165: How to Earn $250k+ With Multiple Remote Data Jobs (Overemployment with Delaney William)

[00:00:00] Avery Smith: Most people struggle to land one. Good job. Our guest today, he figured out how to land and keep three of them. At the same time, all remote, all legit. He's collecting three six figure paychecks without telling any of his three bosses. In this episode, we cover the controversial world of underemployment.

[00:00:18] Avery Smith: Is it unethical or absolutely genius? Why you might consider it, how it works, and why your very own coworker might be double dipping without you or your boss? Noticing. My guest today is Delaney William. He's an ex over employed product manager who now teaches tech professionals like you to do the same.

[00:00:36] Avery Smith: He's even helped a data analyst three x her income going from 150,000 per year to 480,000 per year by helping her add two more remote data jobs without needing to work 50 hours per week. So should you try it? I don't know, but if you're curious, here's a complete guide to getting started. Alright.

[00:00:55] Avery Smith: Delaney, you help people job stack or become over employed. For those that have never [00:01:00] heard of that concept before, can you just give us a quick intro on what that even means?

[00:01:03] Delaney William: Yeah, absolutely. So job stacking or overp employment is really just the concept of working to jobs at the same time. Uh, it's really always remote work.

[00:01:11] Delaney William: I've, I've yet to meet the person who has two, uh, in-office jobs that they stack simultaneously. Yeah, it's really just the concept of working multiple jobs. I'm sure we'll get deeper into this, but obviously with AI making work more efficient, just remote work culture growing, uh, there's a lot more opportunities to leverage that efficiency and, and do what used to take 40 hours in 10, 15, 20, 25 hours a week and, and be able to earn increased income.

[00:01:34] Delaney William: Another question that's loosely tied to that is, you know, is it typically full-time work? Is it part-time work? Is it gig work, job stacking or overp? Employment can technically be any of those things, but traditionally it's. Really focusing on those full-time roles because that's where you really squeeze out the opportunity.

[00:01:48] Delaney William: Like you're really compensated if you can figure out how to be efficient in those roles that are gonna pay you a premium salary.

[00:01:53] Avery Smith: Okay, so the idea is you have multiple jobs at once. Now I can see from like a salary perspective how [00:02:00] that would be beneficial, right? Like, uh, I'd like to get paid more money all the time, but like.

[00:02:04] Avery Smith: Do you have to work more too? Like are you working like 80 hour weeks or do you find that people can actually do this with keeping their work hours pretty far down?

[00:02:12] Delaney William: You know, there's no absolutes here, so it'd be pretty BS for me to say. Anyone can do it. No matter what jobs you get, it'll work out. I think everyone needs to be prepared with the reality of like, and let me just share my experience.

[00:02:21] Delaney William: When I was starting out doing this, I set a hypothesis and a goal, like I'd love to get to three jobs at 500 k. I am also cool with accepting a job and starting it and it not fitting that vision and just leaving that job and and continue pursuing. Like, I knew it was possible, but you could for sure find jobs where it couldn't work, right?

[00:02:37] Delaney William: For whatever reason, the boss is crazy. It's like a tiny startup and you wear five hats and it's just super chaotic. However, like for me, again, just personal experience before we even started stitching others This. I was working three full-time product management jobs, I was able to dial it back to about 25 hours a week.

[00:02:52] Delaney William: And I wanna caveat all this with by saying this only works if you're a high quality performer. Like if the company's not getting an ROI on you, you'll [00:03:00] probably get fired and none of this will work anyways. So I don't encourage anyone to do this at a speed that is faster than your ability to. Actually produce results.

[00:03:07] Delaney William: However, I think the people who are skeptical have never really tried or like probably have a default belief system of, okay, I work for a company and that's really all I do. So I give them 40 hours a week and that's the norm. And they never really thought from that other perspective. You know, it's like never forget the scientific term for, it's like you go car shopping for a car that you honestly didn't even really know existed a couple months ago and now you see it everywhere.

[00:03:27] Delaney William: Same thing, right? If you start a job with the idea of how do I get the outcomes in as little time as possible, you start seeing so many opportunities to become more efficient and you start noticing more solutions. So we can go deeper into these things later, but the three main mechanisms, social capital and just like how are you leading inside of a team and building up that social capital that you can have influence of like, Hey guys, why do we have this two hour meeting?

[00:03:48] Delaney William: That could just be a slack update. You know, if, if you're just a lazy employee, no one will listen to you. But if you're a leader that people respect and you can rally the team around efficiency. Totally different dynamic. The sexier options are ai, where can you embed AI into your [00:04:00] workflows to become more efficient?

[00:04:01] Delaney William: And then lastly, uh, outsourcing, which is like hire someone in a country where you can pay them a few dollars an hour and like you're marginally still taking home 80, 90% of that pay, but you're able to have someone support you kind of as if you were a consultant.

[00:04:12] Avery Smith: Super interesting. Let's talk about a little bit.

[00:04:15] Avery Smith: About like this being real. This is something you did. So I guess we should say this is a data analytics podcast. You are not a data analyst, but you are still somewhat technical. You are a product manager and you did this. Um, can you just talk a little bit about like where you worked and kind of like what you are making?

[00:04:30] Delaney William: Yeah, absolutely. So I started my career at UnitedHealth Group. So basically the company we had, there's several sub-companies, but you know that company where the CEO got murdered not so long ago, and there's a lot of sentiment to that where it's like, I was there and it was like so slow moving and slow bureaucratic, and honestly no one really cared about anyone besides just keeping the lights on.

[00:04:48] Delaney William: So yeah, very quickly I was like, this is not really something where I feel like my creative energy will be rewarded. Yeah, I did a bunch of entrepreneurial things for several years, but eventually when I was ready to start doing this. Like, okay, I'm earning 80 k. After doing some market research, I was like, if [00:05:00] I actually tried, I could for sure be making one 60 as a senior PM if I positioned myself the right way.

