Every so often, you’ll encounter a tech pro on a job hunt who’ll admit to sending dozens, even hundreds of resumes to prospective employers. Despite firing off all those emails and applications, however, the mystified tech pro wonders why none of those employers have reached out to schedule a job interview. There are several reasons why a resume carpet-bombing won’t return acceptable results. For starters, not all companies are the same, and the majority of recruiters and HR staffers are very good at discerning whether a resume is “generic” or tailored to their company’s specific needs. Generic resumes simply don’t make it very far along in the review process. Candidates who send out dozens or hundreds of resumes also lose sight of a key fact: The resume is just one piece of the overall puzzle. When you ask successful candidates how they landed a particular job (or, alternatively, ask employers why they went with a particular candidate over another), you’ll likely hear a lot about building a relationship. Networking, taking informational interviews, and other techniques can all place you much more effectively on a company’s radar than clicking ‘Send’ on a resume and hoping for the best. People only have so much time to look for a job; spending those precious hours focusing on companies and sub-industries that genuinely interest you, and applying multiple approaches to land a job interview, is arguably more effective than simply shooting out resumes into the void.