I'm applying to jobs, and the amount of AI assessments, rounds, AI interviewers, questionnaires, is nuts.
One of these emails for example,
It's rough.
I'm glad I'm near death, every day I hope the black hole at the center of the galaxy will swallow the whole solar system.
And here I was thinking that I was cynical
You okay, buddy?
Tired. The endless grind of mindless constant changes to everything for no gains. I can't keep up and I don't feel like it anymore.
I've been hiring for a year now and I can't get anywhere. Open the job listing for 5 minutes and have 10 million applications. Many are fake made up people. Many are repeated entries, like 100 for the same person but with slight differences, like they are trying to hedge their bets. Have to close the listing after those 5 minutes since there's already far too many to sift through, which means only automated, generated applications got in.
Sift through all of those, interview a few folks, find no worthy talent, start over. It impossible, there is just too much noise.
Strategically, why don't you just disqualify anyone applying too soon?
Almost better off posting the address where you are hiring and see who comes in person to apply. That would be a bigger hurdle for serious applicants.
Or they can send a letter 😅
I got a job in 2017 when I did an application, heard of a widespread computer failure because of shit Windows security, and used that as an excuse to send my application again in paper, 'just in case'. I got the job. It was perhaps the best job I ever had.
Would it make any sense to switch to some kind of physical application process? Not necessarily in person, but require the applications/résumés be mailed in? The advantage that these automated models have is that they are basically for the user to submit as many applications as possible. Requiring that the application be physically mailed would create at least some small barrier and cost that would mean the applicants wouldn't be able to apply a near infinite number of times.
I totally get that it can be overload or even crushing for hiring managers, personal department people, and serious recruiters.
But as things look, companies absolutely want that useless oversupply, as if they want to actively devalue and disrespect people. Take Siemens for an example. They have introduced AI into thier hiring portal. They offer to give you messages about new roles. But that subscription does not even allow to filter their open positions by continent. If I look for a job in Germany, I get open positions in India. And one cannot filter this. What the fuck?
And pretty much in general, companies, job sites, and recruiters do not allow any useful specifity. I cannot filter offers by post code. This already makes most offers useless if I don't use a car. Offers do not specify the actual place of work. They are often not clear about home office rules. They go all wishy-washy about the desired use of AI in software development - which is a huge differentiator for both sides of the table. I could go on. I once had two rounds of interviews until the HR people told me that they required - for a position of developing complex mathematical software - mandatory on-call service every seven weeks, 24/7 for a full week, on top of the normal work. Hard no from me. Excuse me? They could have saved me, and themselves substantial time if they had put that right into the job description.
And one more thing, you speak of job seekers as "talent". But "talent" means at the root that somebody who isn't fully trained yet on something appears to have the natural capability to eventually learn it well, probably. For experienced professionals which have put many thousands of hours into studying something, practicing it, and actually becoming masters in it, that's devaluating, too. The whole process is obviously designed to devalue people.
Dude wtf. I just need to hire some capable software engineers. We pay very well.
Corrected headline: AI gave companies a new excuse to make jobs worse
That’s a thing too, but this article is about interviewing and hiring.
AI teleprompters for remote interviews, AI generated resumes, AI candidates screening, etc.
Everything really shifted aggressively over the last 12 months.
The job market was already ruined, AI is just an yet another excuse that corporations trot out. The heart of the problem is that corporations do not care about society, simply existing to line the pockets of a few people within their ranks. Nothing else matters to them. Country and humanity are equally worthless in the eyes of the elite.
Remember the pre Covid times when we had mostly on site job interviews? Yeah turns out it's harder to cheat in person. Maybe companies should go back to that and pay a wage that is fair for the area they operate from.
Even for some individual contributor positions I budget to fly them in for a final interview. No access to AI, no ability to hide behind a bot. I’ve actually knocked some people out in the final round because they refused to meet in person.
A few hundred to a thousand spent on travel up front is worth the insurance of the six-digit salary we offer.
Six-digit salary you say?
Maude you say?
Impossible. The CEOs would have less time on their islands that way.
"It will create more jobs." is the equivalent of trickle down economics.
It's always the fucking suits. And nepotism.
I’m sorry it sucks.
It seems like there’s a dividing line between newer techs and senior techs that determines the difficulty in getting new gigs. I don’t know where it is but I crossed it at some point in the last 10 years.
Each time I’m done with a job I’m sure there will be some kind of horrible gauntlet to get the next engagement, but it stopped happening. Maybe I just made a lucky connection but it keeps happening. I think they just want candidates who have seen some shit.
I guess the point is that eventually you’ll have done something that gives you the right gray in the ponytail. Keep at it.
I have been in software for 20 years and I never had trouble finding work until this past year. All of a sudden it's a lot harder. I'm just one data point but this time feels different for me. The job market feels a lot more disjointed and full of spoofs and fake listings.
Yeah I have over 25 years and I also have had the assesment stuff although not to often and not every time. Basically I went into tech because it was a field where they wanted people and if you were sharp you could get a job. They don't seem to have the demand they used to but I don't see another place to pivot and honestly I don't think I can change careers the way I did over 25 years ago.
