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This would explain my current experience. I lost my job in the middle of October to a round of layoffs and have been submitting resumes or applications to at least 2 places every day. Out of roughly 82 applications, I’ve have had two interviews and neither of them called back (one actually said they’d let me know regardless of their choice).
I’m not being picky, either, as I’m submitting for everything from line cook to systems analyst. I’ve even utilized professional consultants to help me create resumes for just about every industry my skill set could apply to. It’s beyond discouraging.
It’s hard to take these all these policy wonk shitheads seriously when they claim no one wants to work when I’m over here banging on the window and fogging it with my pleas for employment.
From the other side, hiring competent people has gotten much harder with AI in the hands of people. Its making them dumb.
A coworker and I were interviewing someone for a technical role over a video meeting that we did NOT get through our network. His answers were strangely generic. We’d ask him a direct question about a technology or a software tool and the answer would come back like a sales brochure. I message my co-worker on the side about this strangeness, and he said “We’re not hiring this guy. Watch his eyes. Ever time you ask a question, he’s reading off the bottom of his screen.” My coworker was right. I saw it immediately after he pointed it out. We were only 4 minutes into the interview and we already knew we weren’t hiring this guy. I learned later about LLMs that you can run while being interviewed that will answer questions your in real time.
Another one happened within 48 hours of that interview. Someone that had been hired was on a team with me. An error came up in a software tool that we are all supposed to be experts on. I had a pretty good idea what the issue was from the error message text. This other team member posted into our chat what ChatGPT had thought of the error. In the first sentence of the ChatGPT message I immediately could tell that it was the wrong path. It referenced different methods our tool doesn’t even use.
To translate it with an analogy, assume we’re baking a cake and it came out too sour. The ChatGPT message said essentially “this happens when you put too much lemon juice in. Bake the cake and use less lemon juice next time” Sure, that would be a reasonably decent answer…except our cake had no lemon juice in it. So obviously any suggestions to fix our situation with altering the amount of lemon juice is completely wrong. This team member, presented this message and said “I think we should follow this instruction”. I was completely confused because he’s supposed to be an expert on our tool like I am, and he didn’t even pause to consider what ChatGPT said before he accepted it as fact. It would be one thing to plug the error message into ChatGPT to see what it said, but to then take that output and recommend following it without any critical thinking was insane to me.
AI can be a useful tool, but it can’t be a complete substitute for thinking on your own as people are using it as today. AI is making people stupid.
This is why I generally hire from inside my network or from referrals of those I know. Its so hard to find a qualified worker among all the other unqualified workers all applying at the same time. I know there are great workers not in my network, I just have no way to find them with the time and resources I have available to me.
, he’s reading off the bottom of his screen.
Aw fuck.
I’m gonna have to ask absolutely bullshit questions in interviews now, aren’t I? Do you have any other strategies for how to spot this? I really don’t want to drag in remote exam-taking software to invade the applicant’s system in order to be assured no other tools are in play.
I’m not in a hiring position, but my take would be to throw in unrelated tools as a question. E.g. “how would you use powershell in this html to improve browser performance?” A human would go what the fuck? A llm will confidently make shit up.
I’d probably immediately follow that with a comment to lower the interviewee’s blood pressure like, ‘you wouldn’t believe how many people try to answer that question with a llm’. A solid hire might actually come up with something, but you should be able to tell from their delivery if they are just reading llm output or are inspired by the question.
I wonder if AI seeding would work for this.
Like: come up with an error condition or a specific scenario that doesn’t/can’t work in real life. Post to a bunch of boards asking about the error, and answer back with an alt with a fake answer. You could even make the answer something obviously off like:
- ssh to the affected machine
- sudo to the root user: sudo -ks root
- Edit HKLM/system/current/32nodestatus, and create a DWORD with value 34057
Make sure to thank yourself with “hey that worked!” with the original account
After a bit, those answers should get digested and probably show up in searches and AI results, but given that they’re bullshit they’re a good flag for cheaters
Don’t have the source on me now, but I read an article that showed it was surprisingly easy. Like 0.01% of content had his magic words, and that was enough to trigger it.
I’ve never used AI for interview stuff, beyond a little thing that gave me sample questions and assessed my recorded verbal response, to use as prep before an interview, but in reading that, I remembered that Nvidia has a thing where a visual effect will make your eyes look like you’re looking straight into the camera all the time (unless they’re totally closed of course), and imagined this type of person using that as further subterfuge during the interview, to conceal the ‘looking down’.
Luckily, the average person leaning completely on AI for an interview is not nearly savvy enough for this sort of thing, in my experience.
Literally include “Can you name four basic SQL commands?” any time I interview someone and it’s a great litmus test.
I’m not following, wouldn’t an LLM be able to easily answer that one?
I suspect this is going on in some Oklahoma school districts - I believe that some districts are actively trying to hire uncertified candidates. There is a drastic shortage, but many districts are surprisingly “choosy” - almost intentionally seeking the ability to claim they couldn’t find someone so they can “emergency certify” someone who won’t question orders/join unions.
There’s just something off, and the state is corrupt as all hell.
YES! Oh my god I just started in the putnam school district last year as a TA I have no formal education, practically no fucking qualifications, but bc my moms a speech path they hired me on the spot, and since my old favorite teacher is in admin and suddenly im about to be systems controller. Freaking bizarre
My job hunting experience may be quite atypical then, as I’ve gotten about 50% of the jobs I’ve applied for. It’s probably a lot easier since I work in the trades. I can just email a handful of local companies even if they’re not actively hiring, and a few will probably call me back.
