[xyzelement]

True - but in most cases you can get feedback another way.

Case in point, a buddy of mine is around 50, superstar programmer/manager and never really had to look for a job - was always headhunted - until getting laid off from a bank about a year ago.

I took one look at his resume and it was obvious to me that it was basically the same resume he had since College, with new jobs tacked on but never revamped to read like a "super senior resume." Which makes sense because he never had to rely on it to make a first impression.

It took me about 20 minutes with Google Docs comments to tag up his resume, took him about 2 days to totally revamp it, and go from "a guy with 30 experience who looks junior on paper" to "holly shit this is the engineering leader we need."

Perhaps coincidentally but he landed a role with a hedge fund very quickly.

That's obviously a personal anecdote, but if your job applications are failing to get traction, find SOME way to get an external perspective.