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The System to Get Your Next Job Without Burning Out, with Samorn Selim

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Job searching can be overwhelming, especially when you’re juggling work, family, and the pressure to find your next opportunity. On this episode of Find Your Dream Job, career coach Samorn Selim, founder of Career Unicorns®, shares a simple but powerful system to help you get your next job without burning out. She explains how to spot the signs of job search fatigue, why clarity is the first step to success, and how to focus on what truly matters instead of trying to do everything at once.

Samorn breaks down her three-part system — clarity, strategy, and consistency — to make the process manageable and effective. You’ll learn how to narrow your focus, structure your search in small, realistic steps, and celebrate progress along the way. Whether you’re sending out endless applications or feeling stuck in a cycle of stop-and-start searching, this episode will help you approach your job search with confidence, balance, and renewed energy.

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Find Your Dream Job, Episode 528:

The System to Get Your Next Job Without Burning Out, with Samorn Selim

Airdate: November 19, 2025

Mac Prichard:

This is Find Your Dream Job, the podcast that helps you get hired, have the career you want, and make a difference in life.

I’m your host, Mac Prichard. I’m also the founder of Mac’s List. It’s a job board in the Pacific Northwest that helps you find a fulfilling career.

Every Wednesday, I talk to a different expert about the tools you need to get the work you want.

It’s easy to get overwhelmed when you look for work. There are so many things you could do.

But there are only so many hours in the day. How do you avoid exhausting yourself?

Samorn Selim is here to talk about the systems to get your next job without burning out.

She’s the founder of Career Unicorns®.

Samorn’s company has helped more than 1,000 women, BIPOC, and first-generation professionals land dream jobs, negotiate raises, and create thriving careers.

She joins us from San Francisco.

Well, let’s jump right into it, Samorn. What are the most common signs of burnout that you see among job seekers?

Samorn Selim:

Yeah, that’s a great question, Mac. What I see with a lot of job seekers is that they know that they need to leave their current job. So they’ll start applying.

And what makes it so easy to apply for jobs now is that you have websites like LinkedIn and other places where you can easily apply. So it’s a very passive process where they’re just applying to a bunch of jobs, but they’re not hearing back.

And then that then leads them to being feeling demoralized and then they stop. So the start and stop is one of the signs.

Another sign is they just kind of feel like, you know what, it’s never going to happen. I should just give up. So it kind of goes through this loop and cycle. And it’s hard right now on top of that, because the current market is one of the toughest markets we’ve been in.

I’ve been a career counselor and career coach since 2011, when I started my career at Berkeley Law as its director of employer outreach. And this is the toughest job market I’ve seen, even tougher than 2008 and 2009 during the financial crisis.

Mac Prichard:

Do candidates know what’s happening when they’re experiencing burnout? Do they recognize burnout for what it is?

Samorn Selim:

You know, honestly, I don’t think so. And here’s why we were in the pandemic. People were so overwhelmed and burnt out by the pandemic. And then people just transitioned back into life. And so people had not recovered from that. And there’s research and studies that show that. And burnout is something that kind of happens over a slow process, right?

You start to feel, you know, symptoms also vary. It could feel very sluggish or tired. It could feel like you’re having depression. It could feel like you’re having anxiety. It could feel like you have no motivation to do anything or that you’re just going through the motions.

Many people are very high-functioning folks who are feeling burnt out or depressed or anxious, but they’re still able to kind of show up for the day-to-day life. And so it’s kind of a slow creep. When people start to notice that they’re having burnout is when they’ve taken time off.

Actually, it’s funny, somebody just wrote to me and said, “Hey, I just got back from my two-week vacation. I realized my job is way too stressful. I’m burnt out and I need to find a new job.” And it usually requires some kind of stop from the automatic behaviors and responses we have to our day-to-day life and responsibilities.

Mac Prichard:

Well, we’re going to talk about the systems that you recommend for looking for work when you are feeling burnt out. Before we get there, though, what does your job search look like when you’re experiencing burnout?