[00:05:04] Delaney William: So my next offer came in, uh, from Estee Lauder as a contractor at one 60 K annually. So it was like a contract position, but it was 40 hours a week to like full pay. And then I took a few months, like again, the whole concept of. Do it in a way that's sustainable. So I took a few months off of my job search, just got that second role dialed in until I felt really comfortable.

[00:05:22] Delaney William: And then I ended up stacking a third job at another, uh, company that operates in the insurance space, like a, a really big company making one 50. So I went from 80 to three 90 K in, uh, I think it was 11 months time span from the time I started my job search till making that nearly 400.

[00:05:39] Avery Smith: Okay. That's awesome.

[00:05:40] Avery Smith: I wanna hear more about that, but, but first, like, can a data analyst do this? Have you seen a data analyst do this before in the past?

[00:05:45] Delaney William: Yeah, so our, so we put about 140 people through our program over the last year. Our most successful client ever, uh, I'll, I'll leave her name out of it. No one wants to be known for these things, but yeah, she blew me out of the water with results.

[00:05:57] Delaney William: So she is now earning four [00:06:00] 80 k across three data rolls. She was earning one 50 when she came in, and we were able to help her stack two more roles on top of that.

[00:06:06] Avery Smith: Okay. That's, that's pretty interesting. Okay, so let's talk about like, how the freak do you, do you even like do this? So this data analyst, for example, and.

[00:06:14] Avery Smith: We can, maybe, we don't do data analysts, but like does this work in like for bigger companies or smaller companies, like what should, what should people, if they want, if they want to be job stacking, like what should they be looking for in a company?

[00:06:25] Delaney William: Yeah, great question. So I would personally try to avoid any really small companies for multiple reasons.

[00:06:31] Delaney William: There's a lot of ethical and moral gray area to all this, and I try to, you know, it's important to address some lines in the sand on both sides, right? It's like. There is an element of all this job stacking stuff where it's like, okay, companies don't really have loyalty, so that's one of the ways you can justify doing this of like, if the profitability isn't where it needs to be, companies will let you go, so you should go out and just get yours first.

[00:06:50] Delaney William: I think that can be true, but I also think the line in the sand is like, okay, I'm not gonna go accept an offer from this like tiny startup who is expecting me to completely transform their division and like, I'm gonna make or break this [00:07:00] company success and I gotta really get after it. Maybe they're giving me equity too, as, as a result of that.

[00:07:04] Delaney William: Like I think that's just a bad play and just, you know, not good for anybody. Not even good for you, because it's gonna be so high stress and there's gonna be so much expectation on you. So the flip side of the coin, and not even necessarily on purpose, but the three companies that I was working for were all pretty large.

[00:07:17] Delaney William: All very slow. One of the companies wasn't as large, but because they were just in a, in a pretty old industry being insurance, but slow slash old slash big companies, I would say, are the best ones to job stack in because it's all about just ROI, in my opinion. If you're gonna do this, the way to like justify it is they're paying me 150 k.

[00:07:34] Delaney William: Am I giving them their value in, in what they expect out of me in terms of results, not, not hours, not input results. To do that, you really just have to be. Not the slowest cog in the machine and just do your job effectively. Right? If you're in a small company, there might be way, way, way more expectation on you, but if you're just part of a bigger system, it, it's much easier to have autonomy and just kind of stay in the middle of the pack, so to speak.

[00:07:55] Avery Smith: That makes a lot of sense. Um, I think those larger companies often [00:08:00] at, at least like in tech, like there's a lot of large like, uh, thing companies that have high salaries. I think a lot of large companies, high salaries, I guess small companies can have. Large salaries too, but I think that's another like way, like these large companies, you can get paid a lot and a lot of the times you're a cog in the machine.

[00:08:14] Avery Smith: I actually, like, I'm having you on as a guest and I'm really interested to hear what you have to say. I'm, I'm skeptical about all of this. It's just, this sounds kind of crazy and it sounds like I. Yeah, you should meet a lot. And it sounds hard to do, so I'm excited to, to continue the conversation, but I was thinking, okay, could I have done this?

[00:08:28] Avery Smith: And I asked a couple of my friends and I was like, do you think this is possible? I think we, the people I asked, basically, we both decided that, like when we worked for small companies, it wouldn't have been possible. But when we worked for large companies, like I worked for ExxonMobil, I, I probably could have done it.

[00:08:40] Avery Smith: Like there's, it wasn't really that important. When I was at ExxonMobil, there was a time where I wasn't really getting a lot of projects and I had a lot of free time, so I was like. Doing stuff kind of just for funsies or, or trying to, to be innovative and try new things to help the company. And I, I probably didn't need to do any of those things, to be honest, those things.

[00:08:56] Avery Smith: Sure. Never got me any credibility or any like, bonuses [00:09:00] or anything useful at the company. Like honestly, it just kinda got me in trouble for, for coloring outside the lines. So I think, I think I could have pulled it off at, at ExxonMobil had I even heard of it. And had I been interested in doing it, I think.

[00:09:10] Avery Smith: I possibly could have done it. So you mentioned like there is some like moral gray area. Let's start with like a really first que like easy question is like, is this even legal?

[00:09:18] Delaney William: Yeah, great question. So broad answer, yes. I want everyone, if you're even remotely interested to go do your own research. Chad is a great friend, but yeah, just like do deep research, really understand your situation.

[00:09:28] Delaney William: 'cause I don't wanna just blindly encourage everyone to go do it. 'cause there are definitely. Risks, uh, associated, whether they're big or small for you, but across the board there's no legislation nationally, uh, I don't believe any states have legislation. But again, just double check your own state outlawing the concept of working multiple jobs.

[00:09:44] Delaney William: So from like a legal perspective, blank slate. No, I have seen. So then it's like, okay, what are the outlying scenarios where you could have more risk? There have for sure been situations where I don't want everyone to get super afraid by this, but there have been experiences where people have gone to jail for working multiple [00:10:00] jobs.

[00:10:00] Delaney William: These are outlier type situations where there was like very serious reason for why they should not have been. Maybe they had security clearance and they were a federal employee. That's, that's most of it. And maybe of like the three things I've ever seen of that happening. Two of them were that, and then I think the third example I've ever seen was like.

