Career development

 15h

Are cover letters still relevant or are they Victorian-era essay? Employees debate whether HR actually reads them


A Reddit post sparked debate on cover letter relevance, with one user claiming ditching them improved callback rates by focusing on resume alignment. While some recruiters reportedly ignore them, others insist on their importance, highlighting industry variations and the overall confusion in modern job hunting.

A blunt Reddit post has reignited one of the most exhausting debates in modern job... hunting: are cover letters still worth the effort, or are they just outdated rituals nobody truly reads anymore? The discussion, sparked by a user who says ditching cover letters actually improved their callback rate, quickly turned into a crowded comment section filled with contradictions, frustration, and lived hiring experiences.

The original post came from Reddit user. According to them, job seekers are "wasting HOURS" writing elaborate cover letters that recruiters barely glance at, if at all. They argued that once they stopped obsessing over perfectly crafted letters and instead focused on aligning their resumes with job descriptions, interview invites started coming in.

In their post,the user described spending entire afternoons polishing cover letters to sound like the ideal "cultural fit," only to see no results. The turning point, they said, was treating the job search like a data-matching exercise rather than a creative writing project.

From their perspective, recruiters are overwhelmed with hundreds of applications and are more interested in whether candidates can do the job, not whether they can write what they called a "Victorian era essay" about passion and purpose. Their workaround? If a portal requires a cover letter, they upload a short note expressing interest in the role and direct recruiters back to the resume. "It is not about being lazy," they wrote.

The comments that followed showed just how divided job seekers are. Another user pointed out that every cover letter discussion splits the same way: some hiring managers swear they haven't read one in years, while others insist they won't consider a candidate without one. With no clear consensus, many applicants feel forced to play it safe.

That confusion resonated with the another user, who summed up the broader job-search chaos. They listed conflicting advice applicants hear daily, from messaging hiring managers versus never contacting them, to tailoring applications for hours versus mass-applying as fast as possible. "What are we actually supposed to do?" they asked. "It's a hellscape out here."

Not everyone agreed with the original post. Several users pushed back hard. Someone said they were explicitly told they landed an interview because of their cover letter. While others as well echoed that sentiment, saying interviewers often referenced details from their letters.

Others stressed industry differences. One Reddit user, who hires in nonprofit policy work, said cover letters are just as important as resumes for evaluating communication skills and mission alignment.

Meanwhile, some commenters landed in the middle. One usummed it up neatly: "Nobody reads them, but they all check if you made an effort to include.

The thread never reached a clear verdict. Some users argued applicant tracking systems still scan cover letters and can flag inconsistencies. Others admitted they use AI tools to generate them quickly, seeing the letter more as a checkbox than a storytelling opportunity.

What's clear is that the job market feels inconsistent and opaque. Whether cover letters are ignored, skimmed, or carefully read seems to depend heavily on the role, the industry.

Do recruiters actually read cover letters anymore?

Some do, some don't. The Reddit thread shows practices vary widely by industry and hiring manager.

Is skipping a cover letter risky?

It can be. While some candidates see no downside, others report landing interviews specifically because of theirs. more
2   

  • Maryann MacIntosh

    41m

    If you cannot take the time to express yourself as it relates to your interest in the position and how it can benefit the company, I question your... ability to be the right person for the job. Cover letters are an introduction of your character. more

  • Career Specialist

    3h

    Yes, it’s still important. It makes you stand out from other job seekers. It highlights details that may not be in your resume and shows what makes... you different. more

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Anonymous member


Career development 5d
Hi, you’re going to laugh, but my situation is a total mess. My direct manager is now my ex-girlfriend. It’s crazy, we broke up a year ago because she drove me nuts with all her nitpicking and control issues. I was the one who ended it.
Now I feel like I might have to quit. She clearly hates me and is constantly finding fault with everything I do.
What should I do?

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David Tyler


Career development 1d
We work at a big company, and there are a few women around 50 who love setting up single coworkers. They’ve already gotten two couples married. Now they’ve clearly decided to set me up too.
They act like it’s no big deal, but it’s getting annoying. People keep hinting at things. When I go into the kitchen, they leave so I’m alone with that girl. They’re always finding reasons for us to do things... together.
It’s really frustrating. How can I make them stop? If I want a relationship, I’ll handle it myself.
Thanks for any advice

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Career development

 12h

The LinkedIn Easy Apply Trap: Why 200 Applications Gets You 3 Callbacks


I'll be honest with you -- when I was building SIRA, I kept seeing the same pattern over and over. Developers would message me saying something like: "I've applied to 200 jobs this month and got 3 responses. What am I doing wrong?"

Two hundred applications. Three responses.

That's not a strategy problem. That's a trap -- and LinkedIn's Easy Apply button is the door that leads into it.

Easy... Apply launched to make job hunting easier. And it did -- just not for you. It made it easier for companies to get flooded with thousands of applications per role. One mid-size startup I spoke to last year told me they received 1,400 applications for a senior backend role. Their recruiting team was three people.

You do the math.

Here's what actually happens when you hit that Easy Apply button:

The irony? The more convenient it is to apply, the less seriously each application is taken. By the candidate. By the recruiter. By everyone.

I get why developers do it. It feels productive. You hit 10 apply buttons in an hour, then 20 the next day, and you're thinking "statistically, something has to work."

But here's the uncomfortable truth: a 1% response rate on 200 applications is worse than a 40% response rate on 10 targeted ones.

Why? Because the 200-application approach trains you to write generic resumes. You stop tailoring. You stop thinking about who you're writing for. You become a resume-submitting machine, and machines don't get hired.

The targeted approach wins -- not just in numbers, but in quality. A recruiter who receives a resume that clearly speaks to their specific role is already having a different experience.

Most devs hear "tailor your resume" and think: change the job title, maybe swap a keyword. That's surface-level tailoring. It barely helps.

Here's what most developers get wrong about ATS systems: they're not smart, but they're consistent. They look for exact (or near-exact) keyword matches.

If the job post says "React.js" and your resume says "ReactJS", some systems will not match those. I know. It sounds insane. But this is 2026 and many companies are still running ATS software from 2015.

When I built the keyword analysis feature in SIRA, one of the first things I discovered was that minor variations tank match scores. Developers lose points for:

The fix isn't complicated once you know what's happening. But most people never find out -- they just get rejected and assume the market is brutal.

If I were job hunting today, here's exactly how I'd spend 2 weeks:

Could I get more applications done? Yes. Would it help? Based on everything I've seen building SIRA -- no. Quality over quantity is not a cliché here. It's statistically demonstrable.

There's a psychological cost that nobody talks about. When you're sending 10 applications a day with almost zero response, it starts to mess with your head. Developers who are genuinely great at their craft start questioning themselves. They think something is wrong with them when the real problem is the approach.

I've talked to engineers with 8+ years of experience, shipped products used by millions, who felt completely worthless after a month of ghosted Easy Apply submissions. That's the real damage.

You're not broken. The approach is broken.

Easy Apply isn't evil -- it's just a tool designed for volume, not quality. And volume is exactly the wrong strategy when you're competing against hundreds of applicants with similar credentials.

The developers I see getting hired fast in 2026 are doing the opposite of spraying applications. They're going deep on fewer targets, speaking directly to company pain, and making it dead-simple for a recruiter to say "yes, this person gets it."

If you're mid-search right now and the responses aren't coming -- stop. Cut your application rate in half and double the time per application. See what happens.

And if you want a shortcut for the ATS and keyword matching part, I built SIRA specifically for this. Drop your resume and a job description, and it'll show you exactly where you're losing points before a human ever sees it. There's also a Telegram bot if you want to run a quick check on mobile.

Quick question for the comments: Have you ever landed a job specifically because of a targeted, non-Easy-Apply application? What made it work? I'm genuinely curious what the patterns look like from different people's experiences. more

Career development

 13h

Recruiter: The three things you MUST lie about in a job interview


A hiring professional has made a surprisingly candid admission about the job interview process.

Her revelation? When interviewing potential candidates, she expects them to lie in answer to certain standard job interview questions.

'I've been conducting interviews for years, and I know when someone is lying to me,' the recruiter shared in an job interview tips online discussion post.

'But let me... tell you, lying about the university you attended or why you left your job is not quite the same.'

The hiring expert went on to outline three specific job interview questions where she feels it's permissible to lie because being overly truthful could work against you.

The first instance, she says, is when answering the question "Why are you looking for a new job?".

'Don't tell us you didn't like your previous work environment. That makes you seem like a difficult person to recruiters and makes us think you might cause problems in this job,' she explained.

'Instead, say you're looking for new professional challenges.'

A recruiter shared the three standard job interview questions where she would expect the applicant's answer to contain a few white lies (Picture: stock image)

The second situation where honesty isn't necessarily the best policy is if a recruiter asks, "How did your old boss make you feel?".'

'Look, I've worked with some real jerks in the office, and everyone knew it,' she admitted.

'But even though we all know tyrants exist in companies, don't tell anyone at another company that your old boss was one, because we're not from there, and again, we'll see you as a difficult person incapable of leadership.'

The third instance where a white lie could be prudent is in response to the classic interview question: "Where do you see yourself in five to ten years?"

She explained that even if you have grand plans that are far beyond the scope of the job you're applying for, it's best to keep those thoughts to yourself.

'Although I also see myself running a farm with cows, I'm not going to tell people at the company,' she joked.

'The company wants you there for a long time and they're thinking about the future with you. It's like going on a date and saying you're afraid of commitment.'

Her job interview advice, shared in a Reddit post, explained that candidates need to reframe their understanding of a job interview as 'a negotiation, where the product the company wants to buy is your skills' rather than 'an exhaustive exam'.

