Artificial intelligence is already making it easier for workers to put together a job application. The jury’s still out on whether it’s also making it easier for them to get the job.
Nearly half of recent hires used AI to apply, according to a survey by Resume Builder released in May. The same month, Resume Templates released its own survey results, showing that 1 in 5 Gen Zers looking for a job has used ChatGPT to create a resume or cover letter.
“The rules around this are super-unclear to everybody,” says Monica Parker-James, associate dean for industry relations and career services at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. That leaves applicants and employers to use their own judgment — and weigh for themselves the pros and cons.
First, the cons. An AI-written cover letter will sound generic. That can be fatal to one’s chances of getting an interview. The output might sound like business-speak, but that doesn’t mean it’s good.
People who receive AI-generated cover letters say they sound eerily alike. Mohammad Soltanieh-Ha, a clinical assistant professor at Questrom, says he’s gotten emails for open positions that were clearly written by ChatGPT — they’re all “five paragraphs long and the language is very similar.”
Rather than using ChatGPT to generate a draft, says Soltanieh-Ha, write your own, upload it to ChatGPT and ask for a critique. I tried this, using a couple of cover letters I had lying around, and was low-key astonished by the results. These letters by their nature are often formulaic and stilted; but still, it surprised me that the ChatGPT-ified versions sounded more natural than the original drafts.
Where generative AI may be strongest is in helping applicants prepare for the job interview. ChatGPT can generate a list of common interview questions based on the specific job description. It can also give advice on answering tricky ones like, “what’s your greatest weakness?”
The right way to use the tool, experts agree, is as a sparring partner to hone your own thinking.
As for employers, recruiters may want to emphasize interviews and projects — work the candidate has already completed, whether at a previous job or in school — more than application materials. In fact, recruiters may need to spend more time talking with candidates as written applications start to sound more alike, says Pedro Amorim, an associate professor at the University of Porto and co-founder of LTPlabs.
And any who oppose AI use by applicants should make that clear in the job posting.
But I don’t think it’s cheating to use AI to apply for a job. People have long used templates to write resumes and cover letters. We have tools today that work better, and candidates who don’t use them — or don’t, at least, learn how to use them — may be left behind.
But candidates should only use AI if they’re willing to be honest about it. According to the Resume Templates survey, 1 in 3 candidates said a hiring manager has asked about their use of ChatGPT.
Sarah Green Carmichael is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist and editor. /Tribune News Service