[00:10:15] Delaney William: People working for two direct competitors. I'm like very clear. Like trade secrets being passed back and forth, bite slate across the board, not illegal. You'll take on way, way, way more risk. If you work for the government, you have some sort of security clearance or you're working for direct competitors, that's where you wanna be.

[00:10:30] Delaney William: Like, really? You really watch out? And I'll add one more to the mix as if you're like an H one B Visa holder and you're relying on your company for sponsorship. I definitely discourage it. Eventually the next conversation of after having this conversation is like, okay, risk reward scenario. Right? So it's like if the worst thing that's.

[00:10:44] Delaney William: Likely gonna happen 99% of the time is I get fired. How does that, what is the reward situation if I pull it off? But if your risk is I could go to jail 'cause I'm a federal employee, or I could get eVic like I get sent outta the country 'cause I'm H one B, then it's definitely a different scenario there.

[00:10:57] Delaney William: Since that, I will say that there are, traditionally [00:11:00] you are signing a non-compete with your company that says you shouldn't be doing other things with your time again, like after. Really thorough research on this. Only three encounters ever. I've seen it go towards legal. Typically it's just, you think about it from a company's perspective.

[00:11:12] Delaney William: If they caught you working multiple jobs, are they like, what? Do they really have enough to gain that they're gonna sue you and spend like tens, if not hundreds of thousands of dollars in court with you for what? Pretty unlikely. So if it ever happens, it's like, okay, you just get fired. For now, right? That could change, like this could become like a bigger problem that companies want to send a message to people and who knows?

[00:11:29] Delaney William: Like if that happens, then it'll be a different conversation. But as of now, you know, 99% of the time if you were to get caught, you'd get fired. From an ethical perspective, I spoke to it a little bit, but I personally, my perspective is like if we're operating in this echo chamber of like being ideological, it's like, yeah, you shouldn't lie to your employer.

[00:11:45] Delaney William: You shouldn't be doing multiple things when. You're committing your time to this company, but that assumes that the company is operating from that energy as well. And I think it's very, very, very rare to find a company that will go to bat for their employees if they're having a down quarter, you know, if you're [00:12:00] working for a mom and pop shop or something.

[00:12:01] Delaney William: Sure. And there will be outer companies, so I don't wanna paint with too broad of a brush, but I think when you're operating in that environment, we're like, okay, the average stay at a company these year, these days is like maybe two years, if not less. And it's just not the same loyalty environment. So I.

[00:12:14] Delaney William: My perspective is you really have to put yourself first. And as long as the company's getting an ROI, it can be justified. And it's like they don't necessarily need to know. And also one more thing on the non-competes, it's like, yeah, you shouldn't be doing anything else with your time, but how many executives are on boards of other companies and like doing other things with their time.

[00:12:27] Delaney William: So it's like, even that alone I think is pretty, um, hypocritical in a sense. Everyone should make that own decision. That's how I feel about it. Yeah. And then it really just leads into the risk reward scenario. So like, again, just for me, it's like, okay, the worst thing that happen is I get fired. If I'm working for, so I am job stacking.

[00:12:43] Delaney William: I get fired from a company, well, I had two jobs and now I still have one income. It's like, I'm sure you, you worked in the corporate environment, I'm sure you've seen people get blindsided with layoffs who were good employees. And in today's job market, it can take at least six months for like, people go unemployed for a pretty long time these days, uh, because it's so hyper competitive.

[00:12:58] Delaney William: So it's like, you know, you're risking by having [00:13:00] one job, you're risking. Like eating $60,000 of your savings because you weren't able to have income for that time while you're searching for jobs. So I think a lot of people like might be a bit afraid of jobs stacking because of risk, and that's valid. You should really think through it.

[00:13:12] Delaney William: I'm not saying you should do it, but I don't think people realize that. It's also pretty risky to just rely on that one salary and just blindly, I. Uh, trust in that company to provide for you.

[00:13:20] Avery Smith: It is true that like, especially a lot of big companies, I feel like, view their employees as not even like a line in in their p and l, right?

[00:13:27] Avery Smith: Like you're just kind of a, a number. You're, you're like, the more that we hire of this person, the more like we'll make, I. X more millions of dollars per year. Like that's, that's the return on investment of, of, of this, I don't even want to call it an employee of this like asset to our business. Right.

[00:13:41] Avery Smith: That's unit.

[00:13:42] Delaney William: Yeah, exactly. That's how

[00:13:42] Avery Smith: they, yeah, that's how they view like big companies I think view employees and like, like you said, like there's companies that don't view it that way, but I think a good majority do. And so it's like, okay, well what if I just viewed. Like this job or this company as another line in my personal PLI think that is one way of looking at it.

[00:13:58] Avery Smith: It's like, okay, if [00:14:00] companies aren't going to, you know, treat us well, like, why should I be extremely loyal to them? I think that makes a lot of sense. I, I had a chance to, to ask my YouTube audience the 40,000 subscribers I have there, and I. I said, Hey, I have this job, job stacking expert coming on the podcast.

[00:14:15] Avery Smith: Um, what, what questions do you, do you have for him? And one of the things that, the top voted question, why do you keep taking all the jobs, bro? I mean, I guess it's not you taking the data jobs, it's your student, uh, in your program who's taking all the data jobs. But like, I guess like they're like, Hey, leave me some jobs.

[00:14:30] Avery Smith: Like what, from an ethical perspective, I'm curious what you think like to these people who are trying so hard to land one job. Like maybe, like what do you say to someone that's taking up like three of those, three of those, or maybe two extra, I guess.

[00:14:42] Delaney William: No, for sure man. And it's real. Uh, whenever I break down the modern job market, I always start with how bad is the market?

[00:14:48] Delaney William: And it's like, unemployment rate's actually quite low. It's like 4.2%, which historically is like almost as low as it's ever been, but it's hard to get a job and why? And it's like this trend is still like probably much smaller than it will become over the [00:15:00] next few years. But even if there's a hundred thousand people in the US job stacking, that's like, and they want like three or four jobs, that's like an extra, almost.

