Learn the ' Cheat Code' to Outsmart ATS Resume Scanners

Editor’s Note:? The publication of our Tuesday GuidingYourCareer newsletter was delayed a day due to severe weather and widespread power outages.? This post was originally scheduled for Tuesday.

If you are looking for a word to describe today’s job market, including corporate talent acquisition, it would be dysfunctional, assuming that you were a polite and respectful sort standing on the churchhouse steps.

The less polite will call out bulls*#t!

The cost of this dysfunction, which frequently leads to hiring the wrong person, particularly at the management and executive level, is 1 trillion dollars a year. Studies show that between 40 and 70 percent of new hires fail to survive 18 months. ?

That is all well and good, but that aspect of the dysfunction does not address the intense frustration of job seekers who are thwarted by corporate applicant sourcing and screening systems — known as Applicant Tracking Systems, or ATS —? that are so opaque that job seekers are frequently not told their resume has been received or rejected. As one frustrated executive told me, “It is like the faint sounds of crickets in an otherwise silent night.”

To highlight this issue, on average, seven out of 10 resumes submitted online are never seen by a human.

To highlight this issue, on average, seven out of 10 resumes submitted online are never seen by a human.

As a career coach, I hear complaints from frustrated and angry applicants. It is a routine part of my job.? I am saddened to report that not a lot has changed since I hung up my airline frequent flyer miles as a global executive recruiter and began coaching executives on strategies to offset these rotten odds.

This all began in the mid-to-late 1990s when corporations were anxious to drive our bias and discrimination in recruitment the process while accelerating the process and driving out costs. Companies created algorithms for each job they posted.? The computer scanned resumes routing those it deemed acceptable for further review to the appropriate recruiter. At the same time, the vast majority were relegated to the ionosphere, or as applicants like to say, “the big black hole.”

Job Search Turned On Its Ear

Initially, applicants had no clue that companies had taken the job search paradigm and turned it on its ear, hence the skyrocketing frustration. As word spread, smart and industrious job seekers began using keywords and phrases from the job summaries. Sometimes, that helped. Many times, for a variety of reasons, it did not. ?

To be honest, some applicants did not customize their resumes because, as they reasoned, they never had to do it before, so why start now? Since many executives and managers have an aversion to touching their resume once it has been created by a resume writer and locked down, customizing their resume for each job was simply a bridge too far. They just did not seem to grasp that the old way of corporate recruiting had changed while they weren’t looking and that it would never be the same again. What we now call a generic general resume does not impress the computer scanners. I distinctly remember the stunned face of a healthcare CEO when I told him in one of my interviewing courses, “If you want to argue with a computer about your qualifications, you will lose every time.”?

Over time, job seekers began to understand what they were now up against. What they have not accepted is that applying for a job online is an inefficient and morale-destroying process. They keep looking for an easy workaround, the “cheat code” to help them get past the first phase — the algorithm-powered automated resume review.?

Dueling AI-Automated Job Search Machines

More on the cheat code in a moment.? But first, let's look at how job seekers, particularly managers and executives, are battling back.? They are launching a counteroffensive, using online subscription services with AI systems that generate resumes and cover letters with the punch of a button.? Since this is now relatively quick and easy, they are practicing the previously disproved marketing strategy that “more is better.” This onslaught of resumes and cover letters is overwhelming the ability of some companies to process the volume, the Wall Street Journal reported. So, they are reverting to tried and true ideas from bygone days — before ATS was seen as the ultimate solution — including paying cash rewards for employee referrals hired. Some corporate ATS systems have been modified to give preference to those applicants who have been referred. What started as a trickle is now gaining speed, and this will put a new crimp in the word-of-mouth guide of effective job seeker strategies.?

CHAT-GPT tools and bots are flooding the job search pipeline, and the quality of the product is sometimes underwhelming.? Some HR executives told the WSJ that many cover letters sound strangely similar.?

Here is how this impacts talent acquisition.? Greenhouse, a hiring software company, reported that for jobs posted on their job boards and filled in the first quarter, applicants who had been referred had a 50 percent chance of advancing past the resume review versus 12 percent who did not enjoy the referred status, the WSJ reported.

Applicant Traffic Jam

Greenhouse cofounder Jon Stross told the WSJ? that some candidates have become so desperate to get noticed that they have asked for cheat codes to get through the filters.

So today, recruiters, software developers, coaches, and others in the talent acquisition arena find themselves amid a technology traffic jam. Job seekers are using AI tools to power through corporations’ AI-automated hiring systems.

The frustration is mounting as the White Collar Recession becomes more apparent—today, there are fewer management and executive jobs than there are people who desperately want them.

Sadly, I must state the obvious for management and executive applicants:? there are no cheat codes, save one:

Get referred.? “Who You Know” networking is the best tool you can develop.

Get referred.? “Who You Know” networking is the best tool you can develop.

Be focused and zero in on the fundamentals. Ignore the glitzy, shiny do-dads that promise magic in your job search. That not only sounds to be true, it is.

Finally, while this automated candidate sourcing and screening morass is daunting, their really hard and critical work comes at the interview table.

Lunch & Learn Live Coaching Session Set for Friday

JOIN US AT 11:30 AM CT On Friday for the rescheduled episode of Lunch & Learn.? John will be focusing on the fundamentals of the job interview in this Live Group Coaching Class. Join us at GuidingYourCareer on YouTube , on Facebook and LinkedIn.?

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