How to Get Hired in the Age of AI

“What are you doing tonight?”

In 2026, that question is more than just a conversation starter between strangers at a bar — it’s the sort of prompt fashion recruiters are using to evaluate candidates in a job market being rapidly reshaped by AI.

The objective isn’t actually to get the play by play of an applicant’s evening plans, but to observe how they think, communicate and react in real time. The approach is known as present-tense behavioural interviewing and fashion recruiters say it is increasingly replacing traditional techniques focused on past accomplishments (“Tell me about a time when...”) or hypothetical scenarios (“What would you do if...?”) because those questions are frequently answered with rehearsed talking points generated by artificial intelligence.

“It starts the minute you shake their hand in the lobby to the minute you walk them to the elevator and say ‘goodbye,’” said Kyle Rudy, a senior partner at executive search firm Kirk Palmer Associates. “You could literally be talking about anything, but you’re making [inferences] based on how they choose to answer open-ended questions.

It’s just one example of how fashion hiring is being reshaped by AI.

When it comes to résumés and CVs, tools like Claude, Gemini and ChatGPT have made it possible for nearly anyone to produce a polished application. And while résumés still matter, what stands out on them is changing. Recruiters are placing greater emphasis on qualities that are harder to fake, from judgment and adaptability to curiosity, communication skills and evidence of initiative. Interviews are becoming more probing. Assessments, from marketing presentations to business cases and copy tests, are more sophisticated and harder to navigate with canned AI-generated responses alone.

“We as interviewers have to really go much deeper,” said Yvonne Pengue, founder and director of London-based executive search firm Spot On Minds. “We are more using practical assessments, business cases, simulations, scenario-based interviews, rather than relying on what the candidate says that they have done.”

Weak Résumés

Even as résumés move down in priority in some hiring processes, they continue to be the way most candidates — particularly those at junior- and mid-level positions — get in the door. As recruiter and executive coach Paula Reid put it, they’re a “springboard to a conversation.” And a bad one can undo a lot of goodwill.

“I constantly get bad resumes from senior people, I get more bad ones than I get good ones,” Reid said.

A common pitfall is the AI-embellished or over-polished trap. Even the best candidates are feeding their experiences into AI tools, getting back résumés that sound sophisticated on paper but bear little resemblance to how they actually communicate. Often it’s a combination of AI smoothing out their voice and candidates struggling to articulate information they didn’t fully write themselves.

The result can be a résumé that sets expectations the candidate can’t meet in conversation. But recruiters say the opposite problem is just as common: generic, overly cautious résumés that undersell a person’s skills and experience.

“I personally believe the most important step in preparing for a job interview is writing that résumé,” said Reid. “If you’ve totally got somebody else doing it for you, you’re not going through the thought process … to prepare for an interview.”

Strong Résumés

Recruiters say the strongest résumés don’t try to manufacture sophistication. Instead, they provide evidence of the qualities employers are finding harder to teach: initiative, curiosity, judgment and communication skills.

“I’m looking for logic and consistency,” said Pengue. “You don’t need a CEO who is good at producing information, you want to hire a CEO because they can motivate and persuade people and can build teams, make decisions, manage uncertainty.”

Of course, recruiters still need to assess specific experience. Depending on the role, they’re often looking for candidates who have held similar positions or worked in similar categories, whether beauty, jewellery or luxury. But when executive candidates list their accomplishments, Rudy says he is looking not only for the hard “data and facts” but also proof of real outcomes.

“What stands out on the résumé is not that you drove revenue growth, but the actual number …and is it statistically significant?” he said. “Not that you led cross-functional relationships, but what those relationships built and what changed because of it.”

For junior candidates, recruiters say evidence of initiative matters more than polished credentials. Volunteer work, university clubs, independent projects, internships and even hobbies can help signal curiosity and ambition without overselling skills they don’t yet have.

“Most don’t even have experience or they have done only some part-time [work],” Pengue said. “Of course they have to know Microsoft Office and [how to] navigate social media, but communication, emotional intelligence, judgment — those things are [crucial] as AI makes human skills more valuable.”

Rather than exaggerating interests, skills or past responsibilities, recruiters say they’re better off leaning into the work they genuinely enjoy and want to keep doing.

“Think about the things that you were really good at and you loved and the things that you hope you never have to do again,” Reid said. “Don’t highlight the ones that you don’t want to ever do again.”

Acing the Interview

Recruiters largely agree the biggest change they’re making in response to AI is in how heavily they scrutinise candidates in interviews and assessment tasks (think copywriting exercises or pseudo marketing presentation.) Across the board, they’re raising the bar.

Expect questions designed to get beyond the credentials listed on paper and test whether candidates can back them up with genuine interests and lived experiences.

“I prefer someone to say, ”I love traveling, and then they passionately talk about their trip to Southeast Asia [rather than] someone saying they’re incredibly passionate about art, and then not able to say one exhibition they went to,” Pengue said.

For senior leaders, the questions will more than ever aim to assess their ability to operate in an environment of “constant and accelerating change,” Reid said.

“[We’re looking for] skills that [show] you understand how you lead through that,” she added. “Not necessarily based on a specific initiative, but based on [how you handle] the day to day demands that are required of the workforce today.”

At every level, candidates should prepare for more in-depth assessments. If a marketing candidate is asked to create a PowerPoint presentation as part of an online application, recruiters increasingly expect them to discuss and defend their work in detail during later interview rounds.

Meanwhile, AI-generated responses to application exercises don’t easily go under the radar. Recruiters say canned responses are becoming easier to spot — whether through detection tools or simply because dozens of candidates are turning in versions of the same answer.

“We’re going very much in depth … validating the experience, going into real life situations how they developed a certain market,” Pengue said.

The goal isn’t to rehearse perfect answers. Recruiters say candidates are better served by building a résumé that reflects their actual strengths and using interviews to demonstrate them authentically. AI can still be useful — not for generating polished talking points, but for simulating interviews and helping candidates articulate their genuine interests, experiences and skills.