A hiring professional said job candidates needed to reframe their understanding of job interview from it being an 'exhaustive exam', to 'a negotiation, where the product the company wants to buy is your skills' rather than 'an exhaustive exam' (Picture: stock image)

The recruiter explained that this is why she 'a good negotiator at the interview table' to do a little 'lying', citing the above as reasonable times to bend the truth.

She also highlighted two other interview moments where being straightforward isn't always in a job applicant's best interest.

Returning to the interview-as-negotiation concept, the expert suggested you should very carefully consider whether to reveal your actual salary from your previous company.

'HR professionals are usually paid to find the most qualified candidates at the lowest cost to the company,' she explained.

'That's why, during negotiations, if they pressure you to reveal your salary (which we will pressure you to do), don't give the real amount if you want a bigger raise.'

Another circumstance where she felt embellishment is acceptable is if it helps you better 'sell yourself' to a potential employer.

'I've interviewed top professionals who are far superior to an entire department, but they don't see themselves as such, and during the interview, they sabotage themselves,' she explained.

'Don't use expressions like, "Well, I didn't do it alone, I had help." Instead, say, "We faced problems along the way, but we managed to solve them." That positions you as a leader and humble.'

The woman's advice generated thousands of replies - many agreeing that they felt it was acceptable to lie about particular factors during a job interview.

Many replies to the recruiter's job interview advice felt her suggestions were spot on. But some comments were frustrated about the game playing that sometimes occurred during the hiring process (Picture: stock image)

'Interviews aren't lie detectors, they're sales meetings, so stop confessing and start marketing,' read one reply that had received thousands of upvotes.

'Thanks for the honesty and clarity. Lying is not an ethical question, it is a tool you should learn to use. Lie and practise it to become successful, or don't and be a low-pay, confused loser.'

'It's wild how much of the interview process is just performance art,' another admitted. 'You just have to package your genuine skills into the narrative they want to hear.'

A fellow recruiter thought the advice was spot on, offering additional suggestions.

'I also recommend lying about values/culture. Do pre-emptive research on what the company's values or culture are and ensure during the interview you align your values with the company,' they explained.

'I've seen many good candidates on paper who come across as someone who doesn't give a c**p during the interview. I get that realistically, people need work to earn money and shouldn't have to pretend. But if you're already giving "cbf" attitude even before getting hired, then it says a lot about what your work ethic is going to be like.'

However, many replies to the post expressed frustration at the games involved with the job interview process.

'I wish we could get rid of all this pretence and posturing and just be honest,' read one reply. 'I feel like both companies and employees are always putting on a show and pretending to be what we are not.'

'God, interviews are so exhausting,' agreed another. 'Like, you need someone to do the job, I need a job to do - cool, let's shake hands and see how it goes.' more

Career development

 18h

2026 NFL Odds: Which teams with new coaches will see an uptick in wins?


2026 NFL Odds: Which teams with new coaches will see an uptick in wins?

The NFL's annual coaching carousel doesn't just reshuffle sidelines -- it quietly reshapes betting markets, locker room identities, and in many cases the trajectory of entire franchises. Entering the 2026 season, ten teams will begin the year with new head coaches. Oddsmakers have already drawn a sharp line between expected... risers and potential fallers in the win column. Which teams with new coaches will see an uptick in wins in 2026?

Here's the fascinating part: only three of those teams are projected to regress in total wins, while seven are expected to improve. That split says less about coaching résumés and more about roster timelines, quarterback stability, and how quickly new systems can take hold.

Below is a deeper, non-generic look at what those win totals really signal. But first, here's a recap of the NFL's new coaches for 2026.

These teams share one defining trait: structural transition. New coaches here aren't simply tweaking schemes -- they're installing culture, redefining quarterback plans, and often resetting expectations.

Win totals in the mid-five range usually mean sportsbooks expect competitive losses rather than outright collapse. For both franchises, the real 2026 victory would be:

Historically, first-year coaches in true rebuilds often beat perception in Year 2, not Year 1. So the betting intrigue isn't just the over/under -- it's whether these teams show enough cohesion to become 2027 sleeper candidates.

Both rosters carry high-variance talent. That makes coaching impact more dramatic:

These are classic "swing outcome" teams where coaching psychology matters as much as play-calling.

A 5.5 number here feels different. Unlike pure rebuilds, Miami's roster suggests underachievement correction rather than teardown.

That makes the new coach's job uniquely pressure-packed: win quickly or risk the label of wasted talent.

Falcons (8.5), Giants (8.5), Steelers (8.5)

Eight-and-a-half is the NFL's most revealing number. It implies:

Both teams sit in the league's most delicate balance -- good enough to contend, flawed enough to miss.

For new coaches, success hinges on:

Historically, this tier produces the largest Year-1 coaching jumps, because talent is already playoff-adjacent.

The Steelers rarely live in transition. That alone makes this situation compelling.

An 8.5 projection signals sportsbooks expect:

If the offense modernizes quickly, this number could look one of the softest overs on the board.

If not, regression becomes real for the first time in years.

Ravens (10.5), Bills (10.5)

New coaches almost never inherit double-digit win expectations. That's what makes these two cases fascinating.

Unlike Baltimore, Buffalo's total reflects skepticism.

Oddsmakers projecting fewer wins typically point to:

This is the rare contender where Year-1 coaching impact could swing playoff seeding dramatically.

Across the past two decades:

That historical lens aligns almost perfectly with the 2026 totals.

The most important takeaway isn't which teams go over or under.

It's this: Coaching impact shows up fastest where talent already exists.

Every offseason promises transformation. But in 2026, the league's coaching reset isn't evenly distributed -- it's surgically concentrated at the NFL's most fragile competitive tiers.

That's what makes this season intriguing for fans and bettors alike:

We may receive affiliate commissions if you sign up through links on our site. Read our full Affiliate Disclosure. more

Career development

 19h

'Tell lies': Recruiter shares unique tips about interview questions and answers; previous salary, CV, long-term goals | Today News


A Reddit user claims job interviews are more about negotiation than truth. Candidates should present their value, handle sensitive questions such as salary, and frame job changes positively.

A Reddit user who claims to be a recruiter has explained that job interviews often work more like negotiations than strict truth tests. The recruiter says candidates should focus on presenting their skills... and value while also managing certain sensitive questions carefully.

According to the post, one common area is previous salary. Since companies try to hire strong candidates at the lowest cost, applicants may feel pressure to reveal their exact pay. The recruiter suggests not disclosing the real figure if the goal is a higher offer.

"If they pressure you to reveal your salary (which we will pressure you to do), don't give the real amount if you want a bigger raise," says the post.

Another point involves the reason for leaving a job. Speaking negatively about a past workplace can make a candidate appear difficult. So, it is safer to frame the move as a search for growth or new challenges.

The post also advises avoiding harsh comments about former bosses even if the experience was poor. Recruiters may question the applicant's attitude or leadership ability.

"We'll see you as a difficult person incapable of leadership," says the post.

The Reddit post further states that applicants often hide certain personal truths to align with company expectations. For example, candidates should not reveal their long-term dreams that do not involve the company. Employers want someone who plans to stay and grow with the organisation.

"It's like going on a date and saying you're afraid of commitment," the post adds.

The post also stresses the importance of confident self-presentation. Many highly-skilled professionals speak too modestly and downplay their own achievements.

"Say, 'We faced problems along the way, but we managed to solve them.' That positions you as a leader and humble," the Reddit post suggests.

Another key point is the role of the CV. According to the post, a resume must clearly highlight strengths and real accomplishments. The CV works like a quick marketing document, creating a first impression in seconds.

Free digital tools now make it easier to design strong CVs, so a weak presentation has little excuse.

"Treat it like a marketing company where you have to sell yourself in five seconds. You have no excuse with the number of free tools available for this," the post adds.

This report is based on user-generated content from social media. LiveMint has not independently verified the claims and does not endorse them.

"Before you walk in the building for the interview, you first need to learn how to own the air you breathe and the ground you walk. Be confident, knowing the last question is about money and that you said it all to ask for a large starting salary. Even if you don't have any experience!" suggested another.

One user posted, "TBH I can tell when people are lying, but I respect it. Like, someone's going to shy away from saying they're jumping for a better salary, I know when they are, but I don't care. I respect the lie, and I'd do the same thing."

"Literally, treat all interviews as acting auditions and do/say whatever you think they'll like best until it gets down to the real details (pay, hours, etc)," came from another. more

Career development

 20h

New Director Aims to "Elevate" Work of Westside Community Center -- The Anderson Observer


The new director of Anderson's Westside Community Center tells the story as if it were already a parable, one she has had time to turn over and polish. As a girl, Treca Yvette DeShields lined baby dolls in a row and instructed them to "write your alphabets, say your ABCs," playing school in a house where, she now realizes, she was rehearsing a vocation she had not yet named.

On Tuesday after, in... a ceremony the board deliberately titled a "Passing of the Torch," that private script was made public when she was formally welcomed as Westside's new director, a role she has held since Jan. 1.

For more than three decades, Westside Community Center has been a working thesis about what a neighborhood institution can be. Under its founding director, Dr. Beatrice Thompson, the low-slung structure on West Franklin Street became a hybrid of after-school classroom, informal social-service office, and civic commons, serving a part of Anderson where "Westside" is as much shorthand for racial and economic divides as it is a quadrant on a map. The center's programming -- homework help, youth mentorship, community meetings -- has earned it a reputation as "the haven on the hill," a place where the city's abstractions about empowerment and engagement are translated into a child sounding out a new word or a parent filling out a job application.

