OK, hear me out. You know that feeling when you
finally get home after a long day or if you work from home
like me, you close your office door for the night and you just
breathe and you exhale. Everyone breathe.
That's what your space should feel like, like a sanctuary, a
place where you can truly unwind, let go of the stress and
just be. This is advice I'm giving to
myself because I've been taking on a lot at work.
And at the end of the day, if your bed is not the most
inviting, relaxing, luxurious part of your home, we need to
talk. Like, what are you doing?
So here's the thing. Your 5 to 9 is just as important
as your nine to five. You deserve rest that actually
restores you. And that starts with Cozy Earth.
And I'm so excited to be working with Cozy Earth because I have
used their products before even working with them.
Like I, this is a dream, OK? And you're going to have amazing
dreams when you hear the rest of this.
I have the Cozy Earth bamboo sheet set.
And let me tell you, I even asked my husband for a review so
I could talk to you about this. These sheets are so breathable.
You literally sleep cooler. And by the way, I run very warm.
Like I cannot have a bed or like sheets or anything, a comforter
that are warm or make me sweat because it's inevitable.
So having sheets like this bamboo sheet set that I have
from Cozy Earth is a game changer.
It's literally several degrees cooler.
There's no more overheating, no more tossing and turning, and
the fabric is next level in terms of softness.
Cozy Earth only uses the best materials, so you feel like
you're wrapped in pure comfort. Plus, their durable weave means
no Pilling ever. And I hate Pilling.
All of my sweaters are Pilling and I just can't stand it.
And then you end up having to do all this extra work to de pill.
But the good news, as I said, is that Cozy Earth's materials mean
that there's no Pilling ever and it's guaranteed for 10 years.
Let's also talk about their bamboo pajamas because if you're
still sleeping in that old stretched out T-shirt, it is
time time for an upgrade. These are lightweight but cozy,
designed to help you fall asleep faster and stay asleep longer.
Types of pajamas. It's the kind of comfort that
makes you want to lounge all day.
And by the way, I don't know if my mom is going to hear this,
but this is what I'm going to get her for Mother's Day.
Mother's Day is coming up. And I always, this is terrible,
but I always end up being like, Oh my gosh, that's Mother's Day.
But now luckily I have a heads up and I'm reminding myself and
you that Mother's Day is coming up.
So by your mother, your spouse, your, I don't know, dog mom,
something amazing like these bamboo pajamas or the sheet set
to really make their Mother's Day special.
As a matter of fact, I'm going to ask my husband to get me the
bamboo pajamas because I am sleeping in that old stretched
out T-shirt and it is time for an upgrade.
So here's the thing. What I really love about Cozy
Earth is that they're committed to quality in every way.
Their products aren't just luxurious, they're ethically
made and responsibly produced. So when you invest in better
sleep, you're also investing in something good.
And if you're not sure if it's for you, totally fine, no
worries. Cozy Earth gives you 100 nights
to decide 100. And if you don't love it, you
can send it back. And with that, there's a 10 year
warranty so you know that they believe in their products.
So if you're ready to turn your bedroom into a true retreat, one
that feels like a luxury hotel but better, go to cozyearth.com
and use my code human HR for 40% off their best selling sheets,
pajamas, towels and more. That's 40% off.
That is like the best deal ever. And if you get a post purchase
survey, by the way, please let them know that you heard about
Cozy Earth right here on the Bringing the Human back to Human
Resources podcast. Because it is so helpful for
them to know that my discussion with you about having this most
fabulous 5 to 9 after your nine to five impacted you in some
way. And by the way, like I said, the
first thing that I'm buying not only for my mother, but also for
the other mothers in my life are those cozy, fabulous bamboo
pajamas. So let's prioritize sleep,
prioritize. You sleep better with cozy
earth. Welcome to the Bringing the
human back to human Resources podcast.
I'm Tracy Chernoff, and I've spent my entire professional
career in HR. Each week, we'll explore the
delicate balance between people and business with the aim to
reconnect the two and create meaningful outcomes.
Listen in as I share my own experiences, challenge the
status quo, and chat with guests from various industries about
our mission to bring the human back to human resources.
