read the full Blog on the Website31 Days of Action for Job SeekersFind Your Talents: Learn About Your Strengths, and Watch Your Career GrowJoin 5,000+ Readers of The Job Hunting Newsletter: Subscribe NowLear More About Renata's career coaching and coursesTimestamps to guide your listening:00:00 The Competitive Nature of Job Hunting03:26 Understanding Thoughts vs. Attention19:27 Internal vs. External Focus in Job Search33:02 Applying Focus Techniques in Real ScenariosLinks mentioned in this episode:My InstagramSubscribe to my newsletterGroup coaching wait listReset Your Career online courseAll my courses and coaching services:Video with Alex Cohen that I mentioned on the podcastMovie WimbledonNetflix series Break PointAbout the host, Renata BernardeHello, I'm Renata Bernarde, the Host of The Job Hunting Podcast. I'm also an executive coach, job-hunting expert, and career strategist. I teach corporate, non-profit, and public professionals the steps and frameworks to help them find great jobs, change, and advance their careers with confidence and less stress. Watch the Episodes on YouTubeFollow Renata on Social Media:LinkedInInstagramFacebookX / Twitter

6 Coaching Tools for a Smarter Job Search

Episode 327 - I share six tools I use with experienced professionals who feel stuck in job search. You will leave with clearer direction, a simple decision filter, and practical ways to build momentum. January has a particular sound in my inbox. It is the quiet urgency of people who are either ready for change or exhausted from trying. Many are senior professionals with decades of achievement behind them, now facing a job search that feels unfamiliar, slower, and strangely impersonal. The temptation is to treat that discomfort as a personal flaw. Please, do not. Instead, treat it as a signal. If you feel overwhelmed right now, you are not broken. You are overloaded. And the overload is not only emotional. It is structural. As 2026 begins, multiple signals point to a labor market that is “stuck in place,” with slow hiring and slow firing, and a growing divide between sectors that are hiring and those that are simply holding. That “low-hire, low-fire” reality creates a special kind of psychological strain for corporate job seekers. You can do everything “right” and still hear nothing. You can have a strong resume and still feel invisible. You can be an excellent leader and still find yourself tweaking a LinkedIn headline at midnight, as if the correct adjective will unlock a recruiter’s calendar. This is the context in which mindset stops being motivational fluff and becomes a practical career asset. The market is sending a clear message: there is less room for vague positioning, passive applications, and comfort-zone job searching. The good news is that experienced professionals are unusually well equipped for this moment, once they stop trying to recreate the last chapter and begin designing the next one. Read the full Blog on the Website31 Days of Action for Job SeekersFind Your Talents: Learn About Your Strengths, and Watch Your Career GrowJoin 5,000+ Readers of The Job Hunting Newsletter: Subscribe NowLear More About Renata's career coaching and coursesTimestamps to guide your listening:00:00 Welcome to 2026: A New Beginning00:11 Changing Your Mindset for Job Searching04:17 Six Mindset Tools for Career Success07:22 Designing Your Professional Character10:34 Outsmarting Your Internal Monster14:44 The Third Person Audit for Clarity18:54 Taking Action: From Ideas to Execution20:52 Podcast Changes and Future EngagementLinks mentioned in this episode:My websiteSubscribe to my newsletterGroup coaching wait listRB Lnkdn Club, a support group to grow your LinkedIn presenceWork with Renata: All my courses and coaching servicesVideo I mentioned on the podcastAbout the host, Renata BernardeHello, I'm Renata Bernarde, the Host of The Job Hunting Podcast. I'm also an executive coach, job-hunting expert, and career strategist. I teach corporate, non-profit, and public professionals the steps and frameworks to help them find great jobs, change, and advance their careers with confidence and less stress. Watch the Episodes on YouTubeFollow Renata on Social Media:LinkedInInstagramFacebookX / Twitter

7 Strategies to Navigate Career Uncertainty

Episode 326 - Navigate career uncertainty with strategies to stay relevant amid AI disruptions and global shifts.Rebroadcasting as Episode 326 during our holiday break, this episode (originally released as Episode 295) continues to be one of the most practical and impactful guides for professionals feeling threatened by uncertainty in the job market, especially from AI.The job market feels like it's operating in a dense fog. For many professionals, particularly those in mid-to-senior corporate roles, navigating a career today is less like following a GPS and more like learning to read a compass in the dark. This uncertainty is not just emotional, it’s systemic. We’ve seen a wave of redundancies ripple across different sectors. My own coaching clients, many of whom are experienced professionals, were affected. The catalyst? A perfect storm of geopolitical issues, reduced funding, and yes, artificial intelligence.Read the full Blog on the Website31 Days of Action for Job SeekersFind Your Talents: Learn About Your Strengths, and Watch Your Career GrowJoin 5,000+ Readers of The Job Hunting Newsletter: Subscribe NowLear More About Renata's career coaching and coursesTimestamps to guide your listening:00:00 Navigating Job Search Challenges08:31 Facing Uncertainty in the Job Market17:00 The Fog of Uncertainty in 202536:44 Taking Action Amidst UncertaintyLinks mentioned in this episode:Reset Your CareerTalentPredixBook a consultation with meEpisode 23 - Adapting to Volatility, Uncertainty, Complexity and Ambiguity - with Janet SernackEpisode 59 - The Power of Self-Fidelity: How to Be True to Yourself and Thrive Professionally - With Author Cassandra GoodmanSubscribe to the newsletterAbout the host, Renata BernardeHello, I'm Renata Bernarde, the Host of The Job Hunting Podcast. I'm also an executive coach, job-hunting expert, and career strategist. I teach corporate, non-profit, and public professionals the steps and frameworks to help them find great jobs, change, and advance their careers with confidence and less stress. Watch the Episodes on YouTubeFollow Renata on Social Media:LinkedInInstagramFacebookX / Twitter