I am a second data point.
Works both ways too. The number of AI generated resumes I've gone through, the incomprehensible business speak..
I guess you were hiring. If that's the case, would you prefer a manually written resume that is not matched to the listed position and skills (because applicants now have to send so many resumes that they don't have any more time to match them)?
No no. I want the applicant to be human. Don't bullshit. No buzzwords. Just say I can do this, I want to do that, I like turtles. Be yourself and don't fill the resume with fake ass shit, it's so obvious and depressing
The bullshit isnt for you, its for the AI filter that handles intake before you read a single application. (And if your not using AI to filter, your getting spammed by AI applications because everyone else is playing that game) Applicants are trying to beat the machine, and when the requirements get stricter the applicants just use more AI to send out more applications. Its a vicious cycle that will only end when hiring managers filter with something that a machine can not do.
Dont even get started on the personal data collection of the job sites. Its the most soul crushing thing to be looking for a job right now, anything to make you stand out of a crowd is ignored, volume of applications and adherance to posted requirments are the only way to get a fleeting interaction with a human.
I feel like the solution either needs to go back to in person and paper ads or a personal website acts as your resume, anything other than what we have right now.
Its the most soul crushing thing to be looking for a job right now, anything to make you stand out of a crowd is ignored, volume of applications and adherance to posted requirments are the only way to get a fleeting interaction with a human.
Or none at all.
The advice is not helping either, since you're told to both make your resume and cover letter stand out, but also to make it generic so the automated system doesn't parse it wrong and disregard it.
Problem with that is most jobs are using an AI ingestion and rating system. So if I were a job applicant who doesn’t like AI and prefers to hand write resumes but I need a job to feed my family, I’m going to just blast out the AI resumes anyway because it just has the highest chance of working.
My experience with this is receiving emails with "we will not proceed with your application" and absolutely no indication what or why, for positions that I'm uniquely qualified for.
I'm still looking, don't use Assumed Intelligence, and want to work, but it's not going well.
I suspect that your needs for human written applications is being thwarted by bots filtering your applicants before you even see them.
Most job listing now are just data collection with no actual job behind them.
So many interviews devolve into:
"Why do you want to work for this company?"
Which is code for
"Just how desperate for this job are you?"
The problem is 99% of hiring is looking for specific keywords and phrases like "increased revenue". Since they always do that applicants fall into the same patterns, like an evolutionary arms race.
I sat in on a couple interviews. Blew my mind how many candidates were clearly reading from an AI. They all gave almost the exact same, very AI-sounding answers to the skill based questions then just slammed into a wall when we asked them questions that are more opinion based.
Not all of them of course, and we wound up hiring the person who sounded the most like an actual human being having a conversation with us out of the lot. (Of course, he matched the skills we needed to so that wasn't the only factor.)
"We've decided to hire chatgpt since that is who wrote all of the applications."
It has certainly not done any good to job search.
For example, search for job ads for "embedded Linux software engineer" in your area. Notice the phrasing and keywords which are used. Now, ask on chatgpt.com to write a job ad for an "Embedded Linux software developer", without any further info. You'll see that half of the job ads use, at least in large parts, exactly the same phrasing and the same silly list of technically unrelated protocols - and demand senior experience in real-time systems, which is actually needed in perhaps 1% of use cases. And looking for Linux kernel developers which "are experts in C++"....
giving an applicant an engineering test (kind of like a crossword puzzle with code instead of words)
lol.
job markets ruined work
Man this bullshit seems to have gotten so much worse since I last looked for a job in 2023
Prior to my current job, I worked at one for 7 years. I'm an industrial electrician, so maybe the demand is higher. But in 2023, I applied for 12 jobs, got 3 interviews which resulted in 2 offers. All cold applications on indeed. I was picky about which jobs I even applied for. For one of the offers I did not want the job and it paid too little so I strung them along as much as I could before I finally turned it down as I had a feeling I was getting my current job, but it took forever for some management to come back from field service for my second interview.
Same story. 2022 I got 12 interviews in one week, 8 in the next from about 30 applications (not counting interviews for second round)
Done i didn't pass, others didn't pass me
2026, I'm looking again
200+ applications.
1 reply so far that at least got me a third interview round but I just found out there are 2 more rounds. It's a higher level job, fine, but seriously... 200, and the one that replied was application #2
From the rest?
Nothing. A very few (less than ten) at least replied with the "we love you but...." mails, the rest didn't even bother with that much.
Companies have been very spoiled somehow because most think it's okay to ask for an application that you include a cover letter why you want the job, a separate letter saying why you love the xpmpa souch, a one minute video about how I love the company, and so on
BITCH did you forget that an employment is a mutually beneficial relationship, where you get the fruits of my work and you pay me a good salary? You are not the king, your company sucks and I want to work because I need an income to pay rent
He should be having AI write tests for each candidate.
This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.
