The market is moving—your strategy should, too

If you’re feeling mixed signals in the job market (headline layoffs + pockets of aggressive hiring), you’re not imagining it. Hiring in 2026 is increasingly selective, role-specific, and skills-verified. The upside: candidates who adapt their targeting and storytelling are getting interviews faster—even in competitive sectors.

What we’re seeing across industries

Here are a few patterns showing up in employer behavior and interview loops:

• More “proof” required earlier: Expect take-homes, case prompts, portfolios, or skill screens sooner—especially in tech, analytics, and product roles.
• Role compression is real: Job descriptions bundle responsibilities (e.g., “PM + data + stakeholder management”). Hiring managers want people who can operate across functions.
• Fewer openings, higher urgency: Teams may hire less often, but when they do, it’s because there’s a clear business need. That makes your ability to connect to outcomes crucial.
• Culture fit has shifted to “team fit”: Companies are testing how you collaborate, communicate, and handle ambiguity—not just whether you match values.

Where opportunities are strongest right now

While it varies by region and company size, these areas are reliably active:

• AI-adjacent roles (not only ML): enablement, operations, governance, prompt/workflow design, applied analytics.
• Revenue-protecting functions: customer success, solutions engineering, sales ops, risk, compliance.
• Efficiency-driven roles: automation, business ops, FP&A, process improvement, procurement.
• Healthcare + fintech modernization: data platforms, security, regulatory, and product roles tied to core systems.

Practical ways to stand out in interviews (without doing “more”)

1) Rewrite your story around business outcomes

Swap task language for impact:

• Instead of: “Led weekly reporting.”
• Try: “Built a weekly KPI cadence that reduced decision time by 30% and flagged churn risk earlier.”

2) Prepare a 60-second “fit pitch” for each role

Use this structure:

• What they need (from the job description)
• Your matching proof (1–2 achievements)
• How you’ll deliver in the first 90 days

3) Show your work like a consultant

When answering, narrate your thinking:

• Assumptions → tradeoffs → decision → results → what you’d improve

4) Treat “team fit” questions as performance questions

For prompts like “How do you handle conflict?” anchor on:

• the context, your approach, what changed, and what you learned.

Quick self-check: are you targeting the right roles?

Ask yourself:

• Do I meet 70% of requirements and have proof for the top 3?
• Can I clearly explain how this role ties to revenue, risk, cost, or speed?
• Does my resume reflect the same keywords the role uses (without keyword stuffing)?

What industry or function are you targeting in 2026, and what’s the biggest hiring trend you’re noticing in your search?