1. Build an Adaptability Mindset

Traditionally, you could progress on the career ladder based on your knowledge.  Now, the AI-accelerated workplace means knowledge has a shelf life.  Instead, showcase your ability to adapt.  A Forbes article stated that the constant disruptions to the workplace (economic, geopolitical, technical) make emotional steadiness the new desired leadership trait over operational execution – which means you want to support leaders by learning and pivoting as your role in the workplace changes.

Abandon:

• What new knowledge do I need?
• How do I show what I know?

Adopt:

• What experience and talent do I possess that employers still need?
• How do I demonstrate adaptability?

2. Focus on Skills and Capabilities

The workplace has been structured by titles: teacher, accountant, engineer.  Do not limit yourself to a title.  Instead, think about the skills and capabilities you bring to your current role and how they transfer to another role. I highly recommend Business Model You: A One-Page Method for Reinventing Your Career by Alexander Osterwalder. This book has exercises you can use every few years to identify new skills and capabilities, such as problem-solving and communication, that can help define your purpose and relevance in the workplace

Abandon:

• What role titles align with my skills?
• How can I get a similar role in the same field?

Adopt:

• Where does my expertise create value?
• How can I use my skills somewhere new?

3. Assertively Build New Capabilities

Do not wait for your employer to offer training.  Seek out new skills, tools, and ways to learn them.  Identify your own gaps, follow your own curiosity, and become a continuous learner.  While almost all employers use AI to hire workers, once you are hired, only 8.5% provide the training to effectively use AI in the workplace.

Abandon:

• What is AI?
• Where can I learn about AI?

Adopt:

• How do I use AI to do my work?
• What transferable capabilities can I develop?

4. Integrate AI into the Job You Already Have

Rather than chasing AI jobs, figure out how to incorporate AI skills into your current job.  Less than 1% of roles need knowledge of how to program AI.  More important than understanding how AI works is knowing how to make AI work for you with whatever challenges your job has.  Show your employer the value of your role by working more efficiently.

Abandon:

• What AI Certificate can I add to my resume?
• What technical job can I get?

Adopt:

• What AI project can I use to demonstrate proof of skill?
• How can I use AI to improve the work I already do?

5. Do 30 Days of AI

Pick one task you currently do in your role.  For 30 days, use AI to help you with that task. After 30 days, think about your lessons learned.  Did AI make it better? Worse?  Continue to use AI for that task?  If so, how?  Communicate to your leaders how you are incorporating AI into your role (and how your knowledge and experience contribute to competent AI use).

Abandon:

• What AI skills should I master?
• When will my employer provide me with AI training?

Adopt:

• What AI tools should I develop a habit of using?
• What can I learn about when using AI for 30 days?

Sources Used for Researching AI in the Workplace

1. Your AI prompts determine your results.

To work with AI, you’re going to need to use AI, so learning best practices for AI will be a good investment of your time.  Any use of AI is all about the prompt. I highly recommend this free course on AI prompting.  Even if you do the first 3 modules, it will make your use of AI more accurate and efficient. This “old” adage still applies: Bad data in; bad data out.

2. Your resume must pass an algorithm before it reaches a human.

While not every job you apply for may use an Applicant Tracking System (ATS), an estimated 90% of companies are using them including 99% of Fortune 500 companies.  These systems use algorithms to screen and score resumes much faster than human review.

This raises the importance of including the correct keywords in your resume. For example, if the job description says project coordination, and your resume says project support, the ATS may not match them — even though a human would.  ATS systems match patterns, not concepts. Even so, do not use the “kitchen sink approach” for resume keywords, since ATS’s have a 67% rejection rate of resumes that have 20+ skills listed.  Instead tailor each resume to each posting you apply to.

3. ATS parsing errors eliminate qualified candidates every day.
An ATS parses out a resume by extracting pieces of information by category. Parsing out, to me, is an old-fashioned phrase that my grandma would use (“I will parse out the strawberries so each of you gets the same amount.”) For resumes, the parsing categories are:
• Name
• Contact info
• Job titles
• Dates of employment
• Skills
• Education
• Certifications
If this information is presented in an unsupported format, such as a text box, it will be difficult for the ATS to find the information, and your resume may not pass ATS screening. The ATS rate of rejecting resumes due to formatting is 12% and for parsing issues (not being able to find the most necessary information for whatever reason), the rejection rate is 23%. To see if your resume is readable to AI, use a free resume checker. Some of those options are in the resource list at the end of the article.

4. AI can reduce bias — or amplify it.
One of the reasons employers want to use AI for screening is that it can reduce the bias that humans bring (often subconsciously) to the applicant screening process. This is good news for those who are most often eliminated due to bias; however, bias doesn’t disappear just because a machine is involved — it simply becomes harder to detect.

The bad data in, bad data out rule applies here as well.

The rules an ATS uses to screen candidates are set by humans. Unless those rules are set by a skilled person who is deliberately trying to remove bias, the algorithm might end up with the same biases as the humans involved. Currently, there are no existing laws or regulations for using ATS that ensure the process is equitable or even meets existing HR guidelines stated on an organization’s website.

As a job applicant, you cannot influence unconscious bias from an ATS any more than you can from human review. But the next time you apply for a job that you seem perfect for, and you do not move forward in the process, know that the candidate selection process, with or without ATS, is still far from perfect.

5. AI can help you prepare for interviews more effectively than ever.
Some organizations are using AI to conduct first-round interviews; therefore, they use AI to talk to AI. Use your newly acquired prompting skills to predict interview questions and prepare responses. If you can prompt better than your other candidates (and this includes using AI for company research), you will be better prepared. Do refrain from just having AI write your responses, or you will just sound like AI- and maybe like all the other candidates. Remember, the interview technique: STAR. State the situation or challenge; explain your task or role in the situation; describe the action you took and emphasize the result you achieved. This will help keep your interview answers focused on you rather than AI’s generic responses.

Sources Used for Researching AI in the Workplace