Samorn Selim:

It’s really tough because the job search process itself is already something that requires a strong mental game, because, by nature, you know this Mac, most people are going to get rejections. You’re going to have to apply to so many jobs before you get that first interview, and then go through the interview process to get the offer.

And there are many times when you get to the final interview, and you might be the second-best candidate. And so you have to go through that quite a few times. So that could really take a big hit on your emotional sense of self and sense of self-worth.

And it could lead you to feeling, you know what, it’s never going to happen. I should just give up. Right. So that’s kind of the journey that people go through in the burnout process, it’s start-stop. I feel overwhelmed. I feel demoralized. Maybe I don’t feel good about myself. I feel like I’m a fraud.

So I’m going to take a break. And then that actually increases the length of the job search process and leads to even further burnout. You know, before people start to reach out to me to work with me, they’ll be in the job search for 12 months, sometimes two years, and they’re not able to do it on their own.

And when they do work with me and we follow a very structured system, when the market was good, folks were finding jobs in four to eight weeks. Where the market is right now, I’m seeing it’s closer to 12 to 16 weeks. So three to four months, still a very short time, but usually it takes them that long process of not succeeding before they realize, okay, I’ve got to do something and set up a system that works.

Mac Prichard:

You mentioned at the start of our conversation, people sending out lots and lots of applications in part because it’s easy to do so. Something else you touched on was stopping and starting. Are there other habits that job seekers might be practicing that can lead to burnout besides those two?

Samorn Selim:

Yes, there’s two other habits that people aren’t as aware of. And we’ll get into this later. One is not having clarity. So you’re applying to any job possible and you’re using the same resume. Of course, if you’re using a generic resume, it’s unlikely that you’re going to proceed to the next round of getting an interview.

And then the other one is on the other end of the spectrum, where you are tailoring every resume, every cover letter, and every message to every single job.

And if you’re applying to many jobs, that’s also not a good strategy because every day you could be spending hours and hours and hours on the job search. So when I work with folks, I really keep in mind that many people already either have a job or they have families or they have other responsibilities.

So the job search can’t take more than 15 to 30 minutes a day, realistically. Otherwise, you’re also going to lead to burnout because you’re already overwhelmed with all the other things you have to do in life.

Mac Prichard:

Often when a job search isn’t going well, a candidate might think, and I remember doing this earlier in my career, too, that the answer is to work harder and harder. Why isn’t that the right approach?

Samorn Selim:

That is tough. I think you do have to work hard, but you have to work hard on the things that matter. You know, so for example, if you’re sending a ton of applications out, whether it’s just math applications or tailoring for each one, and you’re not hearing back, sending more applications isn’t likely going to lead to the result that you want. So it’s really about being able to target where you are in the job search process.

And the first step is finding clarity. Without clarity, you can’t actually have an effective job search because you don’t know what you’re looking for. And then that’s what makes the process overwhelming. Once you have clarity, then you have to figure out, OK, where in the process do I need to work on?

If I’m trying to make a complete career change, then the first step is probably networking. Because for someone to get you to the interview stage, they’re going to have to kind of know you. Because otherwise, you’re not going to get through the normal system.

If you’re going in the career path that you’re going in, then the strategy is to update your resume, cover letter, and LinkedIn so that it’s really targeting the types of jobs that you’re looking for. And with that though, you still have to do the networking strategy. That’s still an effective strategy, but you can split the process more.

So it’s really thinking about where in the stage of the job search am I, and what’s the bottleneck. And that’s the part that we need to target first. What happens, though, is people think of the job search as one whole big thing. And that in itself is overwhelming. And so you’re trying to do everything all at once, and it doesn’t work. There’s a sequence to how you should do things, and that will lead to an effective result.

Mac Prichard:

So work smarter, not harder, and break the work down into manageable pieces. And I want to get to that in the second segment. One last question for the first segment. Can employers tell, looking at your application or in your answers to interviews, that you’re experiencing burnout? And if they can tell, what do they think?

Samorn Selim:

Absolutely. Because here’s the thing, we all carry a certain energy with us. And so when you go to a room, this is actually something I work with my clients on a lot, which is that you really have to manage your own energy because people can feel your energy before you even say something, whether it’s on Zoom or even in the same room.

