What’s it called when you send in a cv looking for a job when no positions have been advertised? I’d almost call it sending in a cv in hope but hope sounds too negative, and I know there’s a proper word for it.

I’m not applying to a job, I just need to mention this process in a presentation.

Speculative application?

yep, speculative

Yep that’s what I was thinking of, thanks!

In the presant climate ‘desperation’

good luck

it depends if you are worth having

Timewasting!

Speculative is the right word for you as the sender to refer to it, but I always think the word speculative has some negative connotations when I receive one being described in the letter as that i.e. someone’s trying it on (as confirmed by some of the responses here!).

This is about putting the recipient in the right frame of mind (sorry to go a bit NLP). Personally I’d couch it in terms of “I’m sending this CV to you on an informal basis with a view to discussing matters further, should my experience/expertise be of interest to you” etc etc.