DeShields arrives, as the board's announcement puts it, with "extensive experience in nonprofit leadership, mental health advocacy, youth and family services, and community engagement," a résumé that maps neatly onto the overlapping crises that now define everyday life for many Westside families.

Her own map begins in small-town South Carolina. She describes herself as an only child in her mother's home, "the baby" in her father's, a configuration that left her both indulged and observant. In her recollection, the baby dolls she lined up for lessons were less a fantasy of domestic life than an early experiment in persuasion -- she talked to them, carried on conversations, insisted they perform. As a teenager, she briefly flirted with an alternative narrative: skip college, go straight to work. The plan lasted a week.

"This is not what I want to do the rest of my life," DeShields remembers thinking, before pivoting, abruptly, back toward school with the urgency of someone who feels a door closing.

The more decisive turning point came later, and it was not the sort that appears in a guidance counselor's brochure. One weekend, home from college and not, as she puts it, "quite where I needed to be" despite a recent profession of faith, she went to an old hangout and got into a fight with another young woman. She recalls the details clinically: a turtleneck shirt, a cut on her hand she assumed would require a simple stitch, a sudden collapse in the hospital. When she fell, she tipped to her left, revealing that her entire right side had been opened up; she had been cut nine times, seven of the wounds deep enough that "had I been cut a hair deeper, I would have lost my life." On the gurney, she says, she experienced what she describes as an out-of-body encounter with God and heard an ultimatum: decide, today, what you are going to do.

If this sounds like the sort of stark conversion narrative common in Black church memoirs, DeShields treats it less as melodrama than as an administrative deadline.

"I promised him that day that I would serve him till I die," she said, and within a few years the promise had taken organizational form. In Clinton, South Carolina, where she settled into church life, she started a youth group called Save Our Youth, building it into a 100-voice gospel choir that doubled as a liberal-arts collective. The teenagers rehearsed music but also staged plays and other performances, traveling to churches and events across South Carolina and neighboring states, sometimes opening for Shirley Caesar, the gospel legend whose name still functions as a kind of shorthand for a certain style of ecstatic yet precise performance.

The precocity of this operation is something she seems to appreciate more fully in retrospect. "I have parents now, and we sit back and look," she says. "I was only 17 years old." Because she had graduated high school early -- her birthday is in October -- she was legally an adolescent but practically a tour manager, arranging buses and hotel rooms, fielding questions from adults who inexplicably listened to her.

She invokes these logistics with a kind of retrospective wonder -- How was I able to get a bus? How was I able to get hotel rooms at 17? -- but also with the dawning recognition that this was, as she puts it, "the leader in the making." The pattern is familiar to anyone who has spent time in Southern churches: a teenager given the keys to a ministry, learning governance on the fly.

By the time Anderson County Council honored her in 2025 for "35 years of ministry, mentorship, and tireless advocacy for the youth and families" of the region, that early experiment had become a career. She founded Love Zone Ministries and The Zone Services Inc., a multicultural community-service center whose mission statement reads like a condensed version of contemporary social-work jargon: prevention, outreach, wellness, leadership development, family strengthening. Her programs moved in and out of schools, churches, and community centers across South Carolina, occupying the same kinds of spaces that Westside now offers: multipurpose rooms where a counseling session might share a wall with a basketball game, and where a flyer about trauma-informed practice might sit next to a sign-up sheet for a college tour.

In Anderson, the word "Westside" carries its own load of history. It evokes a cluster of schools and voting precincts, but also a set of long-running conversations about race, industry, and neglect. The community center, perched on a hill at 1100 West Franklin Street, has long tried to serve as a counter-narrative -- a "haven," as its website puts it, where residents can come for tutoring, summer programs, and the less measurable comfort of being recognized by name. Under Thompson, the strategy was to make the building porous: invite in partners, volunteers, and organizations, train teenagers not only to receive help but to provide it, and, in doing so, complicate the idea of who, exactly, counts as a client.

The ceremony on Tuesday attempted to stage continuity rather than rupture. The board, in its public statement, paired "legacy" with "confidence," expressing gratitude for Thompson's "service, excellence, and deep community roots" while affirming its trust in DeShields to "carry the torch forward." Residents and local officials gathered in what was billed as "A Moment of Black History Carried Forward," a Black History Month program that used the leadership transition as an occasion to narrate Westside itself as part of a longer Black institutional history in Anderson. There were refreshments, testimonies, and the kind of lightly formalized blessing that marks many Southern civic rites.

For all the ceremonial language, the practical questions facing DeShields are concrete. The boundaries between school, clinic, and community center have blurred; children arrive with needs that do not fit neatly into a single program category. Her background in mental-health advocacy suggests that Westside may lean further into counseling and trauma-informed care, embedding those practices into settings once devoted primarily to homework help and recreation. Her experience in leadership development and family-strengthening initiatives points toward programs that treat teenagers not simply as recipients of services but as emerging staff, board members, and civic actors -- the same logic that once allowed a 17-year-old choir director in Clinton to book buses and hotel rooms.

In her interview with The. Anderson Observer, she tends to return to that early ultimatum on a hospital table, the sense that she was, quite literally, cut into purpose. Yet the work ahead of her at Westside is less about personal destiny than about institutional stewardship: budgets to balance, grants to pursue, thresholds to keep open. The board's bet is that the skills required to navigate those systems -- the acronyms, the audits, the meetings downtown -- are not incompatible with the ones required to know which grandmother to call when a teenager stops showing up for tutoring. If they are right, the haven on the hill will continue, as it has for three decades, to convert the abstract nouns of press releases -- education, empowerment, engagement -- back into daily verbs, carried out by people who remember what it is to stand, briefly, on the edge of another life and choose this one instead. more

Career development

 20h

Online Courses for Career Advancement: 2024 Course Guide


The future of professional success is being rewritten by digital education. Online courses for career advancement have evolved into practical, credentialed programs that rival traditional classroom training. In today's ever-changing workforce, self-paced courses and career development courses are more accessible, affordable, and relevant than ever before -- ushering in a new era of lifelong... learning for students, professionals, and forward-thinking organizations.

Professional development is no longer limited by physical boundaries or rigid schedules. Accredited online professional development courses and certifications build essential skills for your career and grant learners the flexibility to adapt, upskill, and optimize their knowledge at their own pace. Whether you're an experienced manager, an aspiring entrepreneur, or a recent graduate planning your dream job, enrolling in an online course can help you unlock new opportunities, enhance your skills, and receive a certificate respected by employers everywhere.

This 2024 course guide delivers a data-backed look at career development courses and certifications, including key trends in online learning, the best platforms (like Coursera and edX), critical professional skills, and practical strategies for aligning courses to your personalized learning path. We'll also provide expert insights, real success stories, and step-by-step guidance -- so you can make informed decisions about your next move. Let's explore how online education is closing the gap between career plans and professional advancement.

Career development refers to the ongoing process of gaining new knowledge, practical experience, and professional skills to optimize your career path and align with job market trends. The traditional classroom could never keep pace with today's fast-paced workplace transformation -- but online career development courses and certifications are bridging that gap in truly revolutionary ways.

Self-paced courses are the educational breakthrough students and working professionals have long demanded. No commute, no fixed class time, no compromise. Courses may span a few hours or several months, enabling customized learning journeys that fit personal and organizational needs. According to data from Coursera and LinkedIn, over 74% of learners credit self-paced courses for helping them adapt quickly to workforce needs and secure interview skills for new positions.

The integration of AI, project management, digital literacy, and data analysis into development courses is a defining trend. Training programs like Coursera's "AI for Everyone" or edX's "Introduction to Project Management" offer accessible, beginner-friendly content with an industry focus. Over 65% of students enrolled in AI courses in 2023 received a certificate and reported improvements in their current job performance and job prospects.

The best online professional development courses prioritize essential skills: communication skills, cultural sensitivity, problem solving, resilience, and adaptability. Many successful graduates highlight the value of soft skills -- especially in fast-evolving fields like human resources, teamwork, and entrepreneurship -- as the real key to career success. Consider mentorship and networking functions now integrated into popular career development platforms; these tools for career development foster not just individual competency, but also community growth.

Course selection is foundational to successful career development. Industry trends and personal learning goals must align for maximum impact -- whether you want to launch your own business, strengthen leadership, or simply improve your job prospects.

Not all online learning platforms are equal. Ensure your course is delivered by an accredited college or leading education provider. Accreditation secures the quality standards employers expect. Entities like Coursera, edX, and even LinkedIn Learning offer certificates that verify skill acquisition and are recognized by human resources and hiring managers worldwide.

Project management and business writing are among the most sought-after career development courses and certifications. These training and development programs emphasize organizational, negotiation, and communication skills -- critical for roles in leadership, management, and workforce recruitment. Another booming area is digital transformation skills, including software development, finance, and digital marketing.

Courses can help you build invaluable professional relationships through LinkedIn integration, peer forums, and live mentorship sessions. A career counselor or expert advisor often guides you through learning pathway evaluation, résumé building, cover letter best practices, and interview techniques that make you stand out. Data from LinkedIn shows learners who engage in robust course communities are 30% more likely to reach their career goals and land a dream job in popular career fields.

Turning educational achievement into real-world advancement is why online professional development courses are transformative.

Lifelong learning and upskilling are vital for staying relevant in the ever-changing job market. Courses include modules on psychological resilience, adaptability, and overcoming obstacles. This is especially crucial in today's fast-paced work environments, where employees shift roles and industries more often than ever. A 2023 industry survey found that 92% of professionals who continued to keep learning through online career development courses reported higher job satisfaction and greater career success.

