The whole way we judge candidates is broken: all the polish and credentials in the world can’t get you past automated gatekeepers who reduce years of hard-earned skill to bullet points and buzzwords. Thanks, Grammarly. I needed a clear intro. And thank you, ATS. Tell me more about how I could have tailored my resume and how my education is poorly aligned with the role. I have a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from a top CS university in the country. What the fuck? Seriously?

I can take this two ways. First, I appreciate feedback and seek it often; I could have taken this as constructive criticism. I know I should emphasize my achievements, especially quantitatively. I re-architected distributed systems and migrated off brittle batch pipelines. I got shit done. I didn’t track MTTR or defect rates. The architectures and migrations are my fucking real achievements.

Second, what the fuck do you mean by suggesting I could have tailored my resume better? Are you expecting a tailored resume? No one has the time for that shit, and I pull that out for the big-hitter roles, my dream jobs, not the numbers game that is trying to get past the ATS and get my resume seen. I spend an hour, really, surfacing my AWS or Azure stacks, the Java and Spring stack, different architectures, my frontend experience, and, on occasion, my C chops. I pull up my collaboration or scaling, my cross-functionalness. I can’t spend that time. I have daughters, a partner, and a motorcycle to ride. A life.

It goes without saying that tailoring is now done with AI. The applicant screening system is AI. So now I’m tailoring my resume with AI to get past the gatekeeping AI; it’s AI all the way down. I’m delighted when an interviewer asks a thoughtful question about a past achievement. That’s how rare it is to talk to someone who has read my resume instead of scanning it while I wait. “I don’t have your resume in front of me, so tell me about an achievement.” HOLY FUCK. So the AI approves my AI, which triggers the screening call, which approves me to talk with someone who has no idea who the fuck I am.

The coup d’état is the last line. It suggests I enhance my candidacy and increase my chances by heeding its advice. So it’s by chance? Do I get to try again?

No. 

Now, if you iterate on this, the process for applying is for the candidate to tailor a resume with AI so they get past another AI. It’s just a token resume; it’s not actually read. We literally unlock interviews with the right words in the right order. If you know the password, you get an interview! There will be three hours of technicals, after which your three follow-ups will be ignored. Ghosted. I’m looking at you, Accenture.

By the way, Grammarly’s AI is tailoring this as I write it. It now suggests I soften aggressive language in three places, streamline word choice, and enhance professional tone. No, bitch!¹ All this will go into WordPress, which uses AI to choose the right keywords so it can automatically post to my LinkedIn, where I hope the algorithm will push my ass to your feed so I can demonstrate my worth. By the way, Premium suggests posting at least 4 times a week, and WordPress recommends using images to increase conversions. Here come the AI-generated hot takes!