Since November 2022, the ChatGPT artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot has enabled anyone with internet access to generate almost any type of text.
They can be complex essays, short memos, or poems. Even with basic prompts, ChatGPT can complete complex writing tasks in minutes and function as a creative tool to produce efficient content quickly.
“I’ve had students use ChatGPT to write appeals for parking tickets,” says Vince Miller, a professor of sociology and cultural studies at the University of Kent in the UK.
“But in general, technology allows people who don’t necessarily have the best writing skills to suddenly have them,” he adds.
Among those reporting such benefits are job seekers. Leveraging a huge set of data, text, and words, ChatGPT—powered by OpenAI—can write compelling cover letters or synthesize career details into a good resume.
Want to email a hiring manager? Ask the chatbot, then copy and paste the AI-generated text directly into the message.
But hiring managers are no stranger to this: They already know that candidates are leaning on AI, and they may do so even more as the technology grows more sophisticated.
This could create a shift in job applications as we know it, moving recruiters away from traditional ways of evaluating candidates.
The positive side
Not all recruiters see the use of AI as a red flag, or something to worry about.
Adam Nicoll, director of marketing at UK-based recruitment and employment consultancy firm Randstad, says hiring managers short on time are unlikely to distinguish between a cover letter written by a candidate and one generated by AI. .
“The language generated by ChatGPT reads clean, although it uses formulas. Compared to most cover letters, there are no idiosyncrasies; no red flags, but no personality either,” he says.
Despite this, he says he wouldn’t necessarily consider this cheating in the hiring process.
“He’s helping those who aren’t the best at writing and editing to produce an uncluttered summary of his career highlights. It’s the digitized version of asking a friend to look over your CV,” she argues.
Nicoll points out that recruiters are already less reliant on traditional methods of evaluating candidates, anyway.
“The cover letter has been out for years: Hiring managers read a resume for less than 10 seconds, let alone read a 200-word personal statement. At its best, the cover letter is a box-ticking exercise to accompany the CV; it is practically obsolete, ”he assures.
Instead, Nicoll says recruiters increasingly prefer to look at a candidate’s social media and LinkedIn profile to understand their personality.
And as more candidates use AI to compose their written materials, he adds, the importance of these application elements becomes even more irrelevant.
“If someone can artificially enhance the email they send to a hiring manager, then the email is meaningless,” says Miller, of the University of Kent.
Assessment Changes
Experts say that standard hiring processes may change as a result of new technology.
For example, since AI can create pre-interview presentations, employers can introduce harsher assessments in response.
“The (employer’s) responsibility is to test and evaluate what the machines can’t do,” Miller says.
“While AI can organize data in interesting ways, it’s not particularly creative: it can only work with what’s already there. So that could mean assessments that demand more creative and abstract thinking from the candidate,” he adds.
In addition, there could be a greater emphasis on vetting candidates in face-to-face settings, says Brooke Weddle, a partner at Washington, DC-based consulting firm McKinsey & Company.
“Unlike cover letters, which typically convey little information critical to the actual hiring decision, employers take a hard look at cultural background and soft skills during the interview process,” he says.
On the other hand, some recruiters are already embracing new AI tools into their part of the job recruitment process.
For example, some large corporations are leveraging AI in the hiring process to test the qualities of job seekers through skills and personality assessments, which use data-driven behavioral insights to match candidates against job openings and see your interpersonal skills.
These kinds of emerging platforms that give recruiters more data about candidates can also change the job application process, especially as we “move from degree certifications to skills-based hiring,” Weddle says.
And this may just be the beginning of big changes to come.
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