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Battling historically high unemployment rates and increasingly job-hungry AI, young Americans looking for a leg up are increasingly turning to social media to broadcast their availability — and sometimes very loudly.
And it appears to be working — a recent study found that 46% of Gen Z, who reportedly are often sending out as many as 1,000 applications per job hunt, have secured employment or internships using TikTok.
Some, like NYC marketing and events professional Caroline Schlobohm, insist it’s the only way to make headway nowadays.
After being laid off from two jobs in the span of six months, the 28-year-old took to TikTok to document the struggle and share her resume — vlogging her journey to find a plum post in the Big Apple.
“It was basically an experiment for me,” the Zoomer told The Post, explaining that she had already seen others find both gainful employment opportunities and overnight fame the same way.
“I’m in New York City, I’m attractive, I’m educated, I can hack this stupid app and use my talents to make this a thing,” she said.
As a direct result of her video, and despite a dearth of relevant experience at the time, Schlobohm was hired as a lead event strategist for a private luxury event planner — and found herself whisked around the world, working a three-million-dollar wedding in Tuscany and a billionaire’s charity ball in Monte Carlo.
Now on the job hunt yet again, Scholobohm considers her Instagram profile her current creative portfolio — in particular, the Events reel that highlights her recent work experience.
“People care about the visual and the end result,” she explained, underscoring that social media is destined to play a part in her next onboarding. “It’s going to be a factor one way or another.”
Career expert Amanda Augustine of Career Minds told The Post that the rise of the social media resume among Zoomers is “inevitable.”
“The younger generation is adapting their job search strategies to the platforms they’ve grown up on, and they’ve grown up with social media sharing their lives with the world,” she said.
According to Augustine, social media posts including a TikTok resume allow employers to see an applicant’s personality — for better or worse.
“They get a better idea whether an individual is qualified for the position and also whether they would be a good cultural fit within the organization.”
While Gen Z may be leading the charge for social media as an avenue for employment, Augustine says older applicants may want to take a cue from the youth if they want to stay competitive, especially in creative fields.
“Do I think every 50-plus-year-old needs to hop on TikTok and make a video? Not so much, but I think we’re naturally gonna see an evolution as certain generations start phasing out of the workforce and the younger ones are taking on managerial roles within it.”
Still, she cautions against being too informal on the socials.
“Always take a step back and say, ‘Is this representing me the way that I would want to be represented if I was going in for an interview?’”
For many, however, the video has become the prelude to an in-person meeting — and certainly for 23-year-old digital video producer Reese Meyer, who, after four years in film school and internships at NBC and Disney, is relocating from Phoenix to NYC and job hunting through traditional application methods and with her TikTok resume.
“I can’t force people to click on my portfolio. This is another genuine way to market myself where people can really see what I’ve done,” Meyer told The Post.
Meyers, who runs the successful YouTube channel Spellbooked. shared that she already has a strong following on social media and figured posting there would increase her visibility and viability.
“I thought, why not share a broader scope and hope that it might end up on the right person’s feed.”
Reese said that though her resume has only been live on the internet for a week, it’s already generated momentum.
“I have a community of people who have already commented and reached out to me, so it’s already reached people that I already know who can be in my corner. People don’t know you’re looking for something unless you tell them,” Meyer said.
While her TikTok showcases her video and editing skills, she maintains that all industries use social media and thus a social media resume is primed to become a natural extension of the hiring process.
“A lot of the roles that I’ve applied for have asked me to link my personal social media accounts,” Meyer said. They want to see what I’m making on my own time and what my abilities in content creation are. They’re looking for people who have personality and the initiative to put themselves out there.”
That’s definitely the case for companies like NYC-based luxury skincare brand ANFISA, which recently used TikTok to advertise for the role of social media manager.
“I really want the social media manager to live and breathe and eat TikTok and Instagram and know all the latest trends and know the up-and-coming creators. I was not gonna find these girls on LinkedIn,” ANFISA Cofounder + CCO Aly Korchemniy told The Post.
Korchemniy believed social media humanizes the application process for the hiring team and the applicant.
“You can easily see from TikTok, this is the energy we want to bring to the company,” she said.
“I’ve had so many times where somebody’s applied for a position, and then we had three mutuals on Instagram, and it made it so much more exciting for me to interview them. It wasn’t a traditional reference, but it was somebody’s real experience with that person,” Korchemniy explained.
Josh Katz, a 30-year-old creative strategist, photographer, filmmaker, and author living in Philadelphia, leaned into the idea of letting his online connections speak for him when he posted a sixty-second video highlighting his work experience — cleverly suggesting that his comments section serve as his reference letter.
“The job market is really intense, and the application process seems kind of broken, and applying to jobs on LinkedIn feels like a wild black hole where your resume gets screened out by AI filters before you get seen by a person. You have to do something to stand out,” said the producer of the docu-series Skaters With Jobs and co-founder of video platform Skatefolio, who was seeking a traditional job for the first time.
The response to Katz’s video amazed him.
“I was able to get hundreds of thousands of people to see my resume and enjoy it. It got me a number of interviews with some companies I really admire,” he said, sharing that an unexpected consequence of the video’s success was the freelance work he wound up generating.
Months later, people are still contacting him with job opportunities.
“People are pulling for me and checking in and thinking of me when gigs open up. It has made me top of mind,” he said.
“I have gone from ‘I should get a job,’ to ‘I’m willing to get a job,’ which is the best headspace; being open to it and not needing it,” he said.
Katz calls the idea of a video resume a form of digital optimism.
“Wearing your heart on your sleeve opens doors. I had to put myself out there in a huge, scary way,” he said. “People love rallying behind any sort of community effort, and it’s cool to see people be vulnerable and open and ask for help.”
Being open and brutally honest certainly worked for Londoner Sibusisiwe Khupe a recent graduate looking to make her way in the music industry when she applied for a role at Universal Music way back in 2019.
“I got rejected 22 times, and I was like ‘what the hell’?” Khupe, now 27, told The Post.
“I was redesigning my [resume] and really trying to get myself seen, but it wasn’t landing. I was applying alongside thousands of other young kids who wanted to work at the biggest record label in the country at the time.”
On her 23rd attempt, in lieu of a traditional resume, CV or cover letter, Khupe sent a video appeal for employment.
“I made a TikTok saying why Universal should hire me. I emailed it directly to the creative director, the marketing manager, and the head of HR.”
The twenty-third time proved to be the charm — within days, she had responses from everyone she emailed.
Khupe believes Gen Z will continue to reshape the hiring process — and that their desperation is the mother of innovation in today’s dismal market.
“We have no choice but to seek alternatives. We’re forcing ourselves to find a way to stand out in the noise,” she said.
“We’re adapting to the things that we’re best at. We know how to pick up a camera and speak; we know how to post; so why not use that?”
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