30 years reading people in the hiring room.
Now reading the algorithms that read them back.

Frameworks, tools, and writing on what AI is doing to hiring. The thinking is mine. The code shows up when I ask for it.

Currently Serving Job Market Recon Dossier →
What's on Tap?

Everything pouring tonight.

11 Original Frameworks

How AI-shaped hiring actually reads you.

Career Triangulation. Semantic Signal Audit. RISEE. The Three-Dial Model. Frameworks built from 30 years in the room and refined by what AI is doing to the door.

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Happy Hour

The Specials

Five live diagnostic tools the lab pours every day. Free to pull. Tip jar by the piano.

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60+ Articles

The Writing

Long-form on Medium. Short bits on LinkedIn. A book in progress.

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10 Custom GPTs

The GPT Library

Some seeded an article, some extended one. All of them let you run the concepts I teach.

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Bespoke · Referral Only

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First conversation is always free. After that it is a real engagement or it is not.

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Community

baHRC · JobNet 2.0

Two communities I help run. Both free. Both worth showing up for. My door is open to anyone from either.

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Proof of Work

Two examples. Different clients, different needs, same standard.

Every engagement starts with diagnosis. What gets built depends entirely on what the situation actually requires.

How I Work

Boutique by design.
Referral by preference.

Most people who work with me arrive through someone who knows someone, and that's intentional. And if that's you, welcome in. Be sure to let me know who referred you so I can thank them. If you are here on your own, no worries, there is always room.

Let me tell you about my coaching. It's about short engagements, honest diagnosis, and bespoke output. The deliverable you get depends entirely on what your situation actually requires. Not a template applied to your name.

Hiring is risk mitigation at scale, but people are in it. That variable matters to me, and it changes how I give advice.

  • 01 I start by listening. I learn what's worked and what hasn't.
  • 02 I ask questions. Plenty. The goal is for me to understand you.
  • 03 You leave with a deliverable built for your specific situation. Not a generic action plan.
  • 04 Most engagements are one session. Some run four. None run indefinitely.
  • 05 I work with a small number of people at a time. That's the point.
Philosophy

Agency Before Automation

Everyone has an AI strategy right now. Most of them are the same strategy: use the tools, move faster, produce more. That's not wrong. It's just incomplete.

The professionals getting the most out of AI aren't the ones who've handed it the wheel. They're the ones who show up with a point of view, use AI to pressure-test it, and own the call when the output comes back. The tool is only as good as the judgment behind the prompt.

I've built this practice on AI, for research, for deliverables, for the kind of deep market analysis that used to require a boutique firm and a four-figure retainer. But every output gets filtered through 30 years of knowing how hiring systems actually behave under pressure. That's not a disclaimer. That's the product.

The goal isn't to automate your job search. It's to give you clarity and evidence to make better decisions, faster. AI handles the volume. You handle the judgment. That's the only version of this that actually works.

There's a longer version of this argument elsewhere. Same thesis, different angle.

About

The Career Cantina isn't a brand.
It's a point of view.

I've been on both sides of the table. I've hired and I've been hired. I've built recruiting functions from scratch at early-stage biotechs, managed 50+ open requisitions at large multinational medical device companies, and watched how mergers & acquisitions rewrite everything you thought you were joining.

I've also been in transition. I know what it feels like when the playbook stops working and the advice you're getting doesn't match the reality you're living. That experience didn't just inform my coaching. It is my coaching.

Hiring systems are built to be efficient. Understanding how they actually work, not how career advice says they work, is where agency begins.

I'm the co-founder of JobNet 2.0 and a member of baHRC. I speak to HR and job seeker audiences about AI in hiring, semantic search, and the systems evaluating the professionals.

From Corporate to Cantina

Helping professionals stay upright in an AI-shaped world.

From Corporate Insider to Career Founder. Wayne Rainey's career arc told visually: 30 years in HR and talent acquisition, witnessing system flaws, identifying disconnect, then founding The Career Cantina to restore agency. You're Han Solo in your story. AI is Chewie.
You're Han Solo in your story. AI is Chewie.
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No intake form. No funnel. Just a conversation about what's actually going on. First chat is always free.

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