I am currently on a job search and attended a zoom panel with a few career coaches. One of them said that if you’re not currently using LLMs on the job search right now, you should be, and she gave a few cursory examples like customizing responses and notes, but I’m still not entirely sure what the actual applications are beyond making translating your emails into glib redditese. At the same time, bullshit still appears to still be king, and, if ChatGPT confers a competitive advantage, it doesn’t make sense to tie an arm behind my back. So has anyone used an LLM to help land a job, and, if so, how?
Yes. There is no reason not to. Various aspects of the job search are time intensive and LLMs can help you speed it up.
I used LLMs to help get my current job. It was a good editor for my stuff (letters, resumes) and helped me turn my ideas and experiences into language optimized for recruiters and hiring managers in my field
Just don’t be a dumbass. Like… LLMs are really stupid and will not produce good quality stuff all the time. Use them for drafting, idea generation, help rephrasing things. Don’t just expect them to do all your stuff for you. Also, recruiters use LLMs to pick candidates - so tuning your stuff for that is (unfortunately) kind of important - very similar to search engine optimization.
I got my job really fast because I put a lot of effort into each application (and job market was better when I got hired a couple years back). Try to think what recruiters from that company want to see. Also include lots of key terms - especially from job postings that you want/are similar to those you do. LLMs can help isolate the relevant buzzwords if you want - but that’s easy to do manually
Examples of things to do:
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reviewing resume. It can’t write a good resume, but it can help draft & give ideas for rephrasing things in ways that are more likely to get recruiter attention.
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polishing up linkedin profile. Linkedin sucks and is garbage - but you need one. Why not let LLMs help you turn your resume into an effective linkedin page? Also, LLMs have access to all the shitty articles on how to make your linkedin more appealing - that way you don’t need to read them
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cover letters. Cover letters are much overlooked by job seekers - largely because it sucks having to write/edit dozens of them. Let LLM draft a cover letter and help you change out the words to suit each company you’re applying to.
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interview prep. Have it quiz you. People sometimes post interview questions online. LLMs can access that. So why not ask it to interview you like whatever company you’re prepping for
If this is the world then just send the fucking nukes
Imo this is one of the least dystopian things about LLMs. Helping package my work experiences into corporatese is something I gladly welcome from our ai overlords - because doing that manually sucks. Now the fact that recruiters use LLMs to scan everything and won’t bother reading but what AI tells them are the top X applicants… that is dystopian and garbage
That was pretty much the thought running through my head as I sat through the presentation.
I had someone ask me to ‘just ChatGPT’ them a recommendation letter. Not sure if they meant create the entire thing using ChatGPT. Knowing them, probably. I ended up writing it up on my own, but did run it through DeepSeek and honestly I can see how it could be useful in the way you are describing here.
I just hate that everyone seems to be using it more as a replacement for doing the actual work. Not that you can blame them with how magical all of these tech bros try to make it seem.
Super helpful, thanks.
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Definitely useful, but it really depends- IME I used it on job applications for stuff I was only tangentially interested in and personally focused on the stuff that I gave a ahit about - so it can help you with just putting out a volume of applications - I also like the approach of feeding them your resume bullet points and the job description and prompting it to generate an optimized resume based on the job description and also putting together a cover letter based on it too.
has anyone had success embedding white text into their CV to lure recruiters and/or hiring managers that feed shit into their own LLMs?
Ya I had a friend use it to get a job recently. I think he had it write up his resumé for him.
