Crafting Résumés in the Age of AI
Job-seekers, the era of the one-size-fits-all résumé is over. Artificial intelligence (AI) can now be used to craft personalized CVs that highlight your core competencies, all tailored to each and every job application you submit.
Despite these digital developments, authenticity remains key in the eyes of employers. With many companies now utilizing software to screen and flag automated content, how can you use AI to your advantage without sacrificing your own voice?
The key is to leverage AI as a springboard, not a crutch. Read on to learn how you can weave your own experiences and achievements into AI-suggested content and showcase your unique value to each and every potential employer.
What can AI do for you? 🤔
As anyone who’s ever applied for a job can attest, creating an effective résumé is no easy feat. Condensing a career’s worth of accomplishments onto a single page requires considerable time and effort, further compounded by the need to tailor it for each application. That’s where AI comes in.
Nearly 50% of job-seekers have already reported using it to help write their résumés, while 7 in 10 said they had a better response rate from companies when they employed AI-generated materials. A recent study from the National Bureau of Economic Research also confirmed that those who received “algorithmic assistance” in their résumé-writing process were 8% more likely to get hired than those who didn’t.
Even if you’re not an early adopter, there’s still time to learn how AI can help you land your dream job.
If you’re starting with a hand-crafted résumé, you can run it through an AI tool like ChatGPT and ask for edits and rewrites to make it more effective. Providing the job listing can also help the system leverage its understanding of the role to optimize your work.
AI can jumpstart the process for those starting from scratch by providing a framework to follow and text to tweak. With your input, it can generate a professional summary, blurbs about your past positions, and bullet points highlighting your achievements, all tailored to the position you’re pursuing. It can also revise your existing resume to address any key points you may have missed.
Even better, you can use AI to streamline the process of customizing your résumé for different jobs. Inputting an individual listing into an AI-powered assistant like the Merlin GPT generates a condensed catalog of helpful information, including the company’s mission and values, the job’s key responsibilities and ideal candidate profile, and the main problem this role is meant to solve for the organization. It also provides relevant keywords to sprinkle throughout your CV based on the job’s description. In addition to saving you hours of research, having this data on hand is invaluable in ensuring your résumé reflects what the company is seeking.
Craft, don’t copy ✍️
If this all sounds too good to be true, it’s because there’s a catch. While AI can be used as a tool to streamline the résumé writing process and generate compelling content, it can’t serve as a replacement for your own critical thinking and editing.
Copying AI-generated text may save time, but it can come across as hollow and inauthentic — especially if it hasn’t been fact-checked and doesn’t accurately reflect your skills and experiences. More importantly, plagiarism can lead to disqualification from the application process entirely.
Think of AI as a collaborator rather than a copy-paste machine. Use it to spark ideas and refine your own language, but hold the reins and own your narrative. In the words of design leader Feridoon Malekzadeh, “The AI’s output is only going to be as good as the input you give it. The more information and direction you can feed it, the less likely it is to sound generic.”
Pass the ATS test ✅
As it turns out, AI isn’t just for candidates. Companies are increasingly using automated tools called Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) to sift through and select résumés from the pile they receive. In fact, 99% of Fortune 500 companies are filtering résumés they receive through AI before a human ever sees them.
It’s important to know that ATS don’t read your résumé — they parse it. With that in mind, you can position yourself to make it past the bots by focusing on formatting. Stick to plain, readable text with clear headers to ensure the information you’ve shared is actually being pulled and processed. Photos and graphics are unlikely to be read correctly by AI, so it’s best to show off your creative flair later in the process.
In the same vein, ATS looks for specific keywords to identify candidates with relevant experience. Some companies even configure their ATS to score and rank résumés based on certain terms, with higher-ranking résumés having the highest number of designated keywords. These high-ranking résumés move along to human screening, while the rest are discarded by the system.
Though not intuitive, it’s key to remember that these keywords have to be exact. If an ATS is searching for candidates who have “experience in social media” and your résumé states that you’re a “TikTok and Instagram expert,” you may be dropped for not using the right keywords despite meeting the technical qualifications.
While you can and should work with the system, don’t try to game it by including hidden keyword-stuffed text or direct lines from the job description. Even if you make it past the first round, the company will catch on. Your qualifications and experience should speak for themselves, and highlighting them in a clear and honest way will make you stand out to both AI and human reviewers.
***
Want to dig deeper into the new AI-powered world of work?
Watch the recording of Gymnasium’s livestream Level Up Your Job Search with ChatGPT and learn how to refresh your résumé, cover letter, and LinkedIn bio with Merlin — a custom GPT created by special guest Feridoon Malekzadeh.
