Greg Castro | Indeed | May 18, 2023
Technology changes how job seekers search, prepare and find jobs—and advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) will accelerate those changes. One of the latest advances in AI is ChatGPT, a large-language model from OpenAI, an AI research laboratory. In simple terms, it’s a very advanced chatbot, a computer program designed to simulate human conversation. ChatGPT is some of the most advanced software of its kind, drawing from millions of texts to predict the next words in a sequence.
Since ChatGPT launched in late 2022 the site has gone viral. In fact, if you’ve tried to access the software in the past several weeks you’ve probably been met with a screen stating that “the site is at capacity,” and some people online claim they’ve been stuck in ChatGPT’s waiting room for several days. There are, of course, ways around this roadblock. Like refreshing your browser until you’re granted admittance, which can take upwards of an hour in some cases.
But depending on what your intention is with the software the wait may very well be worth it—reducing hours of work into one (or several) well-worded queries. There are the obvious and, some might argue, problematic uses for ChatGPT, like writing articles or academic essays, but the software has the potential to offer help in more ways, all it takes is learning how ChatGPT works.
To that end, we wanted to test ChatGPT to see how it might be a valuable tool in the job search. We specifically looked into how it could be used to do research on a company, write a resume and cover letter or prepare for an interview. Keep reading to learn what we discovered.
Using ChatGPT as a job search tool
The program has access to texts from 2021 and earlier, so anything more recent is beyond its reach. It’s not actively searching the internet like other popular AI. It’s also prone to generalization, so the more information you can give it, the better. To paint a clearer picture, we’ll walk you through multiple interactions with ChatGPT below.
After OpenAI’s easy signup process—you just provide an email, password and phone number—you’ll be greeted with a chat window through which you can ask ChatGPT just about anything. According to a report from NPR, educators have been grappling with the fact that it can write many students’ assignments for them. And writers at Vanity Fair have found that ChatGPT can very accurately write in their voice.
1. ChatGPT for researching a company
Whether you’re just beginning your job search, or looking into a company you have an interview with, researching is a critical part of the job search. Here we explore how to use ChatGPT to look up information about a specific career field and a specific company.
ChatGPT can be much more useful for research than Google due to its iterative ability. Currently, if you want to find something specific on Google, you have to enter a random collection of search engine-optimized words. If you Google, “Web designer job Portland,” you’ll get a link to open jobs. ChatGPT can’t access specific job openings—but what it can do is tell you how to find them. In this case, it refers you to a local institute where other members of the profession take classes and attend networking events. Search engines tell you what—but ChatGPT tells you how—and that can be very powerful.
But even its version of what can be superior to search engines. If you ask it, “Who was the CEO of Indeed in 2021?” It will tell you that the CEO was Chris Hyams, and give you accurate information on his background. While you can find this info through Google, ChatGPT processes the info for you and presents it in a digestible package so that you don’t have to click through multiple web pages. This is a great way to do research and learn more about any companies you might be applying to. One major caveat: as mentioned, ChatGPT does not have access to any information post-2021, so it’s worth checking anything you learn against other sources. If and when the program gains internet-search functionality, it could become a threat to traditional search engines.