[00:15:07] Delaney William: Half a million people trying to go out and get these tech jobs essentially, when there's not that much supply of it. So I, I do think it has a really big effect that's not really acknowledged in the broader media, but it is for sure a reality where there's hyper competition and it's no longer like, okay, everyone just fights.

[00:15:22] Delaney William: You're like, I have a jobs and I'll leave the next job for someone else. It's like these people who really understand the game, it's like it's a winner. Take all mindset or winner take all experience that's happening now. I don't know, like it might sound a bit. Brash. But I do think that's just sort of the nature of life in general that like everything is in a sense just, you know, it's like a bit of natural selection is not the right, the best term for it, but it's essentially just like we live in this competitive environment, like the companies who are around long enough, like figure a way to figure out a way to outcompete there.

[00:15:48] Delaney William: I. Competition and I think the job market's like it's the same. It's now been magnified, but I can only speak for myself. But when I went to go start doing this, it's like okay, I want this outcome. My options are either to sit in the corner in so, or figure out how to play the game. [00:16:00] And like it sucks. The job market's only gonna suck more and more.

[00:16:02] Delaney William: It's like our clients we're, we're seeing how they're having to have their first round interviews with like an AI robot more and more and more. And it's becoming more part of this like experience. And it's no fun applying to thousands of jobs a month just to get a couple interviews. But I think it's a reality of like.

[00:16:15] Delaney William: This is just where we're at. And you either play the game or go start a company or something, because those are really the only two options.

[00:16:22] Avery Smith: Yeah. And it's also like if, if this person's taking, let's say three jobs, it's not like you were gonna get that one otherwise. Like, um, this person, obviously they're getting three jobs, they're probably pretty qualified, but I guess maybe you could argue, well then someone else would've gotten that one and then that one would've opened up and maybe there's like a trickle down.

[00:16:37] Avery Smith: I don't know. But yeah. Um, and I,

[00:16:39] Delaney William: and I do think it really also ties back to the concept of like. Are you actually able to put out high quality work? Because I think there is an argument for like, okay, if this person can actually figure out how to hold these three jobs and do a good enough job that they're like genuinely, like their employers are proud of them and want to keep them on staff, there's an opportunity to be rewarded for that.

[00:16:57] Delaney William: It like takes another, it's like higher level thinking, higher level problem [00:17:00] solving. There's an equal opposite argument that it's not fair and it is robbing people of jobs for sure. But I think it's also just the reality of. Open market and, and how that operates.

[00:17:08] Avery Smith: I mean, it's capitalism, I guess. Okay. So like, Kay, if we wanna do this, how do we actually start doing it?

[00:17:12] Avery Smith: And I want to go to my, my YouTube post again, because some of the questions that people ask are, what skills are mandatory and which ones are don't you need? Um, this person asks, well, what certifications will enhance my resume and, and boost my chance? Uh, this person asked, well, like, maybe I should, I know SQL and Tableau, but maybe I should know r and Docker and some extra stuff.

[00:17:34] Avery Smith: Take to land multiple roles and my reply to those people were, I mean, I'll ask, and so here I am asking, but from my guess if I had to guess is like you, you have to be qualified for these jobs you're applying for. But I think what separates the people from the people who land multiple jobs versus the people who don't land multiple jobs.

[00:17:51] Avery Smith: Correct me if I'm wrong, but I'm guessing it's not that they're more qualified than someone else. I think it's probably more on their ability, their career. Their job hunting skills, their [00:18:00] networking skills and stuff like that. So is is that true?

[00:18:02] Delaney William: Yeah, great question and I always love to caveat this with, I have an approach that works.

[00:18:06] Delaney William: There are also other approaches that work. So just 'cause I'm about to say what I'm gonna say doesn't mean you can't use networking or other tactic kitted job. The way I see it, the modern job market, if you're gonna go through traditional channels of like, I'm going out there and looking at the jobs that are actually posted.

[00:18:19] Delaney William: Not like going through my network and creating new opportunities, but literally just going after jobs that are posted, 500 people are gonna apply to that same data analyst job that you are. And if you're putting yourself in the recruiter's shoes, A, there's so many facets to this. Like one, there's an algorithm that's gonna predetermine if you fall on page 1, 2, 3, or 33 for that recruiter.

[00:18:35] Delaney William: And that's actually the first thing you have to figure out how to do is be on those first couple pages. 'cause no recruiter's actually gonna click to the 30th page to have a conversation with you. So there's a ton of stuff in there that we can speak to, but really. Because there are 500 candidates, that recruiter's only gonna even entertain the idea of talking to the 30 to 50 people who already seem like complete experts for this role.

[00:18:54] Delaney William: So again, ethics, morals, going back to it, I would love for it to be a world where you could just say, Hey, this is who I am and [00:19:00] here's my resume. Just blankly. And that can work. So, so, so often it's just not gonna work because unless you can position yourself in that top few percent of what they're looking for, you're gonna get probably auto DQ by that AI algorithm on the front end, which will dq like 90% of people.

[00:19:15] Delaney William: But even if not, you'll likely be like totally at the end of the line and the recruiter won't even get a chance to know that you exist because of that. What I've seen is you really have to figure out exactly what job title I'm going after. So for your audience, it's like, you know, these are just some examples.

[00:19:27] Delaney William: I'm not complete expert in data analyst field, but it's like, do I want to go after data analysts? Data engineer, data scientist, the senior version of all those, whatever it might be. Typically, I would say never go above a senior manager level because the volume of opportunities degrees decreases by like a multiple 10 and it, it becomes a numbers game.

[00:19:45] Delaney William: Literally 500 people are applying to these jobs. Even with a great resume, your hit rate is gonna be. Just a few percent of the jobs you apply to, you'll get an interview for is what we see across the board. So, and also it's just like the risk you take on the visibility, it's like better to have multiple lower level jobs that are easier to be an individual contributor and, [00:20:00] and be a little more low key by reverse engineering.