So, a tip that I give a lot of my clients, whether they’re new graduates or CEOs, is to do 25 jumping jacks and 10 deep breaths right before their meeting for two reasons. One, it boosts your energy. It also cuts the anxiety because if you’re doing jumping jacks, you can’t really think, right?

And the job search process or the interview process is very anxious. And then the deep breaths help you to kind of ground yourself so that if you’re a fast talker like myself, it slows you down a little bit so that you can be in a better tempo. Yeah. So those are strategies that I really work with my clients on so that they can show up as their best selves.

You know, when you’re feeling stressed out in the job search market, it really can come across. And unfortunately, the interview is such a big part of the job search process. So if your energy is anxious or nervous, then it can come across as if you’re not confident or you’re not competent. And unfortunately, those are two factors that usually put you out of the applicant pool.

Mac Prichard:

Well, let’s pause there. Stay with us when we come back. Samorn Salim will continue to share her advice on the system you need to get your next job without burning out.

We’re back in the Mac’s List studio. I’m talking with Samorn Selim.

She’s the founder of Career Unicorns®.

Samorn’s company has helped more than 1,000 women, BIPOC, and first-generation professionals land dream jobs, negotiate raises, and create thriving careers.

She joins us from San Francisco.

Samorn, before our break, we were talking about the system to get your next job without burning out.

Now, Samorn, before the break, we were talking about burnout. What it is, why it happens, and how it affects your job search, both in what you do when you’re looking for work, and how employers can pick up on that, and how it might affect your prospects as a candidate.

Let’s talk about how to fix that. You’ve got a system that you use with clients that I’d like to walk through. And you touched on elements of it in our first segment. But the first part of that is for avoiding burnout, and getting the job you want is to be clear, to have clarity.

You touched on this again, but why does clarity matter so much in a job search, especially when you’re dealing with burnout? Yeah.

Samorn Selim:

Yeah, so clarity is so important because without clarity, you don’t really know where you’re going. And you can spend a lot of energy applying to roles that you’re not even interested in.

So when I work with clients, the first thing we do is a really deep, in-depth assessment. And through this assessment, we really try to uncover what are your passions, what are your interests, what are your values, and what are your priorities.

Based on that, then we try to seek out what are available roles that are currently available in the market. And when we find those roles, then we rebuild your materials backwards from that. What people are doing is they’re just listing whatever they think is important on the resume and submitting it, hoping that the employer will understand why they should be the best candidate.

Or they’re just submitting to a whole bunch of other jobs. They’re not feeling that passionate. So I worked with a client who actually thought about quitting his career as a lawyer entirely and wanted to switch into a completely new career.

So when we worked together, we realized actually he loved doing the lawyering parts. He just didn’t like the organization that he was in, and he had a passion for sports, but he thought that it would never happen. And all of his family members and friends were telling him like, why don’t you do something in sports?

He’s like, “That’s done. It’s dead. Don’t talk to me.” But through our work together, we identified that, and we helped him target roles that were in sports organizations. And I’m happy to say that he’s now senior counsel at the Major League Soccer. And he actually came on my podcast, Career Unicorn Spark Your Joy, to talk about his journey.

And so that’s why it’s really important because you could be wasting so many hours applying to a bunch of things that you don’t even care about. And if you’re in that space, it’s really hard to do the work because the job search is hard, even harder in the interview to show enthusiasm and excitement.

And you need to show that in the job search. Otherwise, employers are just going to think, I don’t think this is the right person.

Mac Prichard:

What stops people from doing that kind of self-assessment to get that clarity, and that allows them to make the strategic choices that your client did?

Samorn Selim:

There’s a few reasons. One is we have automated habits. And so we’re we’re waking up and we already have a thousand things like you see. Like I said, I used to have a list of things I need to clean and like a list of things I need to do for my kids, et cetera, et cetera. So there isn’t really any time to reflect.

On top of that, we have social media, we have Slack, we have emails. There’s just so much inundating us. So to actually find a moment of quiet, to actually think through your life, or to reflect. It’s very rare now.