Career advancement today means more than technical expertise. Building a strong personal brand through social skills, résumé optimization, targeted cover letter writing, and proactive job search strategies sets you apart. Many development courses dedicate specialized units to these essential tactics -- helping you make informed decisions about your next career step and networking efforts.

"After completing a project management specialization on Coursera, I received a certificate, landed several interviews, and ultimately secured my dream job," shares Janelle, a former marketing coordinator. Such testimonials illustrate how online learning paths help professionals adapt to new industries, enhance their appeal to recruiters, and thrive on their professional journey.

Online career development courses and certifications have made professional advancement an achievable, affordable reality for learners worldwide. Digital education removes barriers, optimizes learning for real job market needs, and equips students with the hard and soft skills required for lifelong career satisfaction. Whether you're starting your journey or seeking new skills for your current job, online learning empowers you to make informed decisions, keep learning, and achieve the successful career development you envision.

The future of career advancement is here and accessible. Explore your next course, connect with expert mentorship, and enhance your professional skills -- because your development never stops. Start your learning journey today and write the next chapter of your professional story.

What are the best career development courses online?

The best online career development courses include those with clear learning outcomes, accredited certificates, and up-to-date industry content. Platforms like Coursera, edX, and LinkedIn Learning offer highly-rated programs in project management, business writing, AI, digital literacy, and leadership. Evaluate courses based on reviews, employer recognition, and their alignment with your career path.

So, how exactly does lifelong learning help with career progression?

Lifelong learning ensures professionals keep their skills relevant in an ever-changing workforce. Regularly enrolling in online professional development courses allows you to upskill, adapt to new technologies, and enhance both technical and soft skills. This continuous improvement significantly increases your value to employers and opens doors to new opportunities.

Will I receive a certificate when I graduate?

Yes, most online career development courses and certifications include an official certificate upon successful completion. Receiving a certificate demonstrates new skill acquisition and can be shared with employers, added to your résumé, and used to bolster your personal branding. Always check course details to ensure the certificate is accredited and recognized.

The future of career advancement belongs to proactive, informed learners. Let's keep learning and advancing -- together. more

Career development

 21h

How to Ace a Job Interview With an AI


AI video interviews are increasingly common in hiring, requiring candidates to answer questions on camera for AI assessment before human review.

If you're applying for jobs, you better get used to being interviewed by AI.

As the use of artificial-intelligence tools in hiring continues to expand, it isn't unusual for job candidates to be interviewed by an AI platform rather than a human -- at... least initially.

In these AI video interviews, candidates typically see a screen with a written question and their face in a camera frame with a prompt to respond via video. Sometimes the question will require a typed-in or multiple-choice response rather than a video answer. Just like with any job interview, the questions can be both basic ("What does good customer service mean to you?" ) or technical ("What approach would you take to identify the root cause of a $100,000 variance during the consolidation of three international subsidiaries?").

You may have just one opportunity to rerecord an answer; if you flub that, there's no taking it back. The platform usually provides no response beyond a matter-of-fact acknowledgment that your answer was submitted. But behind the scenes it is noting and scoring your answers for an assessment it will give to the hiring company. A human eventually reviews the submissions.

The experience can be awkward or unnerving for many candidates. So we consulted recruiters, career consultants and people who run AI hiring platforms for tips on how to ace an AI job interview. First off, they say, don't act like a robot yourself. Here are some of their other tips:

Practice in the same manner in which you will be evaluated: on video with no one to look at and under time pressure. "AI is evaluating delivery, pacing, confidence and clarity, not just content," says J.T. O'Donnell, chief executive of career-coaching site Work It Daily.

Candidates can easily fall into the trap of sounding too scripted or robotic because without facial cues from a human interviewer, they have no idea how their answers are being received. "Even though candidates aren't speaking to a person live, they should still prepare and communicate as if they are," says Ben Sesser, chief executive officer of AI-interview platform BrightHire.

Record yourself answering six to eight common questions on topics such as leadership, conflict and customer handling, says Conor Grennan, CEO of AI consulting company AI Mindset. Then review the recording on mute, just watching your presence and body language. Next, play the recording audio-only, to listen for pacing, filler words and clarity. Finally, watch the video with sound on. Repeat until you feel you could respond this way in your sleep.

Some of the AI interview platforms offer practice sessions or coaches who work with job candidates in mock AI interviews.

Many applicants try to load their responses with keywords they think the algorithm wants to see. That's a mistake, experts say.

"You want to use relevant industry terminology naturally, but don't game it by just keyword stuffing," says Keith Wolf, managing partner at recruiting firm Murray Resources, adding that "most AI systems are smart enough to detect when someone is being overly robotic." Indeed, Willo, a job-candidate assessment platform, says it uses AI detection technology to note when applicants are relying on AI or keywords in their responses to win over an algorithm.

Try to speak naturally -- not too fast or for too long -- and focus more on the structure and clarity of your answers than how many keywords are in them. It's all right to show personality or use appropriate humor. "Expressing personality, tone or emotion doesn't confuse the system, nor is it considered a mistake," says Prem Kumar, CEO of AI interviewing platform Humanly.

As with any interview, provide specific examples of skills you have, how you have used those skills to solve a problem, metrics to back up what your resolution achieved and how you would use those same skill sets at the company, advises Tessa White, founder of career-consulting company the Job Doctor.

Executives from AI interview platforms say the systems generally don't score job candidates based on eye contact or facial expressions. But since a human eventually will review your interview, career consultants and recruiters advise looking directly at the camera when recording responses -- in much the same way you would look at a human interviewer during an in-person interview.

It may feel awkward at first, but it "makes a huge difference in how engaged you appear" overall, says Wolf.

What's more, some systems are trained to note if it appears a candidate is reading from notes or looking up answers. Looking away from the camera for extended periods could generate such concerns, says Teri Parker de Leon, executive director of the career management center at Duke University's Fuqua School of Business. You don't want to give the impression that you have a script or are cheating in some way.

AI platforms also don't score candidates on attire, but career consultants and experts say dressing professionally for AI interviews can have its benefits.

"Your attire can be important for your general attitude and demeanor," says Duke's de Leon. "Putting on a suit or business-casual outfit may put you in the right 'head space' for the interview."

In general, treat the video as if having a meeting with a human -- after all, a human reviewer will see the video later. You wouldn't show up to an in-person interview shirtless, would you?

This may be obvious but it bears repeating: Make sure you have a strong Wi-Fi connection, close tabs, turn notifications off and silence phones and other distractions before joining an AI interview.

"Muffled audio is fatal," says Grennan of AI Mindset. "If the system can't transcribe you accurately, you get a zero on that question." He recommends using a headset or external microphone for best results.

Make sure you're in a quiet environment. The number of candidates who don't do such digital due-diligence "is quite alarming to me," says Euan Cameron, CEO of Willo. "I've even seen people doing them in the car or doing them on a moving train," he says. "These aren't good ideas."

An AI interviewer generally won't take note of your background or lighting. Still, it's probably best to avoid anything weird or embarrassing since a human reviewer eventually will see it. more

Career development

 22h

The Productivity Olympics: How To Opt Out and Slow Down


This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at FSU chapter and does not reflect the views of Her Campus.

There's an unspoken competition happening, and no one officially signed up for it. Still, every week can feel like a qualifying round for what I deem the Productivity Olympics. You know the one. It starts with a casual "I'm so busy" and somehow turns into a full résumé of... everything someone has done before noon.

By 9 a.m., group chats are already buzzing. Laptops open, headphones on, iced coffee in hand. Someone's reviewing for an exam they have in three weeks. Someone else is editing something, answering emails, and updating their planner at the same time.

There's always that one person who casually mentions they went to the gym at 6 a.m., went to class or work, went to a meeting, and now they're "just here to get a little work done," which somehow means four hours of uninterrupted productivity.

What are the Productivity Olympics?

Scroll any social feed, and you'll see it too: morning routines, packed calendars, and perfectly timed resets. Everyone looks booked, busy, and on top of it. Somewhere along the way, being busy stopped being something we do and started being something we are.

It becomes the first thing we say when someone asks how we're doing, almost like proof that we're trying hard enough. Slowing down can feel uncomfortable, even wrong, because we're so used to measuring our worth by how full our days look.

The thing is, our generation runs on ambition. Everyone's involved in something, or maybe even five things. There are meetings, applications, side hustles, workouts, social plans, and the constant pressure to build a life that looks impressive on paper and effortless in reality.

It's motivating, but it's also... a lot. Somewhere between comparing schedules and comparing milestones, it becomes easy to feel like you're always slightly behind.

The Productivity Olympics aren't always loud. Sometimes they show up quietly, like when you feel guilty for taking a break because someone else is working, or when you open your planner and start mentally ranking your day against everyone else's.

There's this idea that if you're not busy, you're wasting time. That rest has to be earned. That if someone else is doing more, you should be too. Even downtime starts to feel like something you have to justify.

The Reality and How to Slow Down

Here's the reality: most of us are just trying to keep up with our own lives. The girl with the packed schedule is probably exhausted. The guy pulling an all-nighter is probably stressed. The person who seems like they have it all together definitely has at least one tab open titled "due tonight."

Productivity looks impressive from the outside, but it's rarely as perfect as it seems. A lot of it is just people doing their best and hoping it's enough. There's nothing wrong with being driven. Caring about what you're building, your goals, your future -- that's a good thing.

Still, not everything has to be a competition. You're allowed to close your laptop and go on a walk, skip the 6 a.m. workout, or have a day that isn't optimized, scheduled, and perfectly efficient. You're allowed to do things slowly, or not at all, without feeling like you're falling behind someone else's timeline.