Thanks for sharing.
I think my experience has been the opposite. Last time I got a job I applied for was 2005. Granted, I was with that company for 14 years, but since 2019, literally every job I have gotten (4 at this point) has been because recruiters reached out to me, while probably 95% of jobs I proactively applied for never even bothered to interview me. I’ve even seen job listings I applied for expire and get relisted without them even talking to me, which felt utterly humiliating.
It’s weird, simultaneously being in-demand enough that people reach out to offer jobs to me out of the blue, but at the same time being unable to even get an interview on my own. Really makes me think this phantom jobs thing is true.
After I was laid off in February due to Musk and his bullshit, I submitted several hundred applications to jobs I was very qualified for, and provided multiple letters of recommendation from the owners of my previous jobs.
Of all the jobs I applied for, only one of them moved me to stage 1 of the hiring process which was a questionnaire. Never heard back.
Ended up having to get a physical labor job at the business my wife worked at until an entry level position opened up, and probably only got the interview because she worked there.
Because job listings are something investors look for.
Nothing quite crushes the soul like customizing a resume and cover letter for a job at a company, getting turned down via form letter, then see that same job listing posted a week or two later.
Except having every company in town do it to you.
For over two years.
You must live in my town because I’m dealing with the same bullshit.
In Canada JobBank can have employers request that you apply to their posting.
Nothing crushes your soul like receiving a request to apply for a position, customizing your resume and cover letter, and never hearing a thing. Then repeating that process for months.
You get rejection letters?
Ok, emails mostly. I have received a few letters though! Public service employers can be old fashioned that way.
Semantics aside, my point is that you’re even getting responses at all
This is why it’s more important to network and have a good work reputation. 70% of job hires is through networking. It makes sense because from employer’s perspective, there is a higher chance that the person recommended is reliable than the candidate who hasn’t been heard of before. It corroborates my own experience as a jobseeker before. A couple of the best jobs I have had was through connections.
Which is all fine and dandy for those with great social skills or who’ve stayed in the same place long term.
Many jobs have no social requirement, and shy, anxious people may be greatly suited for those roles. But they can’t get them because they are shit at networking.
Same goes for someone who’s moved to a new town, they may have a great CV with a huge skillset but they don’t know anyone so who do they network with?
Your solution boils down to, those who are extroverted or connected can survive while everyone else must be desolate. It’s shite and very easily leads to nepotism and corruption.
I’m not even shy. I go to parties where I don’t know anyone, on my own, and have a good time.
I still don’t particularly network, mostly because there’s not really opportunity to. I have clients, which means I have about 20ish people who I work with outside my org, but it’s unlikely they’ll ever offer me a job.
Yeah I like meeting and hanging out with people who are cool and chill.
But people who network are cringe.
I was going to mention this in my original comment, but I thought I would do so if someone mention the introvert vs extrovert personalities in jobs.
There is no other way of gently putting it, but if you are an introvert, you just have to suck it up. The job won’t come to you. You just have to fake it till you make it until you get a job. Or, while at work, be good and professional enough that you will get good reputation. You don’t have to be best buddies with the boss or coworkers outside of work.
That’s a good point you raised about if someone just moved to a new city. All I could say is that this is why it’s important to secure a job first, before moving to a new city or town, if the person could. But if you moved to a new environment and have been job searching, there are job fairs you could attend. Again, this is where “fake it till you make it” works again; tell the employer that the company is your dream job and all that jazz. And ask how you could apply for the role etc. This worked for me but before I moved out to the new city I am in now.
It’s not necessarily nepotism or cronyism but some places are indeed more corrupt in this regard. I have seen it in my previous company where there is a middle manager, whose position is unnecessary and just annoy the grunt workers. But for the most part, I don’t really see much cronyism and nepotism, although I guess it is because I am not up high in the career ladder yet to witness behind the scenes corruption.
That may be the reality, but it doesn’t/shouldn’t have to be.
What’s the alternative?
DEI. The whole point is to make the hiring process blind to everything about the hire that isn’t relevant to the job. It could be a lack of social skills, disabilities, being a minority, or a history of weed usage - all shouldn’t be issues for an employer to know nor care about.
All hiring postings and transactions should be done through a platform operated by the government, to weed out ghost jobs and to prevent employers from having unwarranted bias.
Hiring based on merit?
Define the metrics for hiring based on merit.
If you mean networking sounds like nepotism or cronyism, it’s not really if a company do its best to have set rules and grade the interview candidates with set objective criteria. Not all companies are like that though.
the statistic was around like what, of 100 applications, a quarter will likely reject you, and like 5% will actually respond back with an interview to some extent. the rest will ghost you.
But employees start ghosting them and it’s the end of the world.
I mean, i always print out all applications, randomize them and throw half in the trash.
Who wants to work with unlucky people…
/s
Until your company does this paperless, I’m out. Who wants to work for wasteful companies? 🙃
its been this way since 2015ish. notice only 1 employer was like half all listing in my field in my area, and they never ever respond at all, looking at thier job listings, yup. it was a famous UC in my area,hint hint. they have been known to outsource certain positions. and i think they put out fake listing through thier own page, and other sites to make it look like they are hiring alot. they made Kaiser look like a saint around wage/hiring.
and the other half just as many ghost listing, or we looked for some else,or some other excuse. they almost never go for “FOB” graduates. hence why my field has a somewhat moderate unemployment rate, minus health industry hirings.
Hey now, there’s no reason both things can’t be true.