Even when people are showering, people have the radio on our podcast on. When people take a walk now. So there just isn’t that time. Second, it’s really hard to think about your career overall without some kind of guidance or help.

That’s why we developed an in-depth assessment so that you can do this and we can work on it together. And I review it and we talk through it so that you can get the clarity because it’s a pretty overwhelming process.

And third, I think sometimes people are afraid, like, you know, when I was practicing lawyer at a big law firm. I grew up poor. My parents are refugees from Laos. We grew up on public assistance. And then in my mid-20s, I was so lucky I landed. I was able to get to law school and land a job in a big law firm making six figures.

And most of the people in my community, you know, they were in gangs, they were in prison. So it’s like you’re the one person who made it. And then it felt really hard. I spent so much time studying for the bar exam. I don’t want to just walk away because I spent all this time, energy, and money.

And it’s a scary process to say, “Hey, all these years that I’ve invested in this, it’s no longer my dream. It’s no longer what I want.” And you know this, you’re talking about finding your dream job. Sometimes your dream job is part of that process is letting go of your old dreams so that you can step into the present and build the future that you want.

Mac Prichard:

Strategy is the second element in your three-part system for avoiding burnout during a job search. Say more about strategy and why it’s so important.

Samorn Selim:

Yeah, you know, I think there’s so much information out there that everybody’s overwhelmed and you’re trying to do everything all at once. And that’s what also leads to burnout or to start-and-stop. So strategy is really important.

You know, things like let’s think about how we break down your time and how much time you’re going to actually invest in the job search each day, and make it a time that actually is going to be workable.

Like, if you’re already a parent working 12 hours and you’re a volunteer for community organizations, there’s no way you can spend three to four hours a day on a job search. Something more realistic would be 15 minutes to 30 minutes, and then really making use of that time by being singularly focused on what you’re doing.

The second thing, after you find clarity, is the sequence of the job search, right? So like I said before, if you know that you want to break into a new industry completely, then networking is going to be a huge part of that strategy.

I had a client who was doing direct services and nonprofit, and she was so burnt out. She was ready to quit. She didn’t have a job, and then she started job searching on her own to go somewhere else for about 18 months before reaching out to me.

And we helped her find clarity, and she was the person who would edit her resume and materials for hours every day. So she would only be able to submit one application a day, wouldn’t hear back, and would get demoralized.

By the time I worked with her, she had 190 resumes. So the first thing we did was combine them all to kind of figure it out. And then what we realized was that she wanted to transition from being in nonprofit direct services to being a consultant.

And so we targeted organizations that helped nonprofits with consulting on how to optimize their strategies or how to, you know, build out their services. And through networking, that was really where she needed to spend most of her energy because she’s trying to switch industries completely. That’s how she landed her dream job. And she’s very happy right now.

I just got a note from her the other day that she’s still using the strategies that I helped her with at work in terms of communicating, in terms of asking questions. So it’s really important that you have a strategy going into what stage of the job search you’re at and where to focus your energy.

Mac Prichard:

And the strategy clarity is getting clear about what you want. The strategy is about how you manage your time and who you reach out to, and where ––  am I hearing that correctly?

Samorn Selim:

Yes. And where you should be spending your time in the job search process. So if you are already a well-established person in your industry, you have all the experience for the next role that you want, then you could spend a lot more time on revamping your resume and then reaching out to your current network.

So you can, you, you will likely get some, some interviews from cold applications. And many of my clients are in that position, 80% of them land jobs with cold applications where they don’t know someone from the company, but their resume and their LinkedIn are so great that they’re getting cold outreaches from the companies.

If you are somebody who’s trying to switch industries completely, you’re unlikely to get through through a normal application process because you don’t have the standard things that they’re looking for. So in that case, the strategy would be, “Hey, I should target networking with people in this different industry.

And then when I show up to these networking sessions, I need to make sure that I do a mock informational networking session so that when I go into a real one, I’m prepared. And most of my clients who do that, they will get folks to say, “Hey, if you’re interested, my company’s hiring, I can submit your resume.”