[00:20:02] Delaney William: That then you're able to put forth the resume that when the recruiter sees it, they're like, oh, that's exactly what I'm looking for. So by being a generalist where you have just like three or four different kind of hodgepodge data type roles, which might be that, that might have been your experience, but it's really so hyper competitive that you have to re-engineer your experience a little bit to say like, okay, if I'm going after.

[00:20:19] Delaney William: A senior data analyst position, I'm gonna reframe some of my past experience. So I come across as I have been, you know, you can have some career progression, but like three to four to five plus years of this exact work listed out on the resume. And then not only in terms of job titles, but also the keywords.

[00:20:34] Delaney William: So it's like when, when I mention the AI algorithm will auto reject, 90% of people are, are pretty way at the back of the line. You have to really understand what keywords are needed. So when you ask like are Tableau, like what skills that is so dependent on the exact type of job you want, and the best way to do that is to go do your research.

[00:20:49] Delaney William: So go find, once you have the job title that you know you wanna go after, then go find 10 of those job postings and pull out all those keywords and put 'em in a Google Doc and then figure out, you can even use Chat petit to make sure you [00:21:00] get all those keywords in your resume somewhere. And that's at a very, very high level.

[00:21:04] Delaney William: There's way more to it, but. That's what's not only gonna get the algorithm to think you're a good fit for these type of roles, but once you're able to do that, like no human's gonna know you exist unless you can beat the bypass, that algorithm filter. The best way to do that is with keyword research. So to really dial back and answer your question, my potentially controversial opinion is any type of certification is not gonna matter because the people that are gonna interview for the any role under the sun.

[00:21:26] Delaney William: Are gonna be people that have done this exact thing for five plus years. So unless you can convey that on your resume and at that point no one cares that you're certified in this thing. It's like you either did it in a real world at a high level or I don't even wanna talk to you. Definitely be competent in those things so you can put them on your resume.

[00:21:38] Delaney William: But like when we do resumes, the education section, which would include certification, is literally two lines. It's like education and then like literally one line of what you, where you went to school. 'cause it's like that is not gonna be the differentiator in today's world. I'd much rather have a long experience section and a long skill section with all those keywords plugged into it.

[00:21:53] Avery Smith: Okay, so let's, let's say you have me and I'm, I'm qualified. Let's say I'm applying for like a data analyst job. I've done this for like a decade. [00:22:00] Uh, I'm qualified. Let's say you have, you have Avery A and Avery b. They're exactly the, the same skill wise. Let's say they even have the, the same resume. What's gonna make Avery a like more likely to, to land more interviews and b, able to job stack than, than Avery be like, what is Avery a doing differently?

[00:22:16] Delaney William: I mean, assuming you guys are just like starting out, so. Are you assuming they already have really good resumes and those things are already dialed?

[00:22:23] Avery Smith: We're working. Let's just say I'm a data analyst at Exxon. Back in the day, I'm qualified for my role and I'm like, ah, maybe I wanna get paid some more and maybe I'm into this job stacking thing.

[00:22:31] Avery Smith: Like what would I do? Sure.

[00:22:32] Delaney William: Okay. So let's start with Avery B, the one that's not getting results. So the one that isn't getting results, which is most people that we end up talking to. 'cause this is how the job market was a few years ago. It's like. Cool. I put together a resume. It has all the impressive things I've done on it, communicates my experience.

[00:22:45] Delaney William: I'm gonna go apply to a bunch of jobs. Cool. I've done that. You maybe didn't do all those things. You didn't do those things I just mentioned where you weren't super clear on the exact job title strategy, the keyword strategy. You haven't really optimized to bypass those AI filters and you start going applying to [00:23:00] jobs.

[00:23:00] Delaney William: That's one component. So he didn't do the optimization. Second is volume of applications. So we operate under the assumption that even with a great resume. If you're only gonna get 1% interview response rate of all the jobs you apply to, and that might end up being low, but I'd rather undershoot and over deliver.

[00:23:16] Delaney William: And even though that sounds crazy and impossible for most people working a full-time job, like how am I gonna apply to, what is that? Like a hundred jobs a day, every workday throughout the month. That sounds really overwhelming for most people. Flipping over to Arie, he would've done all that optimization stuff, but he also would figure out how to have a system.

[00:23:31] Delaney William: And we do this for people, but you can also figure out how to do it yourself on, on different degrees of complexity. It's how do I have a system that's really making sure I get out tons of applications, assuming I'll get one interview for every hundred jobs I apply to. So that can be easy applies. We like to do a mix of long form applications.

[00:23:46] Delaney William: Obviously there's pros and cons to both. Long forms take longer, but there's less competition when you're out on company websites easy applies are easier. You can get away, more volume, but there's way more competition. We really do find, like once you've beaten the algorithm or you've really gotten a place where the algorithm likes your resume and will put you at the form of the line, [00:24:00] the easy applies actually have a really good return 'cause you're just able to skip a lot of people in line on those application platforms.

[00:24:06] Delaney William: But. Regardless, we like to use both of those platforms. We also have an in-house automation tool that can automate the process of applying on LinkedIn, indeed and ZipRecruiter. So that's like the far end of the spectrum. But for the average person who maybe doesn't have the ability to invest in this stuff, it's like carve out at least an hour or two a day to be applying and do a mix of long form and uh, easy apply applications.

[00:24:26] Delaney William: There's a plugin called Simplify that. It's basically a Chrome plugin, like those plugins that save your credit card information so easy. Same thing for your job application process. So even on those long form applications, it'll fill it out really quickly for you. And also when you're filtering for jobs to apply, to start off with applying to anything that has been posted in the last 24 hours.

[00:24:44] Delaney William: 'cause if you can be within the first like 50 to a hundred applicants, your chances of someone seeing you and talking to you are gonna be way higher. To really close the loop on that, Avery A would focus on how do I make sure the algorithm loves me and I'm a top 5% candidate? 'cause that'll just shoot your response rate through the roof [00:25:00] compared to Avery B.