Hi everyone, welcome back to the Bringing the Human Back to Human
Resources podcast. Thank you so much for being here
for another week. Don't forget to rate, review,
and subscribe wherever you're catching this episode.
And if you're watching on YouTube or Spotify, leave a
comment, give a thumbs up, share in general, whether you're
listening or watching, share this episode with a friend.
Share the podcast with a friend. A couple of housekeeping items
here. One, the podcast is officially
five years old, which is insane. The very first episode came out,
I think it was November 2nd and 2020.
So that is wild considering it's now been five years, which is
kind of unbelievable. Like I always say that, you
know, whether you're doing something or not, the time is
going to pass. This is what ultimately led me
to getting my masters because I was like, you know what?
I can only go part time because I, I, I'm not willing to take on
more student loans. I have to be able to work and
pay for school as I go. And so I went part time and I
remember friends. Oh my gosh, there's so many deer
in the back. Sorry.
Oh, it looks like a little baby, but maybe an adolescent deer
because they no longer have spots.
Anyway, sorry nature. So when I was going for my
master's, I remember I had friends who were like part time.
Wouldn't you rather just do full time and get it over with?
And I was like, yeah, of course, but I can't afford to do that.
I need to, you know, work. And also I didn't really want a
gap in my work. I kind of just wanted to do
both. And I was like, the time is
going to pass anyway. So whether I do it part time or
do it full time, like at the end, the outcome is the same.
I have a degree, I have another degree, right?
So that tends to be one of the mottos that I live by is that
you can either choose to do something with the time that is
passing either way, or you choose to do nothing and that's
OK. Like some people don't want to
do much more with their time and that is totally fine.
But if you are looking to continue your education or take
on a new hobby, the time is going to pass anyway.
So do it. Even if it's once a month, just
do it anyway. So I digress that that is my
outlook on the last five years is that wow, I got married, I
have kids, I've switched jobs, all while still recording this
podcast. And so I just wanted to thank
you for being here. Whether you are new here or
whether you've been here since day one.
I appreciate that you are one of the listeners of my show.
And the second housekeeping item is that this is actually going
to be the last episode of 2025. I know, crazy.
If you've been here at least for the last year, you know that I
generally take the last couple of weeks of December off and the
first week of January off. But of course there will be
episodes starting. Let me check my production
schedule that our first episode of 2026 will launch on January
6th. So still so much to look forward
to. I think that's awesome.
Oh yeah, I have January 6th duplicated now.
Yeah, no, January 6th we have an episode.
How exciting. Actually, it's going to be a
Policy Pulse episode. It's going to be the first one
of 2026. So we're going to kick off the
new year with what 2026 might have in store for us.
And I'm realizing now, based on what I'm recording, I have to
start watching Hallmark movies. I need to I need to get myself
into the winter mood and the holiday spirit Wild.
It's amazing how time flies. So anyway, take my motto as you
will and thank you for being here through all of 2025 and
beyond 2025 if you've been here even longer.
So this week I wanted to kind of use this solo episode almost as
like a like a catch up and a catch all some topics that are
are well, one topic in particular is like really top of
mind for me right now because at work, my team and I have noticed
like an increase and an influx in very obviously AI generated
resumes and applications. And I thought it would be
helpful to talk about on the episode or on the podcast this
week because it's kind of like a cautionary tale and a word to
the wise for all of you who maybe are using AI to create
your resumes or paying for a program to apply to jobs for
you. So let's let's take the resume
piece first. I think it's very obvious when
someone uses AI to generate their resume.
It's not like very specific. Usually there aren't any
statistics, you know, or data points, I should say.
Metrics generally, it kind of just reads as like any other
resume that might come through for a particular job.
And certainly it tends to fall flat in terms of having like
personality. Whereas when someone creates
their own resume or they hire someone like me to help them
write a resume, there's more of a personal touch and you can
kind of feel the, the person's individuality and also their
passions and what they focus on what they want out of a job.