So that’s the strategy in terms of, hey, if you’re trying to switch industries, that’s where you should focus your energy. So it’s really about being able to identify again where the bottleneck is and where you should be spending your time and energy that’s going to have the most impact.

Mac Prichard:

The third element of your system for avoiding burnout during a job search is consistency. Why does consistency matter?

Samorn Selim:

Wow, you know, it’s such a hard, it’s like simple, but hard to do, right? To stay consistent, because in the job search process, you can be demoralized, because you can get an interview and then get rejected the next day. You can make it to the mine around and then not get the offer.

So I was working with a client who wanted to transition to product marketing manager, and that’s a very tough industry to get into. Before that, she was doing marketing in her own company, consulting, freelancing, and then doing some government jobs here and there.

And in her case, she would apply and stop, or she would apply and get an interview, and then not apply because she’s like, okay, I just got to focus all my energy on this.

And what I tell clients is no, you have to keep your pipeline warm. And so we really break down the task into Monday, apply to three jobs. Tuesday, send 10 LinkedIn messages for informational interviews. Wednesday, apply to three other jobs.

Thursday, prep for the interview if you have an interview, and/or read an industry article so that you’re updating your knowledge about the industry and learning the lingo. Friday, apply to another three jobs. Saturday and Sunday, take some time off because you deserve a break, and if you don’t take a break, you will burn out.

So it’s really about looking at how much time you can spend in the job search and breaking the task down into such small, specific ways. And then the other thing is reminding yourself to count the wins. Now people think, I can only celebrate if I get an interview or an offer. That’s not the case.

You should celebrate every time you hit submit for an application. You should celebrate every time you send a request for an informational interview, because those are the things that are in your control. And you want to work on the things that are in your control in a very consistent, systematic way.

Mac Prichard:

It’s been a terrific conversation, Samorn. Now tell us what’s next for you.

Samorn Selim:

Yeah, thanks for asking that. What’s next for me? I have my gratitude journal. You can see it there in the back, but I also use it every day. And it’s called the Career Unicorns™ 90-Day 5-Minute Gratitude Journal: An Easy & Proven Way To Cultivate Mindfulness, Beat Burnout & Find Career Joy.

So it’s available in both the English and Spanish versions. And we’re getting another version translated to Mandarin right now.

Mac Prichard:

Terrific. Well, I know that our audience can learn more about you by connecting with you on LinkedIn. When you do reach out to Samorn there, please mention you heard and saw her on Find Your Dream Job.

And also visit your website at careerunicorns.com.

Now, Samorn, given all the great advice you’ve shared today, what’s the one thing you want our audience to remember about your system to get your next job without burning out?

Samorn Selim:

I want folks to remember that no matter where you are in your career, it’s possible to find your dream job that fits with your goals, your values, and the season of life that you’re in. And what it takes is to be able to look at that in the face and really be honest about what you want and take small, consistent actions.

You know, when I was leaving my job in Big Law, I was working 20-hour days, and the only time I had time to job search was on my bus ride to work. It was literally anywhere between 10 to 15 minutes, depending on traffic.

And through that process, I found clarity, and I was able to land my dream job as Berkeley Law’s first director of employer outreach within three months. And I was told it would never happen by all the experts, but when you find clarity and when you are aligned and you feel that enthusiasm, there’s always a way.

Mac Prichard:

Next week, our guest will be Shannon Grosswiler.

She coaches executives, entrepreneurs, and nonprofit professionals through career transitions.

Confidence is vital to a successful job search, especially in this economy.

But many of us, no matter how much we accomplish in our careers, may suffer from self-doubt.

Join us next Wednesday when Shannon Grosswiler and I talk about overcoming imposter syndrome in a tough job market.

Until next time, thanks for letting us help you find your dream job.

This show is produced by Mac’s List. 

Susan Thornton-Hough schedules our guests and writes our newsletter. Lisa Kislingbury Anderson manages our social media and creates our transcripts. 

Our sound engineer and editor is Anna McClain. And our music is by Freddy Trujillo.

This is Mac Prichard. See you next week.

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