There are right ways and wrong ways to use generative AI when job hunting. Follow these guidelines to land your dream gig.
Job hunting can be soul-crushing and tedious. After spending hours answering application questions, browsing job listings, and crafting immaculate cover letters, there’s still no guarantee that you will even get a response. And as employers are increasingly turning to AI to screen job applications, you might be wondering if you can leverage AI to level the playing field or, at the very least, take some of the drudgery out of the application process.
The short answer is « yes », and we’ll tell you how, in three easy steps, below. But even more important than the ways you can up your chances of landing that dream job using artificial intelligence are the ways you should avoid relying on AI. You don’t want to get dinged right out of the gate or, even worse, ruin your professional reputation.
With that in mind, read on to see how you should—and should not—enlist generative AI to help you secure a new job.1. Boost Those Keywords and Tailor Your Resume
Aside from checking your resume for grammar and spelling issues, AI chatbots can check for passive voice, phrasing, and word choice. These might seem like minor tweaks, but using the best language possible to demonstrate your experience can make a meaningful difference. Furthermore, it’s not always easy to do that by yourself after staring at the same page for hours.
Many companies use software to keep track of applicants. Often, these programs look for certain keywords to trim a pool of candidates down from hundreds or even thousands to a number a hiring manager can reasonably interview. AI chatbots can pick out potential keywords from a job description or a list of the top keywords in your industry, as well as give you suggestions on how to incorporate them naturally into your resume without resorting to keyword stuffing.
You should take advantage of deep research capabilities, too. ChatGPT and Gemini, for example, can generate reports spanning dozens of pages and incorporating upward of 50 sources on any topic for free. As such, you can task a chatbot with digging into what’s going on in your industry and coming up with ways to optimize your resume. For example, if there is a high demand for coders with experience in a language you know, you can emphasize that in your resume.
Lastly, tailoring a resume to the job you’re applying for, especially if it’s a dream job, can be worthwhile. But it’s also a major pain.