[00:25:00] Delaney William: And then really focusing on volume. And if you assume one interview for every a hundred jobs I apply to, how do I just keep bumping that number up to like one 2000 job applications per month? That's a recipe like that might sound intense and over the top, but that's for sure. Like it's really hard to not have success.

[00:25:16] Delaney William: If you're having at least 10 or 20 interviews a month, it's almost just, you know, even if you're not great at interviewing, you're struggling with that process. It's kind of just a matter of times when you land something. Yeah. Those are the main three components that we see.

[00:25:26] Avery Smith: That's exactly what I was, uh, trying to get to is like once you're qualified.

[00:25:31] Avery Smith: Getting more qualified isn't what's going to separate you from, maybe I was in a hundred thousand dollars job, you know, Avery B was a hundred thousand dollars and now after Avery a doing this, maybe I'm at $350,000. The difference between $350,000 and a hundred thousand dollars, I. Isn't that, you know, I went out and got certified in one other skill or that exactly.

[00:25:51] Avery Smith: Like I got better at my skills because once you're qualified, you're, you're qualified. Right. And, uh, even adding, maybe you added one more qualification that's not necessarily the difference maker. The difference [00:26:00] maker that, that you just said is like, no, I'm gonna like a hundred x. Your your output basically.

[00:26:05] Avery Smith: Yeah, exactly. Through, through automation. And it's like, and, and really that's like a job hunting technique, although it is kind of a crazy one, right? It is a job hunting technique and that's what separates the 300,000, $350,000 data analyst to a hundred thousand dollars data analyst is, is really the skills could be the exact same heck.

[00:26:21] Avery Smith: Even Avery B could be a better data analyst than Avery A, but like a hundred percent if you're qualified. If you're qualified at that point. It's kind of like a numbers game slash slash a. Yeah. It's just like, it's math. It's like, oh, if you're going to, you know, you're the average, uh, I think it's called like an applicant ratio, the, the OR interview ratio.

[00:26:38] Avery Smith: Like the number of times you get interviewed for, the number of times you send an application is like the average is like, I don't know, 5% or something like that. So it's like, you know, for every a hundred applications you send, you're gonna get five interviews, and then you probably have some sort of an interview percentage as well.

[00:26:52] Avery Smith: Maybe it's for every first interview you have, you'll end up landing, I don't know, one out of six of those jobs maybe. And so it's like, [00:27:00] okay, if I want to get more offers. Like the easiest thing is just increase the, the number of applications I sent out.

[00:27:06] Delaney William: Exactly. Yep. A hundred percent.

[00:27:08] Avery Smith: So anyways, to everyone on, on the YouTube channel, who left, who left these questions of like, you know, what skills do I need or like, or what, you know, certificates do I need.

[00:27:16] Avery Smith: It's like, okay, once you're qualified, it doesn't really matter. It's just like you're out.

[00:27:20] Delaney William: Yeah, exactly. But it's also valid to be like a. Like just double check. Like, look at these job posting. Maybe you'll notice a new framework or tool or skillset that you don't have. You're like, oh, I'm actually noticing this is a trend that might be worth filling those gaps.

[00:27:34] Avery Smith: And, and for the record people, guess what? You can just put stuff on your resume, even if you don't know it. Like you can get in trouble when you get to the interview, but at least you're in the interview at that point. Like, like that's what we say.

[00:27:44] Delaney William: No, I'm on the same thing. It's like, do what you gotta do to get your foot in the door.

[00:27:46] Delaney William: That's the hardest part. Then figure out how to justify it. Like that's what I'll, as long as you can, if you think you can learn the skill within like 10 hours if you had to, to just be competent, put it on your resume. You'll figure it out later

[00:27:56] Avery Smith: and, and yeah, I, one time there was a project that [00:28:00] required D three in JavaScript.

[00:28:01] Avery Smith: I don't know, I didn't know D three at all. I got the job, I learned it like I figured it out. But like you get in the interview and you just cram right beforehand and you'll be fine. And, and if you're not fine, well guess what? At least you got the interview. 'cause if you wouldn't have put on your resume, you wouldn't have gotten the interview.

[00:28:14] Avery Smith: So you got at least one step closer. Okay. So let's say Avery a does this. I do mass application. I first have a good, good resume. I do mass applications, I start to get interviews. Let's say I start to, to land these roles we talked about like you have to pretty much be remote, otherwise it's gonna be really hard.

[00:28:28] Avery Smith: You, you kind of hinted at this earlier, but like, what am I doing? Like how, the question on YouTube was how can you do justice, the requirements of each job and to yourself if you're, if you're juggling multiple, like what tools do we have at our hands to actually pull this off? Like we're now I have. Two full-time jobs, like how the heck am I gonna do this?

[00:28:45] Delaney William: Yeah, absolutely. So we usually do this as like a side-by-side discovery with our clients. It would be kinda ridiculous for me to say we know exactly how to do it. 'cause everyone's job is so different. The things they are responsible for in their role are gonna be different. And my corporate experience has only ever been in product management.

[00:28:59] Delaney William: [00:29:00] So for me to say, I know exactly what you need to do in your data analyst role to. Work them simultaneously would be very inauthentic. So I think I would, I go to a few things. So one is for sure those three pillars that I mentioned before. So before we even look at the tools and like the sexy, like what AI could you deploy to make your coding, your, uh, data analyst role easier?

[00:29:18] Delaney William: I would really like the least sexy, but most effective one is just your social capital and your EQ and your leadership. Role and as you like, I wouldn't even start pursuing a second job until you've really dialed that first job into like 20 hours-ish per per week. If that's really, really hard for you, you may actually wanna consider trying to find a job that you could just replace this one if it's a non-starter, right?

[00:29:38] Delaney William: So some people, they're gonna be totally against this whole concept because. Even their current role is hard, and that's super valid and justifiable. So for people who really do wanna pursue it, it's just finding that right work environment and really building that leadership social capital and really just rallying everyone around efficiency.