And of course, it's very easy for anyone to take their resume,
take a job description that they see online and say, dear Chachi
PT or Claude or Gemini, please match my resume to this job
description, right? Because of course, candidates
know that AI is often used in hiring and so when there's a a
higher percentage of a resume matching a job description,
maybe that increases their chances of getting an interview
that, you know, totally intrinsic, right?
However, I think the cautionary tale here is that, you know,
there is a person hopefully on the other end of the hiring
process who is looking at your resume and you know, is
potentially thinking, what is this?
Like, what am I getting from this person?
And even if the job description and the resume might match it,
it doesn't necessarily mean that that candidate is moving on to
the next phase of the recruiting process just simply because it's
so obvious that they, you know, have maybe generated their
resume completely or solely through AI.
So that's the first thing. The second is that when let's
say someone effectively, you know, uses AI to generate their
resume and they get an interview, that that resume
being generated by AI does not necessarily mean that you've
actually done the things on the resume that it says that you've
done. And so you go into an interview
and the hiring team asks questions about how you've LED
projects, what you've done specifically to, you know, kind
of execute or achieve on the things that that your resume
says that you have accomplished. And you don't necessarily have
an answer. That's not great.
And frankly, the way I kind of look at the world is that you
get 1 reputation. You don't get really a redo on
your reputation. Like we can think of celebrities
and all these people, sure, who maybe get like a second chance
at building up their names or, you know, revitalizing their
reputations. But it's much harder for for us
normies out here like once and industries are really small.
So once you've made a name for yourself that you don't actually
have the experience and you, you like falsified your resume or
you, you embellished on your resume so much that you didn't
actually pass an interview round, like that's not great.
It doesn't look good. And hiring teams generally
remember that because it doesn't happen that often.
It's happening a little bit more often now, I think, but it
doesn't happen often enough where it's like, oh, just
another, you know, another person where I'm experiencing
this. No, it's like, oh, this person
named so and so obviously over embellished their resume.
It's just not a good idea. And then I have to ask, what
happens if you get the job and you don't actually have the
capabilities or the skills to execute on the things that your
resume has overly embellished as a, as something that you can
effectively do? Like then what?
Then thinking about your reputation again, that's even
worse because then, you know, you've made a name for yourself
with more than just the hiring team and you're not going to
succeed. Like you're like most people in
that circumstance are going to fail.
And it's just, you know, and then the question is, well, they
said that they had all this experience.
They their resume showed they've done these things.
But when you get to the job and you can't actually execute or
achieve on the things that you, you know, allegedly had achieved
before, that's problematic. So seeing this recently made me
want to share with all of you that I would highly encourage
you to stay away from, you know, solely using AI to generate,
generate your resumes. Now, certainly if you have your
resume and you've created it or you've worked with someone like
me to create your resume, you can always say, hey, dear AI
generative AI tool, how does my resume match up with this
particular job description? What would make it stronger?
What makes it weak? And in those cases, the, you
know, ChatGPT or whatever tool will say, oh, you know, this is
either a good match or not a great match.
And here's where you can, you know, elevate your resume and
assuming that you actually have that experience, then that it
gives good feedback on that. But I would really, really,
really stay away from saying, dear, dear AI tool, please
create a resume for me that matches the this job
description. It's just a bad idea.
And like I said, I think it's very obvious when that happens.
And you know, the other thing on this topic that I've thought
about is that a colleague of mine had was, was conducting an
interview for someone and this person, you know, it's a video
interview. This person had the camera like
you can't say if you're watching, you can see, but
basically like starting at their chin.
And so there wasn't like a full kind of like frame in the video.
And my colleague said that it was pretty obvious that this
candidate was using AI to support answering, support them
and answering questions that my colleague would ask.
And he said that he noticed this or like could tell that that's
what was happening because he would ask a very specific
question. And I guess, you know, maybe at
some level this candidate was using their phone to, you know,
use dictation and get the question in from my colleague.
And then they would just kind of rattle off what Traci PT or
whatever tool they were using kind of wrote out for them.
And he said that the questions that he asked or the answers
that the candidate shared often did not even match the questions
that he asked. And so again, like from a
reputation standpoint, what are you doing?
