Artificial Intelligence (AI) is reshaping the world as we know it. It is dramatically influencing workforce productivity, healthcare, education, entertainment, and tasks of daily living such as driving, cooking, and exercising.
ChatGPT developer open AI’s weekly active users surpassed 400 million in February, and China’s generative AI platform, Deepseek, was the number one download on Apple’s App Store that same month.
As users continue to search for ways to improve productivity and efficiencies, it seems logical that they would try to leverage AI for what many consider one of the most daunting parts of a job search…writing a resume. Documenting your entire work history is time-consuming and can feel overwhelming. But is this a wise task for an executive to outsource to AI? Does it present opportunities to surge ahead of the competition or fall behind? If you are using AI to create your resume, consider these questions.
Does Your Resume Suffer From Imposter Syndrome?
Recruiters have noticed that they can easily spot AI-generated resumes based on tone or the use of buzzwords in the document but never backed up with demonstrated proof of how the candidate has used these skills. An AI-generated resume might suggest a lack of authenticity or misrepresentation of qualifications. With this comes the risk that the resume overpromises what the candidate can deliver.
Is Your Resume Really Your Own?
AI data is gathered via search engines, chatbots, web crawlers, databases, newsfeeds, and APIs (Application Programming Interfaces). If you copy and paste phrasing from AI results, you are essentially plagiarizing. Additionally, just because AI has scraped content from someone else’s resume doesn’t mean it’s a well-written presentation. A resume heavily influenced by AI might lack the unique voice and perspective that sets a candidate apart. Executives want evidence of strategic thinking and innovative ideas, which might be more challenging to discern in an AI-generated resume.
Is Your Resume a Reflection of You?
A resume created by AI is unlikely to accurately represent your unique value proposition because your workplace success stories belong to you alone and can’t be articulated by leaning on the mass-produced and curated content of others. Leaning into AI too heavily may rob employers of the chance to really understand what company problems you could help solve. Good resumes rely on strong storytelling and measurable examples of challenges you have faced, your actions to address those challenges, and corresponding outcomes, particularly quantifiable ones. Taking the time to prepare these stories and then translate them into resume content is also a valuable exercise for preparing for future interviews, where you will be asked to convey examples of how you have helped the companies you have supported do things faster, smarter, and more efficiently.
Just because AI may present some limitations and “watch-outs” doesn’t mean it can’t assist you in the writing process. There are many ways to use AI to complement your writing strategy and make you feel more confident in the product you are creating.
Use AI as a Starting Point
Rather than staring at a blank page for hours, use AI to generate a framework for your story. Use prompts based on your experience, such as “CEO success story for a healthcare company turnaround” or “CFO accomplishments for technology company cost-cutting,” to generate ideas for the type of stories to tell around growing the business, saving money, saving time, transforming the culture, building strong teams, etc. The key is customization. Only you can claim ownership of your successes, and doing so makes you a stronger and more authentic candidate.
Use AI to Research Resume Keywords
AI can discern keywords from job postings, which can be leveraged to cross-check your resume to determine if your document contains the most prevalent skills necessary for the roles you are considering. If there is a disconnect between the keywords in the roles you are interested in and what you can accurately report on your resume, you may need to reassess your targets.
Use AI to Improve Grammar and Clarity
A great candidate can quickly end up in the “no” pile if their resume contains typos or grammatical errors. AI tools, such as Grammarly, can help detect errors that can be hard to spot on your own and ensure a “camera-ready” document.
While your resume is an essential self-marketing tool, companies hire people, not resumes. Even the strongest resume will fall flat if there is no accompanying job search strategy to support it. Once you create your message of value and commit it to paper, talk to people to build your network and gain important introductions that will ultimately lead to the interviews that will help you secure your next role.
This post was originally published on the Human Capital Solutions blog.