[00:29:52] Delaney William: You're not coming in and saying, Hey guys, like I'm just, you don't wanna give the vibe. If I'm lazy, I don't wanna be at meetings. But everyone can get behind efficiency and especially in bigger companies, there's [00:30:00] usually so much room for efficiency. Uh, so if you can bring, like, if you can just understand, like, I won't pretend to be an expert in terms of ways of working within the data field, but you could probably look at the way people are doing things and make recommendations for how you could.

[00:30:09] Delaney William: Carve off five or 10 hours per week of things that are happening just because they're not as efficient as they could otherwise be. If you're a team leader, obviously more things like delegation and empowering the people around you. One of my roles as a product manager, I, for like two years did literally nothing because just everyone around me was empowered, powered to just.

[00:30:24] Delaney William: Do things and they were bought into the role and they enjoyed it. So those are options. When it comes to, like with our data analyst client specifically that I just mentioned earlier, she took on three roles when we got to this point where she's like, okay, I'm working these jobs. I'm like kinda worried if I'm actually gonna be able to do these together.

[00:30:38] Delaney William: You know, we just spent an hour together where she mapped out first and foremost, it's like, what am I being really clear on? Like, where is your time being allocated? 'cause. We have usually a general sense, but it's like really map out in a week, where are you putting your time, what type of projects were you focused on?

[00:30:50] Delaney William: And even something as simple as using in a basic LLM to just kind of plug that in and say, Hey, these are the things I'm doing. Are you aware of any AI tools like AI agents, like any other ways I can [00:31:00] make this workflow more efficient? Relying on AI to help you find out if there's any AI tools or functions that um, would allow you to free up time and.

[00:31:08] Delaney William: Again, I can speak to the product manager, but almost everything in the product manager world was just basically turning words into other words. So that was pretty easy to do with chat GPT and building a custom GPT that was trained on company. Uh, just basically like all of my onboarding documentation, I just uploaded it into a, a custom GPT that I.

[00:31:26] Delaney William: Would write like project, you know, feature requirements and and whatnot for me, or like quarterly goals and whatever. So those are effective options. And then sometimes like, and it's really about looking at each of these tasks that we have and what would be the right approach. So like of those three pillars, outsourcing AI or eq, what would make the most sense to tackle this problem?

[00:31:46] Delaney William: And you can test and try things like another option. Something I did, uh, the woman who's now the COO of our company, I hired her at $4 an hour, like three years ago to be my. Assistant to help me do my product management work. 'cause she had done some of that before. So she, back then, for me, just an [00:32:00] example of like how I utilized her is I had to do a monthly, um, competitive analysis PowerPoint.

[00:32:07] Delaney William: So I would have her do that for me, turn over to me. I'd present it to the team, like analysis of feedback. So like all our app store reviews, thousands of reviews. She would assess that, put a PowerPoint together, save me like three hours a week that I didn't have to do those things. So there are times and places where that type of stuff makes more sense.

[00:32:22] Delaney William: I want to asterisk that. That can come with risk because your company does not likely want, you, definitely doesn't want you outsourcing that work to other people. So you have to be like, can I get a pulse on that of is this something I'm willing to do? I was willing to do it doesn't mean you should, but it saved me a lot of time and.

[00:32:37] Delaney William: Is always a viable option. It's really like, usually I make that decision of like, okay, would an AI do this way faster with way less guidance? Cool, I'll do that. If this is something that for whatever reason it would be harder for AI to do, but also if I, if I teach this person to do it, like is it gonna spend, am I gonna spend more time explaining it to them?

[00:32:52] Delaney William: Then it will take me to just do it myself. So I'm thinking about those type of things as well to determine, because then there were always things that were just for me to do. 'cause I realized like, eh, AI [00:33:00] can't really do this well. It's not even worth trying to get this other person to do it 'cause they won't understand the industry as much.

[00:33:04] Delaney William: And that should be stuff that's still on my plate. So there will always still be work to do, typically, but it's just constantly assessing, like, what could you ship off to other functions?

[00:33:11] Avery Smith: Well it's interesting because, and I, and I always get nervous just talking about my, my ex-employer, Exxon. I, I love you, uh, but I'll, I'll use you as an example.

[00:33:20] Avery Smith: Like Exxon was definitely offshoring. My roles, like my role to places like, like India and, and other offshore places. So it's like, if they're gonna do it, like why? Just to play, just to play devil's advocate here. This is one way you could think about it. Not the only way, but like, if they're gonna ship it to someone else to do it cheaper, like, why can't I do that and keep the delta like, like they're gonna, they're gonna do it otherwise, right.

[00:33:41] Avery Smith: So like, why not get started on it? Yeah. And, and then in terms of like ai, it's funny because I haven't worked, I, I left my job in 2021 and like LLMs were chat. GPG wasn't a thing yet. So LLMs were. You had heard about 'em, but you haven't really used one yet. Um, and so now it's just so funny because if I could take 2025 Avery and go back to like [00:34:00] 2020 Avery, like I would be fast in all this, like all of my coding.

[00:34:04] Avery Smith: Like I wrote a lot of Python code and it's like I would've written that a lot faster now, like probably five times faster because, you know, AI is never going to be as good of a data analyst as me. That's my belief. But like. It can get 50% of the way there, and then I only have 50% of the project to do. And so I can see how AI would be really powerful, especially if you maybe work for an older industry where they're like not using AI and stuff like that.

[00:34:26] Avery Smith: So that makes a lot of sense. So, okay. The, the three things that, that you can do when you're in the job to balance all this is one, just like. Have, have people like you, like be, be like a good leader, be like, Hey, yeah, let's try to be efficient. Like try to get rid of meetings if you don't need 'em. Two is to use AI to do things that maybe, uh, you used to do by hand.

[00:34:43] Avery Smith: And three is to delegate to to others and have them do stuff for you basically. And those are the three pillars then?

[00:34:48] Delaney William: Yeah, exactly. Yep.

