Keep every application in one place

A job search rarely lives in one place. You apply on a company’s career page, then on a job board, then through a friend’s referral. Replies land in your inbox, interview invitations in your calendar, and a recruiter’s message arrives somewhere in between. A few weeks in, the simple questions get hard to answer: which CV did I send them? Am I waiting for them, or are they waiting for me?

Keeping everything in one place takes less effort than it sounds, as long as you track the few things that matter.

What to keep for each application

For every role you apply to, write down:

• The company and the role, with a link to the job description. Job posts get taken down, so save the description itself if you can.
• Where you applied: the company’s site, a job board, a referral.
• The CV you sent. If you keep more than one version, note which one. It’s the first thing you’ll want to reread before an interview.
• The current stage: applied, screening, interview, assignment, offer, closed.
• The next step, and whose move it is. This is the most useful line of all. “Waiting for them since Tuesday” and “I owe them three time slots” call for very different actions.
• The people you’ve spoken to, and a few notes after each conversation.

A weekly routine that keeps it under control

Once a week, go through your list in this order:

1. Anything waiting on you. Times to pick, an assignment to hand in, an offer to answer. These are the ones where a delay costs you.
2. Upcoming interviews. Reread the job description and the CV you sent, and prepare questions.
3. Applications that have gone quiet. If it’s been a while since the last update, a short, polite follow-up is fine.
4. Closed applications. Mark them closed and add a line about what you learned. It helps more than you’d think when a similar role comes up.

How Cortopus does it

Cortopus is built around that list, so you don’t have to maintain it by hand.

• Applications to companies that hire on Cortopus are Verified by Cortopus: the stages come straight from the company, so they’re always current. When the team moves you to the next stage, your journey updates, and you’re notified.
• Applications from anywhere else can live there too. Add them yourself and they show as Added by you, with the same stages, notes and to-dos. (You can already link a Gmail or Outlook account, read-only. Picking up hiring emails from it automatically comes next, and isn’t live yet.)
• The next step is always on top. Every application shows where it stands, like Action required · Choose interview time or Scheduled · Interview tomorrow at 10:00, and your dashboard puts the ones waiting on you first.
• A board groups everything by where it stands: needs your action, interviews, waiting for an update, offers and closed. Prefer a table? That works too.
• Each profile keeps its own CV, and the company receives a copy of the one you chose, as you sent it, so you always know which version they have.

You still decide what to apply for and how to follow up. Cortopus just makes sure nothing slips through the cracks.

Written by the Cortopus team. Found something unclear or out of date? Tell us.