Opting out of the Productivity Olympics doesn't mean that you're falling behind. It just means that you're choosing a pace that actually works for you, and honestly, that might be the most productive thing you can do. more

Career development

 22h

How To Navigate Long-Term Unemployment In Today's Job Market


Headline unemployment remains relatively low. And yet a growing share of job seekers have been out of work for six months or longer. For many, re-entry is proving slower and more disorienting than expected. As CNBC recently reported, long-term unemployment is becoming a status quo in parts of today's labor market.

If the economy is "fine," why are so many capable people stuck?

For those living... it, long-term unemployment is not a statistic. It feels like sending résumés into a void or being told you are "overqualified" one week and "not the right fit" the next. The system you knew how to navigate no longer operates the same way.

The easy explanation is cautious employers and longer hiring cycles. The harder explanation is structural: many professionals are looking for yesterday's job in tomorrow's job market.

How To Reposition Your Job Search During Long-Term Unemployment

If you have been unemployed for six months or longer and are wondering how to get hired again or survive long-term unemployment, the answer may not lie in sending more applications. It may lie in repositioning yourself for how today's job market actually works.

Treating the job search as a transaction -- find an opening, submit a tailored résumé and wait -- no longer works reliably because roles are evolving before they are formally defined. Organizations increasingly hire around emerging gaps that do not translate neatly into traditional job titles or prior experience.

That is why conversations matter more than applications.

Not the transactional "I'm looking for a job" call. Few people respond well to that. What you want instead are curiosity-driven conversations designed to understand where the work is moving, how problems are being framed and what capabilities are becoming more valuable.

Embark on a "coffee journey." Start with people you already know who are doing work that interests you. Talk to them about what is changing in their field. What new pressures are emerging? What tools are reshaping the way work gets done? What challenges feel unresolved? Then ask who else you should speak to.

This is more than networking. It is research.

As you expand your circle from people you know to people you do not yet know, two shifts occur. First, you begin to describe what you actually know how to do, independent of your previous title. In conversation, you naturally draw on past experiences to engage with current problems. You recognize where your experience is relevant, even if it once carried a different label. A former marketing manager may realize her deeper capability lies in translating customer insight into strategic decisions. An operations leader may recognize that what he brings is systems thinking across complex environments.

Second, you learn to tell the story of your skills in the language the market is using today. You discover adjacent spaces where that capability matters. The marketing manager who once saw herself narrowly as a brand lead may find opportunities in product strategy or customer experience. The operations leader may see openings in transformation initiatives or cross-functional redesign efforts. You begin to recognize needs before they are formalized into job postings. What once felt like a fixed career path starts to branch.

The coffee conversations lead you to a clearer understanding of where your capabilities intersect with emerging needs. They shift your focus from chasing openings to identifying opportunity.

How To Redefine Your Professional Identity During Long-Term Unemployment

Even with that clarity, long-term unemployment can destabilize identity. The longer someone is out of work, the more tightly they cling to their last title as proof of competence.

But employers are not hiring your past. They are hiring their future. That requires more than describing your experience. It calls for reframing how you understand and present your value.

Repositioning begins by asking different questions. What problems do you consistently solve well? What decisions improve when you are involved? What patterns do you see faster than others?

You are detaching your professional identity from job titles and anchoring it in transferable value. In a market where roles morph quickly, job titles are fluid. Capabilities are portable. The ability to synthesize information, manage ambiguity, design processes, build trust or interpret data travels across industries. Over time, that clarity becomes your personal brand, grounded in value and trust, and it opens doors to new possibilities.

How To Upgrade Your Skills For Today's Job Market

Professional stagnation used to be a hidden risk of long-term unemployment. Today it can become an opportunity. Work inside organizations continues to evolve. AI tools are being integrated into daily workflows. Teams collaborate across geographies and time zones. Data fluency is becoming expected rather than optional. If you are out of work, you have something many employed professionals lack: time to learn deliberately.

Employers are far more likely to hire someone who can elevate the team's capabilities, not just fill a slot. That means demonstrating familiarity with emerging tools, new operating models and the changing language of your field.

In a market that rewards learning velocity, forward motion signals adaptability. Experiment with AI tools in your domain. Take on short-term or project-based work that stretches your exposure. Volunteer in a nonprofit navigating digital transformation. Write publicly about how your field is evolving. Teach what you know in new contexts.

Even modest forward moves signal adaptability. And adaptability is increasingly the currency of employability.

How To Make Money And Stay Motivated During Long-Term Unemployment

Financial pressure is real. If you are asking how to make money while unemployed, the answer may not be waiting for the next full-time role.

Project-based consulting, fractional roles, teaching, advisory engagements and contract work can generate income while expanding your network, exposing you to new challenges and accelerating your learning. You do not need to decide that you are done with salaried employment. But you also should not confine yourself to one narrow version of what your next step is supposed to look like.

Careers are becoming more portfolio-based over time. Many professionals will combine employment and independent work across a lifetime. Long-term unemployment can become the moment that opens that broader model.

The key is to treat interim work as strategic, not temporary. Instead of asking, "How do I get back to where I was?" begin asking, "Where does my capability create leverage in the opportunity that is emerging?"

Those who treat this period as repositioning rather than waiting often discover it becomes an inflection point. In a world where careers will stretch across multiple identities, industries and models of work, learning to reposition may be the most important skill of all. more

Career development

 23h

Why the Balance of Power Has Shifted Back to Organizations -- and Why That's a Good Thing


Why the Balance of Power Has Shifted Back to Organizations -- and Why That's a Good Thing

Let's be honest, most CHRO groups out there are bad. They are expensive, filled with vendor pitches, and loaded with "fluff" resources that are outdated by the time they are published. That's why I put together Future of Work Leaders. A CHRO group for people leaders who are moving beyond traditional HR to... focus on the future of work and employee experience. No pitches, no selling, no fluff.

The community is focused on discussions, candid Q&A sessions, and sharing of resources and insights. Members include Lego, Novartis, PwC, Saks Global, and dozens of others. I'm just in the process of planning our annual in-person forum which will be at the end of March. if you want to learn more and request an invite go to Future of Work Leaders or email me directly Jacob[at]thefutureorganization[dot]com.

In the free edition earlier this week, I shared a set of signals that looked disconnected on the surface: résumé inflation, automation moving beyond white-collar work, executive optimism that clashes with employee anxiety, and regulators stepping in to impose guardrails.

Here's the pattern underneath all of them: the balance of power is shifting back toward organizations and artificial intelligence is making that shift more structural than cyclical.

What follows is the deeper analysis: the labor-market reality behind the shift, why artificial intelligence changes the negotiating environment permanently, what leaders are saying out loud now, and the leadership model that makes this power reset productive instead of chaotic.

For the last few years, a quiet assumption took hold in many workplaces: employees had the leverage, so everything became negotiable. This was of course true during and post pandemic.

But this wasn't negotiation as a healthy leadership skill. It was negotiation as an operating model born out of fear.

During and after the pandemic, organizations were terrified of losing talent. When hiring was chaotic and churn was high, leaders started treating almost every element of work as up for debate: where work happens, when it happens, what performance looks like, and what tradeoffs are acceptable. In many cases, it wasn't because leaders believed every demand was reasonable. It was because they didn't think they could afford to say no.

The data from that era helps explain the psychology. In 2021, job openings surged and quits hit record highs. BLS research notes job openings reached 11.4 million (December 2021) and quits reached 4.5 million (November 2021). That was the peak "you can leave anytime" environment, and leaders behaved accordingly.

That was never a permanent cultural shift. It was a market condition.

And now the condition has changed.

The most recent Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey (released February 5, 2026, covering December 2025) shows job openings falling to 6.542 million, the lowest level since September 2020. Meanwhile quits held steady at about 3.2 million, a level that signals much less worker willingness to walk than during the peak resignation period.

When the option set narrows, behavior changes. And once behavior changes, power shifts quietly, without anyone needing to announce it.

The real shift: from employee veto back to employee voice

A lot of leaders talk about "taking back control," but the more accurate description is this: work is moving from an era of employee veto back toward employee voice.

Voice is healthy. It improves decisions. It's how organizations avoid blind spots.

Veto is different. Veto turns leadership into facilitation and standards into a moving target. It also creates a subtle cultural problem: when every boundary is up for debate, outcomes become inconsistent and inconsistency breeds cynicism.

My wife and I have two kids, a 5 year old boy and a 9 year old daughter. In our home, our kids have a voice, we listen to them and always let them share what's on their mind. But, they don't have a 50/50 vote on what takes place in our home because thee responsibility isn't equal (and they are children!). If our kids want ice cream and cookies for dinner I'll let them say that, but my response is going to be absolutely not and there's no further discussion about it. My wife and I are responsible for their long-term outcomes.

Organizations aren't families and employees aren't children (even though we treat them like they are). But responsibility still flows asymmetrically. Leaders carry obligations to customers, regulators, investors, and the long-term health of the enterprise. That reality leads to a principle that got blurred during the leverage era:

Decision authority should sit with the party accountable for outcomes. During and post pandemic the power balance was 80/20 in the hands of employees and now it's 80/20 in the hands of organizations, as it should be! Keep in mind it's the organizations (leaders) who take on all the risk. They pay the salaries, the retirement accounts, the benefits; they cover the cost of the offices, utilities, food, snacks, equipment, etc.

That's not anti-employee. It's stewardship.

Why AI makes this shift durable: it strengthens the organization's outside option

Labor markets are cyclical. Leverage usually swings because both sides stay mutually dependent: employers need people, people need jobs, and scarcity moves around.