[00:34:50] Avery Smith: Okay. I can see how it's possible, I can see the, the vision of, of it all. It sounds scary still, but I like what you said. You're like, okay. You're not even doing this until you're, you're in [00:35:00] a role and you're, you're not, you're, you're not job stacking in the beginning.

[00:35:03] Avery Smith: You're just trying to get to like 25 hours a week. That's like, that's your starting point. And then once you're there, then you can start thinking about, um, about job stacking. That actually reminds me, um, a really good book that that kind of talks about this that's like maybe what almost 20 years old is Four Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss, and he talks about a lot of similar things of like.

[00:35:24] Avery Smith: If you wanna like, have financial freedom in your life, figure out how to start working remotely. Once you're working remotely, figure out how to get like less on your schedule. Um, and he talks about some of the delegation to outsourcing stuff. So anyways, that's, that's just kinda the key is like, before you, before you even dabble into this, that's kinda what you have to be thinking about.

[00:35:40] Avery Smith: Now let's talk about what you do. So if I'm, if I'm watching or listening to this and I'm like, okay, I'm a data analyst, I have experience. And I wanna get down to, or like, let's just say I wanna earn more money. Like do I start talking to you to try to get to 25 hours a week? Do I start talking to you once I'm in a role that's at 25 hours a week?

[00:35:57] Avery Smith: Like what, what do you do and how do you help you?

[00:35:59] Delaney William: Yeah, [00:36:00] I would say it's the right time to engage with us, or at least like book a call with us. If you're ready to really make this a reality, if you're still in like the, I don't even know if this is for me thing. Definitely just, you know, we have some good YouTube content, just like, you know, figure that out if you even wanna pursue it.

[00:36:13] Delaney William: Right? Zero pressure. But what I would say is it all takes time. Like I'd much rather have someone get started on the process with a lot of runway and time. So even if you're like, yeah, I know I can get into 2025. 20 to 25 hours a week of work at this role, but it'll take me a little time to just like get those building blocks in place.

[00:36:32] Delaney William: Then I think it's the right time to engage with us because getting your resume out there, building momentum, that stuff can take time. So both can happen at the same time, right? Like, we don't want you to be like, okay, I'm ready, and then you're like waiting a month or two to get the, the algorithm really hitting the right way to start getting interviews coming in.

[00:36:46] Delaney William: So yeah, if, if you're ready and you feel confident in it, we'd be happy to have a conversation to see if it even makes sense to support you.

[00:36:54] Avery Smith: Awesome, Delaney. Well, we'll make sure we have, uh, all of your social links down below so that people can get in touch with you. [00:37:00] And, uh, if you're, if you're watching and you're listening and you're interested in this, uh, reach out to me.

[00:37:04] Avery Smith: 'cause I'd just love to, to to, it's hard, it's hard to talk to people who are interested and who are doing in this 'cause they kind of wanna keep it on, on the dl, so it'd be fun. Yeah, for

[00:37:11] Delaney William: sure. Yeah, I graduated from it to talk about it openly.

[00:37:15] Avery Smith: Yeah. E even, even then, like, uh, I mean, you don't want to get. It's funny though because like if, if the company's not happy with their, with your performance how you're doing, they should get rid of you.

[00:37:24] Avery Smith: Right. Like that. I think that's fair. It's like if you're not performing up to their standards, they should get rid of you. But if you are performing up to their standards and they find out that you're also hitting someone else's performance standards, I mean, to be honest, they're gonna fire you for sure, but like, they should theoretically be okay with it.

[00:37:39] Avery Smith: 'cause you're, you're doing everything that they're asking and they're happy with your output. All of a sudden they figure out that you're doing more than that and they're not

[00:37:47] Delaney William: my take. Not that I, I know that this is true or not. I really think that will shift over time. So, and you're clearly an entrepreneur as well, but like what I see in the entrepreneur community of like these smaller, they're still like companies that do really well, but they're smaller, more [00:38:00] like modern thinking, like almost all my employees are fractional and they do other things.

[00:38:04] Delaney William: Yeah, at least like 80% of them. And it o we operate from that model of like, as long as you're doing your thing, great. So many companies, especially as they're growing, will rely on consulting or agencies to run business functions. And that's like normal, but it doesn't really translate to the, uh, traditional nine to five role.

[00:38:19] Avery Smith: That's actually, I thought the same thing. Um, especially when I, when I quit my job and I started doing like freelancing, I was like, this is awesome. And I was like, I picture a future. Where we're all just freelancers and we, we just freelance for maybe multiple companies and maybe one day we were freelance for one company.

[00:38:35] Avery Smith: One time we freelance for another company, and so I was like, this is, this is the future. And so I was like, how do I, like, I think I'm early on this. How do I, like, how do I invest in this? Like how can I call my shot? Right? And so I, I bought a bunch of, uh, Fiverr and Upwork stock. 'cause I was like, these are freelancing companies that are, uh, that are really, that are really good.

[00:38:53] Avery Smith: Uh, Fiverr's down 45% in the past five years. And Upwork is up [00:39:00] 25% in the last five years. Nice. But also,

[00:39:01] Delaney William: yeah, so I've ever, I've ever had it tanked a little bit.

[00:39:04] Avery Smith: Yeah, it tanked big time. And even Upwork, like back in, back in 2021, it was 60 bucks and now it's 17 bucks. So it, it's uh, it's fallen quite a bit too.

[00:39:13] Avery Smith: So we're not quite at that, that future yet. Yeah. But, uh, if you guys wanna hop in and you guys are like, yes. I wanna be a modern worker and I wanna work, I wanna job stack, I wanna be over employed. I wanna make a lot of money so that way when the layoff inevitably happens, my family's gonna be taken care of.

[00:39:27] Avery Smith: Um, then this is a good option for you. And, uh, Delaney is one of the only people that I've seen talk about this openly on the internet, so he'd be a good resource.

[00:39:35] Delaney William: Appreciate it, Avery.

[00:39:36] Avery Smith: Hey, no problem. Thanks for coming on Delaney.

[00:39:38] Delaney William: Yeah, of course. It's been a fun time.