Possibly screwed over by AI

[Zkr623]

In the interests of time and to avoid errors, I wanted to reply as quickly and smoothly to an interview request by email from a recruiter who wanted to move to the next step. So I let my AI app formulate a quick reply. Only after sending, I noticed AI had added a telltale 'signature' to the bottom.

" Thank you for reaching out. Thursday, November 20th at 1pm works perfectly—I’ll be available and looking forward to our conversation.

You can reach me at (XXX) XXX XXXX.

Best regards,

Would you like a slightly more casual or more formal version as well? You can reach me at 2XX XXX XXXX

"

Am I screwed? AI suggested a followup to tell her to disregard the last email BUT that would just draw more attention to it. I am so embarassed. Aren't recruiters trained to look for details? Is this over?

This is bad all round - your poor spelling and lazy use of AI.

Hopefully they’ll look past it; if not find another recruiter. And stay off AI.

I got 70 applications for a job in the NHS recently, I could tell a million miles off who had used AI. In the interest of efficiency I disregarded any applications only partially completed and any that clearly used AI (Americanisms or snippets like you had at the end that gave it away). Quick way to cull the field down to those who had put the effort in. First impressions count and all that

I absolutely would not want someone with your attitude working for me. If you cannot write your own two line email, know that the word is "perfectly" and not "perfect" then you are of no use to me. This is meant to be you on your most impressive behaviour. And calling your potential employer "shallow" if they are not happy with your lack of attention to detail, is the icing on the cake.

If someone is so nitpicky and shallow that they are looking so deeply into what is essentially nothing more than a really informal and quick confirmation email, then im not sure I'd want the job anyway. Isn't it?

Thats not really how it works though. All employers are discerning - some more than others and it’s not a reflection of how ‘good’ or not the job on offer is. It’s like turning up to an interview with a carrier bag to hold your bits in than a smart bag or very heavily made up - whilst everything else may be fine, these things do matter since they don’t know you and have nothing else other than these possible superficialities to go on.

That said, they’re hardly going to retract the offer of an interview now they’ve made it based on that misjudgment of yours. You may however, need to be extra fab at your interview so good luck!

I really want to know what AI did to help you along, here. There are some jobs it’s quicker to do yourself than to ask someone else. This appears to be one, am I miss8ng something?

Oh dear… I mean I would judge you so hard for this. It was two lines, why on earth did you use AI? If writing two sentences just confirming a date requires the use of AI it would make me seriously doubt your ability to do anything of any import or responsibility.
I’d also doubt your integrity because it’s basically cheating. Did you have any assessments you may have used AI for? I’d be questioning that if you had.

It may not have ruined your chances though. Maybe the recipient will think you’ve just used text to speech, or if it’s a recruiter then they may just have a job to fill/target to reach.

Really you need to do better in future. There’s no point getting a job you aren’t actually equipped to do, it wastes everyone’s time when they need to terminate you for poor performance.

I would be relived that I had met a kindred spirit who uses AI the same way I do 😆

Is it a third party recruiter or a recruiter working inhouse at the company?

If it’s the former, I wouldn’t worry. We (recruiters) are all using it - I would just think your attention to detail might not be the greatest but I wouldn’t worry.

If it’s the latter, it’s slightly more awkward but definitely don’t follow it up. Leave it and wait for the response.

You weren’t screwed by AI. You were screwed by your own laziness. Learn from this.

People say AI will destroy humanity. I don't agree. I think humanity will use AI to destroy itself . People using it this was will have mush-brains.

The wrong use of perfect and the exclamation mark would put me off more than the AI.

It’s not nitpicky and shallow. Attention to detail is so important. The fact it’s a quick and informal confirmation email and you couldn’t even do that is even more embarrassing for you.

I have ADHD and I have days where I really struggle with simple tasks like this. I might end up rewriting a simple email response 20 times and wasting half an hour in the process when I could be focusing on much more important tasks.

I'd think you'd screwed it. If you need AI to write a 2 sentence reply!

recruiters who bitch and whine about AI are annoying too though.
People have to write (in my case literally hundreds) of applications. The job ads are often written by AI. The applicatioins are definitely filtered by AI, and all my rejection letters are by AI.

So sod that - i will use AI to write application letters. (otoh i do take time to personalise them and make them much less AI than the original version)

ETA: but that was incredibly lazy, OP, and it is yourself not AI that screwed you over

Possibly screwed over by your own laziness. Call it what it is.

Be prepared to answerable the interview why they should pay you money to do the job when you'll be outsourcing stuff like this to AI. Let's hope you have something really impressive to show for what you actually used the time and effort on.

But that is different. The OP said that if the prospective employer did not like it, then they were shallow and nit picky. Totally different.

So in a 2 sentence reply you managed to misspell a word yourself and cut and paste without checking what you were sending?

it’s not AI who screwed you over. It’s you. You did it to yourself

OP, AI didnt screw youniver to start. You used it and used it incorrectly.

Yeah I would say you screwed yourself. Not sure I would interview someone that couldn’t be asked to write a two line email by themselves - and with a spelling mistake.

Chalk it up to one of those things and move on.

I recruit, and I’d probably put you on the “no” pile based on that. It shows both a lack of effort and a lack of attention to detail. It’s very poor.

This is a lesson to learn from, AI language models should be used as an aide, the human should check the results.

A side tip, depending on what AI package you are using is to give it the prompt “Remember that I am based in the UK and prefer to write in British English”
Then start a new session and ask “What do you remember about me?” - scan the results to see if it is “remembering”, and if necessary tell it to “forget x” if it has picked things up from your history

The real error in this case is to not sanitise the results, you can either embed a memory or begin your prompts with something to cover context such as “Please write a brief professional email in reply with regard to my application to a recruiting campaign on ……”

And if that makes me shallow and nitpicky, so be it. My industry provides an important service where accuracy is essential. If our clients wouldn’t accept it, then I can’t.

Its not really looking deeply, its more that they may see it as a reflection of you and how serious you take your work. You’ve shown you’re willing to cut corners to save yourself a bit of thinking and then don’t pay attention before submitting.

It’s not even just the use of ai that’s made you look lazy, it’s that you also didn’t bother to read a few lines and make sure your “work” was correct.

If the job you’re applying for comes with responsibility and a need to be accurate, it’s not gonna look good that you are not paying attention before the interview.

That is so moronic of you when trying to get a new job. 😂

Would you like a slightly more casual or more formal version as well?

Please consider the environment before printing this reply

💼

I don’t judge, but it really does depend on the role. If spelling, grammar and attention to detail were essential then there could be a problem. Generally speaking, I judge on the Teams call performance, not if they’ve used AI.