Artificial intelligence changes the shape of that dependency not by "replacing all jobs," but by expanding the organization's credible alternatives.

In the past, when employees pushed for more, more flexibility, more pay, narrower scope, leaders often had only two real options: agree, or try to hire someone else. If hiring was hard, negotiation became the default. Boundaries blurred. Exceptions multiplied. Authority weakened.

AI introduces a third option that didn't exist at scale before: redesign the work so the organization needs fewer human hours to produce the same output aka let go of people.

That redesign shows up in very practical, unglamorous places, the places that quietly determine power:

- Support and service: self-serve knowledge, automated triage, AI-assisted resolution, ticket deflection, fewer escalations.

- Back office: faster reconciliation, automated reporting, contract review, scheduling, compliance checks, work that used to require layers of coordinators.

- Middle layers: managers with broader spans because systems handle coordination, updates, and routine follow-ups.

- Knowledge workflows: drafts, summaries, first-pass analysis, structured output, raising the baseline and shrinking the "time tax" of many roles.

None of that requires a dramatic layoff headline to change the negotiation environment. The shift happens the moment leaders and boards believe, credibly, that they can protect output even if a specific role is hard to fill or even if a subset of employees decides to push back.

This is why the power reset is likely to stick: it's no longer only about the labor market. It's about organizational optionality.

And that optionality changes expectations on both sides. Employees can still ask for more, and in some cases they should. But organizations are increasingly able to respond with a different question than "How much will it cost to keep this person?" The question becomes: "How should (or CAN) this work be designed?"

That's a healthier question. It moves the conversation away from constant negotiation and toward operating-model clarity, what work matters, what standards apply, what gets automated, and where humans create differentiated value.

It also raises the bar on leadership: once AI can absorb more routine load, the hardest part of the organization isn't "work getting done." It's people growing fast enough to keep up with what the work is becoming.

Leaders are saying the quiet part out loud

The cultural temperature around authority is changing too.

Jamie Dimon captured the emerging posture when he said remote-work advocates won't "tell JPMorgan what to do," while discussing the bank's stance on office work.

The tone isn't the point. The posture is: the organization will listen, but it will decide.

That posture is also a response to an operational truth: organizations can be human, fair, flexible when it makes sense, and still maintain standards. But they cannot run on permanent negotiation and still execute consistently.

Why this shift is good -- and why it raises the bar on leadership

This shift is good. Not because employees matter less, but because organizations are the ones carrying most of the weight.

Companies make the capital investments. They take the risk. They sign the contracts, fund the systems, comply with regulations, and serve customers. They pay the bills -- payroll included. When conditions change, it's the organization that absorbs the downside first. So it makes sense that decision authority sits with the party accountable for outcomes.

That's not authoritarian. It's how stewardship works.

But here's the part many leaders miss: when organizations have more power, they also carry more responsibility to use it well. That doesn't mean "squeeze people harder." It means raise the quality of leadership.

In practice, the healthiest version of this new equilibrium looks like an adult model:

- Employees have a voice, clear expectations, and a real path to grow.

- Leaders make decisions, set standards, and are accountable for outcomes.

If organizations want performance and commitment, they don't earn it through perks or endless negotiation. They earn it through opportunity: coaching, mentoring, skill-building, internal mobility, and direct feedback that actually helps people get better.

AI makes this more urgent, not less. As systems absorb more repeatable work, what becomes scarce is not "labor" in the abstract, but good judgment, strong management, and genuine development. AI can automate tasks. It can't replace stewardship.

The World Economic Forum's Future of Jobs Report 2025 digest captures the direction: 40% of employers anticipate reducing their workforce where AI can automate tasks. The point isn't that every company is about to do mass layoffs. It's that employers already see AI as a lever in workforce design -- and once that lever is credible, the "everything is negotiable" era doesn't return in the same form.

The bottom line

The balance of power is shifting back toward organizations because the fundamentals have changed: fewer openings, slower churn, more compliance, and a growing ability to redesign work instead of negotiating endlessly around it.

The smart conclusion isn't "employees lose." It's "the workplace returns to an adult model."

Voice matters. Listening matters. Fairness matters. Growth matters.

But leadership still decides because leadership still bears the responsibility.

And in an era where AI increases the organization's ability to redesign work, the organizations that win won't be the ones that use power to intimidate. They'll be the ones that use authority to set clear standards and build serious mentoring, coaching, and development engines -- so people can rise with the work instead of being left behind by it. more

Career development

 23h

Woman on her way to job interview received prayers from taxi passengers in touching viral moment


In the middle of a routine taxi ride, strangers created a moment that many people said they will never forget. It reminded Mzansi of the famous Ubuntu netizens are known for.

A heartwarming moment unfolded inside a South African taxi after a woman revealed she was on her way to a job interview. The video was posted by @bulelanibillions on 17 February 2026, capturing the unexpected show of support... from fellow passengers. According to the man who recorded the clip, the woman mentioned her interview during the ride, and other commuters immediately began praying for her. He filmed the emotional moment and later shared it online, saying he hoped she would succeed.

The video showed passengers coming together in prayer, offering encouragement and positive words before she reached her destination. In a country where daily transport is often rushed and quiet, the gesture stood out as something deeply human. Public taxis remain one of the most common forms of transport in South Africa, carrying millions of commuters every day.

The clip by user @bulelanibillions resonated widely because many South Africans understand the anxiety that comes with job interviews. Unemployment remains a serious challenge, and securing an interview can already feel like a breakthrough. Seeing strangers take a moment to pray for someone they barely knew touched something deeper.

Online reactions poured in with messages of hope and encouragement. Many users said the video restored their faith in humanity and reminded them that kindness still exists. Others praised the passengers for taking time to uplift someone during a stressful moment.

Zee Nathi Sodladla K wrote:

"A similar thing happened to me. When I entered the building where I had the interview, the security guy asked me if I prayed. I said yes, he said let's pray again. We did, and I got that job. 🥺"

Thumamina90 wrote:

"I'll cry because today I went to an interview. I got lost and had to take extra taxis. When I was busy asking the driver for some directions, this other lady overheard me and instantly gave me extra cash and said 'goodluck mntanami'. And I am here typing this cos I got the job, and I don't know how I'm gonna let her know of all this 🥺."

Nommie wrote:

"There's nothing as heartwarming as prayer from a stranger. I'm being bullied at my new workplace. Today, my TL told me how I smell in front of my colleagues. The lady didn't even consider that this is my first month working after not working for a long time. I literally struggle to have something to eat, so what about toiletries? I went to the toilet and cried my eyes out. One of the cleaning ladies hugged me and said a short prayer for me."

Kwena Tee wrote:

"Not a believer of such, but I'm a strong believer in positive energy. Imagine having strangers wishing you well like this. PROFOUND and POWERFUL."

"I remember going to an interview in Rustenburg. The marshal asked where I was going, dressed like that, with no bag of clothes. I told him I had an interview at 12. The marshal told the driver, even if you leave before the taxi gets full, there is someone going for an interview here today, she must make it on time. The driver did that. I got the job. When the job is yours, when the time is right, God will make it happen."

KgomotsoS🇿🇦 wrote:

"Taxi drivers are honestly the best. I was going to an interview and kept getting lost. I gave up and went to the taxi rank to go home. The driver asked where I was from. I explained, and he said he knew the company. He took the taxi with me only and dropped me at the office, and said good luck. I got the job. 🤩"

Matshepotekane wrote:

"It's 04h30 on a Wednesday morning. I am in tears. The post and the comments. There are still good people in the world, and I pray there can be more like this. ❤️❤️" more

Career development

 1d

ATS-Friendly Tech Resume


I need a polished, Applicant Tracking System-compatible résumé that positions me as a strong entry-level scientist within the technology sector. The draft I have now is basic; it lacks the right keywords, modern formatting, and the concise storytelling recruiters expect. Your task is to rework the content, weave in industry-specific terminology that an ATS will recognize, and present my projects,... coursework, and any internships so they read like real-world achievements rather than classroom assignments. I'm aiming for scientist roles, so highlight analytical skills, research experience, and any lab or data tools I've touched, while still keeping the tone accessible to HR screeners who may not be technical experts. Please deliver: * An editable Word document optimized for ATS parsing * A clean PDF version ready for direct submission If you can also suggest a brief LinkedIn headline and summary that echo the résumé's keywords, that would be a welcome bonus. more

Career development

 1d

Navigating Careers and Self-Discovery


Today's guest is David Petrovay, a career development expert and author with over 20 years of experience in career coaching.

Originally Published April 29, 2022 Today's guest is David Petrovay, a career development expert and author with over 20 years of experience in career coaching. David shares his lifelong passion for understanding what drives people in their career choices, sparked by his... own childhood reflections on his father's career. He also addresses the challenges of imposter syndrome and the significance of recognizing one's unique strengths. Tune in to hear David's inspiring story and gain valuable insights into navigating career transitions and living a fulfilling life beyond work. Join us for this enlightening conversation and discover how to achieve your own fantastic life!

About Dave Petrovay: In 2008 he founded his company, David Petrovay Coaching, based on his slogan - I help people figure out what they are here to do in life...and then DO it. During his twenty plus years as a career counselor and coach he has worked with individuals and groups to do just that. His clients are professionals across a broad spectrum of work settings who are motivated to be the best at what they do. He has presented to groups on a national, state, and local level on work-related topics such as communication, creating attention getting resumes and LinkedIn profiles, and the challenges facing those who are seeking employment. He is a published author with his most recent book, Life between Jobs: Out of Work...Not Out of WORTH, receiving a #1 Bestseller badge.

