More often than I'd like this summer, I'd see an open job posting I knew I was qualified for, take the time to craft a personalized cover letter explaining why I was a good fit, and customize my résumé for the role. I'd apply . . . and get an automated rejection, often within minutes of submission.

My summer started with an unexpected layoff. I spent most of it applying and interviewing for new roles. I've also spent a ton of time on LinkedIn, where the consensus is that the recruiting process is broken. In many ways, I agree with this. But I disagree with one of the top diagnoses, which is technology -- AI recruiting tools and the automation provided by applicant tracking systems, for example -- is what's ruining the hiring process.

While on a very basic level, technology -- most likely an applicant tracking system: hiring software that automates and optimizes recruiting -- is technically the tool physically rejecting applications before a hiring manager can look at them, technology hasn't yet evolved to the point where it can make decisions without human input.

I know this better than most because I worked for a recruiting platform for the past three years. My last company sold onboarding software and an applicant tracking system that utilized AI-assisted capabilities to help organizations streamline their hiring. I helped conceptualize the term "AI-assisted" as part of the marketing team responsible for the company's messaging, attempting to reflect that AI doesn't work without input from people and hoping to telegraph to savvy hiring teams to use technology strategically, not simply adopt it and hope for a miracle.