Like that's just, you know, I understand that and I know that
it's a very, very challenging job market.
And this I think is what is kind of creating some of the pressure
for people to resort to like completely relying on AI, you
know, to get interviews, to get jobs.
But that's just really bad like that.
That's something that you really don't come back from and it does
tarnish your reputation. You never know who could be your
next boss or hiring manager. Like you just never know.
So just think about your reputation first before anything
else. And yeah, so anyway, my
colleague said that it was like super obvious and it was just a
really, really bad interview, even though the candidate was
obviously very smart and and successful, at least based on
what their resume, you know, the story of their resume told.
And I, I wonder like if this reliance on AI comes from like
a, a lack of confidence or maybe like a a lack of maybe self
esteem. I don't know if it's probably
confidence, but I think about if someone feels so inclined to
fully use AI when they're, especially when they're
interviewing, like in the interview, it really it's either
there's a lack of confidence or they actually have 0 experience
and everything is a lie. The resume is a lie, their
experience is a lie that, you know, I don't know, I, I would
like to think that that's not the case, but that certainly is
kind of the read that I'm getting.
And the other thing is, again, like knowing that the job market
is really tough. Maybe it's like a desperation
thing, like I need to do anything that I can to get this
job. But all I can say is that the,
the more prepared you are for an interview, the better it's going
to go. AI is not going to land you the
job, but AI can help you to prepare for the interview.
And I work with a lot of clients on their resumes and interview
prep skills and, and courses. And so when I work with clients
on getting prepared for interviews, like there's no harm
in saying, OK, like, you know, this is I give people a workbook
when I work with them. But I also say like, you know,
leverage AI. You can say like, hey, ask me
some interview questions and then I'll answer them.
And then you can type in your answer and AI will tell you,
well, this is how you can make that answer stronger.
Like it's all about how we use these tools.
I think it's not this like all or nothing approach.
And I think I've said that before on the podcast that I
don't see AI as this replacement theory tool or something that
can like fully basically replace like what a human can do.
Whereas like, you know, I don't know, I grew up like practicing
interviews with like my parents, you know, and like friends.
And I just don't think that AI can necessarily replace that
entirely. But AI can certainly strengthen
our competency and help us think about things that maybe we
otherwise didn't think about. And so when I think about it's
the how we use the tool kind of concept instead of seeing this
like black and white, OK, I have to use AI to generate my resume.
I have to use AI to apply to jobs.
I have to use AI to to interview successfully.
You can instead say I need to use AI to ensure that I'm most
prepared or that I have all of the that I'm thinking about all
of the ways that I can, you know, effectively communicate my
experience. And there's so many great ways
to use AI. But again, this all or nothing
thing does not work. And then finally, my other
thought on AI is that in the last like couple of weeks, we've
noticed my colleagues and I have noticed that we're getting like
a ton of emails where people are basically sending an e-mail to
like the recruiting team to my team saying, hey, I saw this job
posted and like, I'm interested in applying and here's my
resume. And it's from like a company,
first of all, I would say pretty confidently that people are not
going to be clicking or opening attachments, clicking links or
opening attachments from unknown senders.
So this is red flag number one. But red flag number 2 is that
it's these we've researched these companies and they're
companies that people pay to have apply to jobs for them.
So to give you context here, if someone is looking for like a
sales job, right, they can pay the a particular company to take
their resume and apply to jobs that match basically any job
that matches their preferences, remote, hybrid, in person,
certain salary, certain job titles, certain locations.
And then those companies will just like, you know, spam apply
all of those openings and like, maybe it works for some people,
but I couldn't imagine if someone has paid this a
particular company and then they get a job interview and they
actually have no idea what job it is they've applied for.
They have to then go and look for the job description and they
have to do all this research. And it's just like a very, it's
kind of like a, a bizarre concept to me, but maybe it
works in that, you know, statistically, the more jobs
that you apply to, maybe, you know, you're more likely to get
more interviews. But a lot of people will make
the argument, like a lot of thought leaders in the
recruiting space will make the argument that you have to be
really precise about the jobs that you apply to, not just, you
know, kind of this spray and pray approach.