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Amanda Hollingsworth


Career development 3mo
I’m not an ambitious person, I just want a normal, calm job and I’m not chasing promotions. But my boyfriend keeps nagging me every day about why I don’t try to please the boss, don’t take overtime, and don’t agree to work weekends when they ask. He keeps saying I need to build a career and make more money.
Honestly, I’m starting to wonder if I should even stay with him, because I don’t want to... plan anything serious with someone who’ll keep pushing me to work like crazy, while I just want a job I actually enjoy. What would you suggest?

 more
14   

  • ismail Mohammed

    3mo

    it's encouraged to have a balanced approach to life, including work and personal time. (peace be upon him) said, "Work for your worldly life as if... you will live forever, and work for your hereafter as if you will die tomorrow.

    This means finding a balance between your worldly responsibilities and your spiritual growth is key. If your job is halal and you're able to fulfill your duties without compromising your faith, then it's okay to prioritize your well-being and happiness.

    Regarding your relationship, emphasizes the importance of mutual respect, kindness, and understanding between partners. If your boyfriend is pushing you to prioritize work over your well-being, it's worth reflecting on whether this is a healthy dynamic for you.
     more

  • Tiffany Smith

    3mo

    Only relationships built on "unconditional love" will thrive! If you want to THRIVE in business, inbox me for more details!

Load more...

Finch Vane


Career development 1w
I had a strange interview at a big real estate company. The HR lady first asked me what settings I changed on my phone. I just made something up so I could answer. Then she asked when was the last time I lied. It felt like a trick question.
They said they would call me in a few days to tell me if I got the job, but I’m shocked and don’t think I passed. What would you say if they asked you about... lying?
Thanks

 more
2   

  • Sheila Milburn

    5d

    As a 30 year licensed MD Realtor, I can attest that nationally we have surprisingly high standards for integrity and ethics. The lawsuits are caused... by those that ignore them. So I can see this being a question to test integrity.  more

  • Ashaba Princess

    6d

    And some HRs sometimes they ask funny questions for u to fail,

Load more...

Career development

 1d

Mintz On Air: Practical Policies -- Real vs. Robot: AI's Impact on the Workplace Life Cycle


AI is reshaping the employment life cycle so quickly employers are racing to keep up. In this episode of the Mintz On Air: Practical Policies podcast titled "Real vs. Robot: AI's Impact on the Workplace Life Cycle," Mintz Member Jen Rubin sits down with Associate Emma Follansbee to discuss how AI is reshaping some employment systems and offers advice for employers on how best to adapt their... workplaces to AI developments.

Insights include:

Listen for insights on how employers can adjust established practices to address AI's growing influence across the employment life cycle.

Practical Policies -- Real vs. Robot: AI's Impact on the Workplace Life Cycle Transcript

Jen Rubin (JR): Welcome to the Mintz On Air: Practical Policies podcast. Today's topic: Real vs. Robot: AI's Impact on the Workplace Life Cycle. I'm Jen Rubin, a Member of the Mintz Employment Group with the San Diego-based Bicoastal Employment Practice representing management, executives, and corporate boards. Thank you for joining our Mintz On Air podcast. If you have not tuned in to our previous podcasts and would like to access our content, please visit us at the Insights page at Mintz.com, or find us on Spotify.

Today I'm joined by my colleague, Mintz Associate Emma Follansbee, from our Boston office. Emma is an employment attorney who counsels clients on a wide variety of employment issues and litigates employment disputes before state and federal courts and administrative agencies. Her litigation practice includes restrictive covenant agreements, discrimination, sexual harassment, and retaliation claims. Emma also litigates wage and hour cases and counsels on wage and hour compliance.

Like many Mintz employment attorneys these days, Emma has spent considerable time advising clients on the impact of AI in the workplace, and that is the subject of our conversation today. Welcome, Emma, and thanks for being here.

Emma Follansbee (EF): Thank you so much for having me. I'm thrilled to be here.

JR: AI is turning out to be what I'm going to call "a boon and a bane" for human resources professionals and in-house counsel. These folks are wrestling with so many issues that AI has raised in the workplace, and frankly, Emma and I only have a limited amount of time, so we can't discuss all these issues on today's podcast. But if any of you listened to my prior podcast with my partner, Mintz Member Paul Huston, about AI's impact on protecting trade secrets in the workplace, you know that Paul and I identified some thorny issues that employers may not have previously considered -- but really should -- when it comes to AI in the workplace.

Building on that prior podcast, I thought I would focus our discussion today on AI impacts on the employment life cycle -- hiring, working, terminating -- always with an eye toward the practical. Not just because that's the title of this pod, but because it's our job as counselors to help clients identify issues before they happen and problem-solve in advance, if that is at all possible.

AI at the Hiring Stage

JR: Emma, the first topic I want to surface with you is one that comes up at the time of hiring, and it really has two parts.

Part one: we know how easily AI can impersonate and trick -- and we'll get back to some of that later. But can you give our listeners some practical guidance on things they should consider adding to the pre-hire list to account for some of these AI issues?

EF: Yeah, that's such a good question, Jen. I think we're all experiencing -- in our personal lives, at work, and in the media -- this question of what can be real and what can be fake when it comes to AI.

The good news is that employers already have a lot of tools at their fingertips, but it's about being thoughtful about the tools you already have in place and how you can use them to focus more on sussing out whether there's AI trickery at issue.

Let me give you an example. Take something as simple as your offer letter. We often include language stating that everything a candidate represents during the hiring process -- in their résumé, credentials, and experience -- is accurate, and that by accepting the offer, they are not misrepresenting any facts.

We're increasingly seeing that this isn't always the case with AI. It's now very easy for candidates to download a polished résumé, invent a work history, or provide information that may not be accurate. One practical step employers can take is to ensure that onboarding documents -- such as offer letters -- include provisions that protect the organization if they later discover false information generated or assisted by AI.

JR: What about any state or federal legislation that impacts how employers deploy AI in the onboarding process? Can you speak briefly about the impact that might have?

EF: Absolutely. This is a constantly changing landscape at both the federal level and state levels. We are already seeing states -- and even cities -- develop their own AI rules and regulations governing how AI is used in the hiring process.

For example, there is a New York City local law that governs how AI may be used and aims to prevent discrimination when employers rely on automated decision-making tools during hiring.

At the same time, we're seeing activity on the federal level. Recently, President Trump issued an executive order seeking to slow the flow of new state-level AI regulations to establish a more uniform federal regulatory scheme. We're likely to see challenges to that approach, and it has not stopped new rules from cropping up.

All of this makes compliance challenging, especially for multistate employers. A requirement may take effect in New York City, another in California, and yet another in Texas -- each addressing completely different aspects of AI. They all touch on AI-related issues, and the rapid pace of change makes it difficult for employers to stay compliant.

JR: It's interesting because everything is changing so quickly, and at the same time, employers may be using AI tools that don't account for those rapid changes. In many cases, they're not consulting humans about how these tools should be deployed or how decisions made by AI need to be backed up, verified, and vetted by a human.

Toward that end -- and relatedly -- Emma, what do you think about job descriptions and proficiencies? We're still in the onboarding process, where employers are putting together job descriptions and advertising for open positions. How do you account for AI in those job descriptions and in the proficiencies employers are looking for?

EF: I think there are two aspects to that, Jen. The first is whether we understand what it means when a candidate says they are "proficient in AI" at the hiring stage. It's not enough to insert something into ChatGPT or another LLM system, get an answer back, and call yourself an efficient user of that product. We need to know whether employees have experience prompting, verifying, and sussing out false or incorrect information that an AI system might generate.

Because if AI is going to be used in your workplace, you want to know that employees are using it responsibly.

JR: It's very interesting to me, because you may have a situation where someone has learned to use AI to write résumés and job descriptions. It almost becomes a loop -- where does the human insert themselves? I won't go off on a tangent, but these issues raise more issues. It becomes one giant onion, at least to me, and I think probably to many people.

So, let me move on to another question I have related to onboarding.

Let's say you've set up your job application, you're advertising for the right type of position, and that might include AI proficiencies that you hope are being accurately represented. Let's assume a human has accounted for developments and changes in the laws and has reflected that in the systems being deployed. And let's go a step further and say that applicants are being notified that AI is being used -- whether as part of an applicant tracking system or elsewhere in the onboarding.

Are there things employers should be doing with respect to the onboarding documents themselves? For example, should they be thinking about offer letters, arbitration agreements, or restrictive covenants to the extent they're applicable? What should employers be doing at this point?

EF: Absolutely. You raise a good point about restrictive covenants. I'm also really interested in how AI is going to change the way employers think about contracts involving trade secrets, confidential information, and intellectual property. A few questions come up right away.

The first is: what happens -- and how are you documenting it -- when employees use AI to create information or materials? Who owns that? And how do you ensure your agreements make clear that whatever an employee creates, even if they use a separate system to create it, still belongs to the employer?

We haven't really dealt with this before. It used to be the case that an employee walked in with their skill set and used it to create work on behalf of the employer. That's no longer the full picture. So how do we make sure employers are protected? And I know you touched on this with Paul in your last podcast, but it's critically important that employees understand which products -- whether AI or something else -- are permissible use cases.

If an employee uses an AI product that isn't a closed-loop system, your confidential information can easily end up outside the organization and used by others.

I want to go back to something you asked earlier and tie it together, which is the importance of employee training.

JR: Yes.

EF: If a new hire comes in and says they're proficient in AI and they used it at their last job, we, the employer, still need to train them on our systems, processes, and confidentiality expectations. That piece is important. AI isn't going away, so we need to make sure employees know how we expect them to use it -- and how they can't.

