AI buzzwords are wrecking your job search - here's what really matters

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ZDNET's cardinal takeaways

• Employers whitethorn employment buzzwords to awesome innovation.
• Both employers and occupation hunters whitethorn confuse AI terminology.
• Creativity and curiosity are sought-after skills.

In today's employment environment, occupation hunters whitethorn beryllium padding their resumes to immoderate grade with AI skills, but employers are besides padding their occupation descriptions. In a inclination known arsenic "AI connection inflation," employers are utilizing buzzwords to look much cutting-edge, but are highlighting capabilities that whitethorn not beryllium indispensable skills for the roles. The effect of this ostentation is simply a vicious cycle, with occupation hunters dropping AI buzzwords into their resumes. 

That was the decision of a caller panel that featured executives from Indeed, Salesforce, and IBM. For occupation hunters, AI connection ostentation means learning the antithetic flavors of AI -- instrumentality learning, versus generative AI and agents, for example, "and don't conscionable driblet terms," said Jessica Hardeman, caput of endowment attraction astatine Indeed. 

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The sheet said employers request to beryllium wide astir requirements that whitethorn not needfully absorption connected AI. In galore cases, employers worth curiosity and a willingness to larn implicit AI skills. Certain skills, specified arsenic cybersecurity, besides fertile precocious arsenic sought-after skills, according to a caller SpiceWorks survey. (SpiceWorks is owned by ZDNET's genitor company, Ziff Davis.)

Some of the roles seen successful occupation descriptions "are conscionable branded with AI buzzwords to pull endowment oregon to awesome innovation without really requiring existent AI expertise," said Shibani Ahuja, elder vice president of endeavor IT strategy astatine Salesforce: "Conversely, determination are immoderate roles wherever you really request AI literacy, but employers are failing to clarify what that really means. Is it method depth? Is it concern fluency? And truthful I deliberation it's creating a spot of disorder for candidates and misalignment successful hiring." 

Ahuja added that erstwhile conducting interviews, she looks for however radical usage the word AI. "AI is utilized precise loosely and astir similar a buzzword. What I'm looking for is the due usage of the connection AI. How good are radical truly starting to understand, much deeply, what is artificial quality oregon integer labor? Or however they're utilizing it, truthful it's not conscionable arsenic a buzzword but day-to-day applicable examples?"

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At IBM's ample consulting organization, "we're progressively looking astatine and focusing connected things that are uniquely human," said Matt Candy, planetary managing spouse for generative AI astatine IBM. Traits specified arsenic "creativity, curiosity, innovation, connection skills, and wide arts skills go adjacent much important successful the future. Think astir English becoming, effectively, the latest coding language."

The quality of humans "to explicit ourselves, to inquire amended questions, to interact with this exertion successful a funny iterative mode becomes truly important," Candy added.  

That inclination implies it's little important to cognize a azygous programming connection truly deeply, Hardeman said: "It's much astir being capable to enactment alongside AI systems to amended productivity and determination making."

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Professionals successful accepted exertion roles, specified arsenic developers, volition find their jobs enhanced by AI agents from extremity to end. "It becomes acold much than conscionable coding," Candy said. 

"I deliberation astir platforms, tools that alteration radical to accelerate coding -- that's 1 portion of a accepted improvement lifecycle. But determination are galore different parts to delivering bundle end-to-end. We privation to physique agents to enactment radical astatine each signifier of that journey. The agents are caller teammates."