Job applicants may be desperate to get in the door — and thanks to the ubiquity of artificial intelligence tools, pretending to have the skills needed to land an interview, at least, is easier than ever.
Employers set keywords through applicant tracking systems to find certain skills, but job applicants have long been wise to this strategy. With generative AI tools, they can use those same keywords to bust through screening processes — an “explosion of convenience” that has made recruiting difficult for everyone, Paul Farnsworth, president of Dice, a tech career marketplace, told HR Dive.
“There’s a volume problem and it’s likely this problem will be something we will be dealing with for a while,” he said.
So what can be done to ensure hiring companies aren’t “skillfished,” or tricked, into hiring a less-than-ideal candidate?
Put in the time
“When it comes to employee selection, I like to use the phrase, ‘Hire hard, manage easy,’” Cindy Parker, instructional professor of management at the Costello College of Business at George Mason University, said in an email.
In other words, employers that take the time to build a selection process that assesses skills, knowledge and cultural fit will avoid skillfishing traps, Parker said.
Though this may indeed extend the hiring timeline, that may not be an issue at the moment. “In today’s labor market, where qualified candidates are plentiful and jobs are scarce, fear of candidates slipping off the hook isn’t a significant concern,” she continued.
Solidify the interview process
In the era of AI tool use, interviews are increasingly key, Parker said.
Pre-screen interviews may have once been about verifying credentials and other aspects of the resume, but these days “skills verification” questions are more common in these interviews, Parker explained.
“These often take the form of mini-cases or situational questions that require the candidate to demonstrate skills earlier in the process,” she said. “Of course, combatting candidates’ use of AI while taking these assessments is another challenge.”
Recruiters tend to have a good sense for when a person is embellishing, Farnsworth said, but validation will likely require a second pass these days, he noted. Some companies have moved back to in-person interviews because of this.
Allow for caution — carefully
Recent times have forced the recruitment tempo to shift somewhat. Recruiters that might have avoided assessments of knowledge workers because of a combination of a high demand for skills and a general distaste among applicants for them may be compelled to use them again, Farnsworth said.
But when fear of legitimacy spikes, “companies end up being more cautious about the act of an offer,” he said. That means probationary periods for work — such as temporary contracts or similar — could make a return as another form of validation that a worker can do everything they promised during the hiring process.
However, probationary work periods “aren’t an ideal solution,” Parker said. If they are used, employers should be sure to set clear expectations and provide regular feedback as well as “reasonable support for managing minor skills gaps and integration issues,” she noted.