JR: Many employers think of confidentiality agreements and training as a given, right, Emma? It's not controversial, if you think about it, to ask someone to join your company and keep your information safe. Almost everyone does it. It's hard to find companies that don't have some sort of confidentiality agreement.

What's interesting now, to me, is that employers really do need to go back and look at those agreements -- restrictive covenants, confidentiality agreements, training materials -- and make sure they clearly communicate the importance of using AI properly. These things used to feel like a given. I don't think they're a given anymore. Employers really need to rethink them and double down.

AI's Impact During Employment

JR: So, let's transition. Let's assume the employee is now hired. You've updated your documents -- created with human judgment, not an AI tool -- and the person has walked through the door. Let's talk about some of the issues that arise during employment where AI is having a significant impact.

EF: Some of the laws and frameworks we're seeing at the state level apply not only when an employee is hired but also when AI or other automated systems are used to help employers make any employment-related decision. That includes setting the terms of compensation, issuing discipline, making promotion decisions -- whatever the scenario may be.

We're watching a growing framework around how we use AI in these decisions. Employers need to be thoughtful and make sure they understand how the AI is being used. As you know, Jen, we're already seeing litigation under current federal and state anti-discrimination laws. If an employer doesn't understand how AI factored into an employment decision, it becomes very difficult to defend that decision when an employee raises a complaint or inquiry -- for example, about a performance improvement plan, discipline, termination or, you know, insert relevant employment-based action.

AI is touching everything. It's not going away, and the issue is only going to become more prominent. Employers should be in regular conversation with their counsel because the landscape is changing so quickly.

JR: Let's talk about employee complaints. As we know, complaints are a regular feature of the workplace. When humans work together, conflicts arise. How, if at all, does AI affect an internal workplace investigation?

EF: We're seeing that if we have access to these tools, employees do too. Employees can pop into ChatGPT or another AI system, explain a situation that has happened, and ask what the situation sounds like or what potential issues it raises. Employers are starting to receive complaints, letters, and demands that clearly read as if AI helped draft them.

Does that change employers' obligations? Not necessarily. But employers still need to make sure they fully understand the facts and circumstances. In the example you gave -- an investigation -- employers still need to understand what the employee is saying on the ground and what other employees report. There's heightened vigilance when there's essentially a third party in the room -- the AI -- and we have to be aware of how it's influencing these situations.

JR: From the investigation standpoint, you can't overstate the value of sitting across from a person -- watching body language, hearing tone of voice, and experiencing all of those nuances of human communication. Whether you're in HR or counsel conducting the investigation, that interpersonal interaction gives you information you can't get from a written complaint.

So even if the complaint looks beautifully written, uses a lot of great buzzwords, and invokes all the different provisions of the employee handbook, you still, as an employer, have that obligation to investigate. And if it turns out that something was fabricated or embellished using AI, you're likely going to suss that out quickly once you talk with the person. It's much harder to "mock that up," so to speak, in real time.

Here's another question -- still in the employment life cycle. What about using AI in a surveillance context? At the firm, for example, when we use Zoom we have to turn off any recording features. I personally don't like having that option available, but it seems so easy for people to record surreptitiously or have AI running in the background. What should employers consider?

EF: I've had the same experience. There are so many AI tools that will record conversations or take notes automatically. They seem almost implicit and helpful in a lot of ways. But employers have to pause and consider when and how these tools make sense, whether they affect the quality of work, and whether more surveillance in the workplace affects employee morale.

There's also a significant legal landscape around the issue of recordings -- including single-party versus dual-consent states. And there are broader privacy concerns emerging across jurisdictions. It's another one of those things employers should keep in mind when auditing where AI is being used because this area can be a little quieter but have a huge impact. It's easy to think "Sure, I'll hit the AI button on Zoom," without considering whether it changes how people participate or whether they feel comfortable speaking freely.

AI at the Termination Stage

JR: That's a great segue to the last part of the employment life cycle -- termination. Terminations are inevitable; the question is why they occur and what the consequences are, which is where you and I spend a good part of our professional life asking.

I want to go back to what you mentioned earlier about employees using AI in the investigatory context. How do you see it being used on the other end -- after termination?

EF: Yeah, I think it's connected. We're seeing this technology create more polished materials, which also means employers are receiving more polished post-employment demand letters and complaints -- often full of legal buzzwords and structured as if written by outside counsel.

We're seeing this in courts too. Litigants can use AI to draft complaints that read as if an attorney has drafted them. There can be benefits to that -- increased access and more capabilities for individuals to advocate for their own rights -- but the downside is that these documents are not always accurate and can conflate issues. We're seeing these impacts more frequently, and it's clear how AI is shaping the tone and tenor of communications employees send after leaving an organization.

JR: Are there systems or processes employers should change to account for receiving AI-generated demands? Or should employers handle them the same way they always have?

EF: Yes and no. Employers should absolutely continue taking these things seriously, responding within appropriate timeframes, and treating them with the level of seriousness they deserve.

But there should also be heightened scrutiny. We need to understand what's truly being asked or demanded. We're all learning to identify when something "sounds like AI" -- certain phrasings, grammar, patterns, punctuation. From there, employers can assess whether the AI-generated nature of the document affects their response or next steps.

JR: The takeaway from this episode is that it's never a bad idea to take a new and hard look at each of your processes -- hiring, training, internal investigations, and termination -- understanding that there is a growing use of AI affecting every stage of the employment life cycle. And appreciating that.

Where it really matters is remembering that human judgment and nuance can't be replicated by AI. So while it's important to understand these programs, appreciate how they influence decisions, and have confidence in yourself as the person responsible -- whether you're an HR professional, in-house counsel, or someone else handling these issues -- it's equally important to go back to your own judgment. That means speaking with people directly and confirming that you have that human aspect in the process.

All of this connects to the concept of trust, which, as you know if you follow my podcast, is fundamental to employment relationships. And trust ultimately comes from human-to-human interaction.

Wrap-up

JR: Thank you, Emma Follansbee -- this has been an interesting discussion. Talking about AI raises more questions than we can answer, but we're all learning as we go. I really appreciate you joining us today.

EF: Thank you very much for having me. It's my pleasure.

JR: Thank you to those who have tuned in to the Mintz On Air: Practical Policies podcast. Please feel free to visit us at Mintz.com for more content and commentary, or you can find us on Spotify. Thanks again. more

Career development

 1d

I used ChatGPT to stop awkward small talk -- and it actually worked


AI came to my rescue to help cut through all the awkward silence

One of the worst feelings is sitting in complete silence with someone -- or worse, in a group where the conversation suddenly dies and everyone feels it.

It's hard being the person who makes things awkward, whether it's because I said something off-putting that killed the vibe or because I didn't say anything at all. I think of... myself as an extroverted introvert: I love being out around people, but I'm just as happy at home binge-watching my favorite show alone.

Lately, I've been looking for ways to strengthen the "extrovert" side of my personality, especially in situations where conversation doesn't come naturally. That led me to focus on improving my conversational skills for those tricky moments.

With ChatGPT's help, I discovered better conversations that ease social awkwardness. The AI gave me a simple way to come up with questions that keep dialogue flowing -- whether you're meeting new people, navigating work events or trying to avoid those dreaded awkward silences.

I put my prompt to use to come up with questions for a first date

My days of swiping, matching, chatting and eventually getting ghosted on dating apps finally ended last year. Since then, my mental state is stronger -- and my thumbs are busy typing for work instead of chasing the slim chance of a date.

Still, I'm a firm believer in "stay ready so you don't have to get ready." I never want to sit across from someone on a first date while an awkward silence buries any chance of a second one.

To make sure that never happens, I turned to ChatGPT to generate conversation starters based on someone's interests. You can swap in whatever hobbies apply to the person you're meeting:

"I'm going on a first date with a woman who enjoys baking, ballroom dancing and cozy video games. Give me 10 good ice-breaker questions I can ask based on those interests."

ChatGPT started with a smart reminder: the key to a great first date is asking questions that invite stories -- not yes-or-no answers. It then generated open-ended questions tailored to each interest, plus a creative bonus: "If your life were a cozy game, would the main quest be baking, dancing or something totally different?"

It even offered flirty follow-up lines, but that's where I draw the line. I don't want AI guiding every moment of the conversation. I'm happy to let it handle the ice breakers -- the rest is better left to real, unscripted human interaction.

Then I applied it to produce a bunch of questions to ask during a job interview

Another way the prompt can help in social situations is by suggesting smart questions to ask during a job interview. It's one thing to navigate awkward silence on a first date -- it's another to face dead air when it's your turn to speak with a potential boss.

To see how this could work, I tried a prompt aimed at preparing for a social media role at a news site:

"I'm attending a job interview for a social media consultant position at Tom's Guide. Give me 10 thoughtful questions I can ask based on that role."

Before generating questions, ChatGPT offered useful guidance: strong interview questions should show you understand the brand, think strategically about platforms, care about performance and audience growth, and come across as collaborative rather than interrogative.

The questions it produced covered brand strategy, performance metrics, content workflows and team culture -- exactly the areas hiring managers care about.

The takeaway

Using ChatGPT as a preparation tool is one of the main ways i apply it to real-life situations. Using AI in this way helped me stay ready for a potential first date and help me better equipped to speak confidently during a job interview.

It can also aid anyone in plenty of other social interactions, such as chatting with strangers on public transportation, cooking up amusing dialogue with a friend of a friend, your mate's parents, or even a child or senior citizen who has been put in your care. It's always best to respond in a natural manner and not let AI completely dictate how you should operate during a conversation.

But it doesn't hurt to keep some AI-produced ice breakers in your back pocket if you're trying to make your next meetup as comfortable as possible.

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