As part of our AI and Careers blog series, we thought it would be helpful to consider the advantages and potential challenges of using Gen AI when making applications for jobs and work experience opportunities
Generative AI’s rapid growth and the extent to which it could impact our personal and working lives, may have left you feeling somewhat overwhelmed, but one thing is certain: Gen AI is here to stay!
Perhaps the most well-known example of Gen AI is ChatGPT, but there are many similar AI-powered tools available (some free, some with a cost), with new ones being developed all the time. If you have already used it, you aren’t alone – a recent survey of 2000 students and recent graduates [Arctic Shores/Institute of Student Employers, 2023] revealed that 72% of candidates are using some form of Generative AI every week and 7 in 10 plan to use it in the future to complete application forms.
Below are some key points to consider:
The Pros
Time saver
Using an AI tool can be an excellent time saver when it comes to creating cover letters, tailoring CVs and writing answers to application questions. It can quickly help you choose the most relevant skills and experience to highlight that are most relevant to each job description. In can also help you to keep track of your job applications, whether or not you’ve had a response from an employer and which ones need following up.
Good starting point
We’ve all had that feeling of not knowing how to start, when faced with a blank document. An AI tool such as ChatGPT can help to avoid common ‘writers’ block’ by offering suggestions for sentence starters and supporting you to articulate your thoughts and give structure to your writing. This can be especially useful if writing with impact doesn’t come naturally to you and can provide an effective template, which you can then tailor in order to make your application authentic and personal to you. For more guidance on writing winning cover letters, watch here.
Breaks down language barriers
An important part of any application is to communicate and articulate yourself in a clear and effective way, something which may at times feel daunting if you are a non-native English speaker. However, with Gen AI the ability to write confidently in English is now achievable for everyone. You can use it to check for English grammatical mistakes, improve the overall readability of your documents and enhance your vocabulary to match the quality and tone of a native English speaker.
Researching companies
Gen AI is essentially one enormous search engine, drawing information from across the internet, so that you don’t have to! So using it to do that all-important research into the companies you are considering applying to the sectors you are interested in, can make things a whole lot easier and more time efficient. But do check how up to date and accurate the information is, for example ChatGPT-3.5 (the free version) currently only accesses information up to 2021, so don’t rely on this as your only means of researching (see ‘fact checking’ below) – check company websites, social media posts and sector resources to build your knowledge and feel confident that you are being provided with the latest details.
Interview preparation
As the saying goes, ‘practice makes perfect’, and this is certainly the case when it comes to interviews. Being well-prepared will make you feel more confident and perform better. Gen AI can help with your preparation in a range of ways, from predicting possible interview questions to refining your answers, and even enabling you to conduct a mock interview with feedback. Do keep in mind though that a chatbot does not know you personally or your unique experiences, so use it as a supplementary resource to complement other methods of preparation and be sure to carefully tailor your responses to reflect your own personal voice. See our Getting Ready for Interviews playlist for further guidance.
The Cons
Not all recruiters love it
Despite encouraging information from organisations about the potential to reform and enhance the way we work, and the known potential for AI to help initially craft application responses, many recruiters are explicitly warning applicants against the use of AI in recruitment processes:
“No artificial intelligence tools are allowed. The story will be run through AI and plagiarism detection tools.” [The FT Paul McClean Graduate Training Programme]
It can’t self-reflect for you
Generative AI is too generic: it will not be able to personalize your answers in the way you can. Whilst you can add information about your work experience into a prompt, it won’t do the thinking and reflection – like you can – to communicate to a recruiter what you learned and what you can offer from that experience.
It needs to be fact checked
You can add information about the job and company you’re applying to in a prompt, however, don’t rely on GenAI to research the company and the job for you. It can be known to ‘hallucinate’ (i.e. create statements or information which aren’t true). The other absolutely crucial detail here is that when you insert information about a company or a job into your application (for e.g. you might be responding to ‘why do you want to work for us?’), you need to state why these facts are important to you: showing how you connect to an organisation in an application is key to being shortlisted.
Writing to think
For some people, going through the process of writing your own applications (from informal notes, to drafting to the final version) can help you reflect on your answers and reasons for applying to this role. This in turn can help with interview preparation and for you to be as specific as possible about your strengths, attributes and knowledge which make you unique.
Overly-embellished language
GenAI tends to throw out sentences like, ‘My enthusiastic interest for this position’ or ‘my respect for your esteemed organisation’. The addition of these adjectives creates a flattering tone that may not always read well in the eyes of a recruiter; they’d much prefer hard evidence of your enthusiasm or reasons why you think their organisation is so esteemed.
Document formatting
If you ask GenAi to write a covering letter or CV for you, it will give you information and a structure you need to follow (and in ChatGPT there’s a handy reminder to tailor your information to the job), however it won’t format these documents for you.