And that you have to like really be specific about industry and
job and in the the all the insurance and outs that the job
requires within the job description.
So I will say that those companies that are just like
sending resumes to people's emails, like that's just not
going to work. I don't know anyone.
Yeah, no, I don't know anyone who is seeing an applicant come
through over e-mail from an unknown, from a company, not
from the person's personal e-mail.
That's a little bit different, but from a company and then is
like, Oh yeah, let me open this unknown senders attachment.
It just doesn't happen. Doesn't make any sense, but
certainly an applicant. I have seen applicants get
through the door by sending emails from their own e-mail
address where they're like, hey, I love your company.
I've been looking out for jobs. I see this job.
I think I'd be a great fit. That's different, but to come
from a company like your, your resume is just not going to
look, get looked at. I don't know, at least not from
anyone that I know. And I know a handful of people
who make hiring decisions and I just don't think it's effective.
And frankly, you might get caught up in the spam filter
anyway. So that it's like, what are you
paying for? Why are you paying this company
or whatever companies to have this like spray and pray
approach to your career? Like at some level you have to
be involved. So I don't know, maybe I have
like a little bit of an old school mentality on that.
I don't know. I know the job market's tough.
I know that it tends to land people in this like situation or
predicament where they're like, I'm just going to do anything
that I can. And I totally can understand
that. I also think that, you know, if
you are without a job, like paying these companies money
that you otherwise are not earning on a regular basis is
probably a waste. And it would be better for you
to work with like a headhunter or a recruiter or someone in
your network and pay them to help you get a job rather than
paying these companies that actually probably do not care
about you that much. So that's my, I don't know if
it's a hot take, but that's my take.
I'm curious if any of you have used these companies before or
if you've, you know, been successful in having AI like
generate your resumes or apply for you to different jobs.
I'm very curious. So if you can e-mail me or
comment on this podcast episode, I would really appreciate it
because then I'll, I'll have a little bit of a greater insight
into what is kind of going on around town, so to speak, and
what people are doing and why. So my e-mail is
contact@hrtracy.com and you can you can send me your thoughts
there. And of course, I can always keep
you anonymous as I've kept many, not guests, but many listener
comments anonymous in the past. So those are my thoughts for the
last episode of 2025. I think when we go into 2026, of
course, we're going to continue to see a lot of discussion
around AI that is like 1000% without a doubt, we're going to
continue to talk about it. And I also think it'll be very
interesting to see how the landscape evolves, whether it's
workplaces, whether it's the government regulation, It'll be
interesting to see. And certainly I think that, you
know, the job market hopefully will get better.
But I do think certainly it will be even more competitive because
of AI, because, you know, maybe there are some jobs that have
reduced in quantity as a result of companies streamlining a
little bit of their operations, whatever that might be.
Again, I don't believe in the replacement theory concept, but
I do think that the competitiveness in the job
market will continue to increase.
And frankly, this is where I think working with someone who
can help you craft a really strong resume, really strong
cover letter, whatever it is is that you might use Will be all
the more worthwhile. And so that is also a humble
plug that I do work with clients on their resumes, on their
interview skills, on their cover letters, on their BIOS,
especially executive BIOS. So if that's something that
you'd ever like to work with me on, you can always reach out
contact at hrtracy.com and we can work together.
And that's kind of everything for 2025.
I really appreciate you being here for the whole year and
beyond, if you've been here again for more than just a year.
And I look forward to catching up in 2026 and seeing all of the
things that kind of come down the line.
And by the way, we have some unbelievable guests lined up for
2026. I've had already some amazing
conversations that I think are really going to take the podcast
to the next level. So stay tuned for that.
Yeah. So have a wonderful end of year,
have a very happy holiday season, whatever holiday you
might celebrate, if any, and happy new year as well.
See you in 2026. May it be a fabulous year ahead.
Thank you so much. Bye.
Hey, just before you go, don't forget to subscribe to the show
so that you are the first to hear when an episode drops each
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with them. Thank you so much for tuning in
and I'll see you next week.