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AI is reshaping how job search and recruitment look like these days.
Candidates are using AI to apply for more jobs.
Recruiters are using AI to manage and search through more candidates.
And somewhere between the two, a lot of very good people are becoming harder to find.
When the job market feels crowded, it is tempting to make your CV and LinkedIn profile as broad as possible.
You might describe yourself as:
“An experienced commercial professional with strong communication, leadership and stakeholder management skills.”
It sounds flexible. It could apply to Customer Success, Sales, Partnerships, Account Management or Operations.
And that is exactly the problem.
A recruiter rarely opens LinkedIn and searches for a “great communicator who can do lots of things”.
They might be looking for:
“Customer Success Director, EdTech, higher education, SaaS, enterprise accounts, renewals, Salesforce.”
Or:
“Sales Director with experience selling SaaS into UK schools, managing enterprise sales cycles and leading a sales team.”
The more specific the search, the more important the information on your profile becomes.
Recruitment platforms increasingly use AI to help recruiters search, filter and prioritise candidates.
LinkedIn Recruiter, for example, allows recruiters to describe the person they are looking for using normal language. Its AI assisted search can turn that request into criteria including job titles, skills, industries, companies, location and experience. Recruiters can also use a job description to help identify relevant candidates.
LinkedIn also searches information contained across a member's profile. Its skills search looks at skills listed directly on a profile as well as relevant keywords elsewhere in that profile.
Other recruitment systems work differently.
Pinpoint, for example, can create criteria based on a job description and assess applications and CVs against those criteria. Recruiters can then use that information to decide which applications to review first.
This does not mean there is one giant AI system reading every CV on the internet and deciding who gets a job.
There isn't.
But it does mean that more recruitment tools are looking for clear signals that connect a candidate's experience with the requirements of a role.
Imagine you have spent six years working in EdTech Customer Success.
You have managed university clients.
You have worked with enterprise accounts.
You have been responsible for renewals and expansion.
You have implemented SaaS products.
You have used Salesforce and Gainsight.
You have worked closely with Product and Sales.
But your LinkedIn profile simply says:
“Responsible for managing customer relationships and ensuring customer satisfaction.”
A recruiter searching for higher education, enterprise SaaS, renewals or Gainsight may have very little information connecting you with their search.
Your experience exists.
The evidence does not.
That distinction matters.
Please don't copy every phrase from a job description and paste it into your CV.
Recruiters can spot that.
And a CV written purely for an algorithm is unlikely to convince a human either.
Instead, make your experience clear.
If you worked in EdTech, say which part of education you worked with.
If you sold to schools, universities or MATs, say so.
If you managed enterprise clients, say so.
If you owned a revenue target, include it.
If you managed renewals, expansion or retention, use those words.
If you worked with particular platforms or systems, name them where relevant.
If you led a team, explain its size and what you were responsible for.
The goal isn't to add more words.
The goal is to add better information.
Your CV should make it easy to see why you fit the specific role you are applying for.
Your LinkedIn profile has another job too.
It needs to help recruiters find you before you have applied.
That means your headline, About section, job titles, experience and skills should clearly show where your expertise sits.
If you want your next role to be in EdTech Customer Success, Sales or Product, ask yourself:
Could a recruiter tell that from my profile within a few seconds?
Would the terms they are likely to search for actually appear on my profile?
Have I explained the market, customer, product and type of work I have done?
Have I shown outcomes, rather than only responsibilities?
Those questions matter more now, not less.
Quite the opposite.
The people using recruitment technology still need enough information to understand where you fit.
AI can help them search.
It can help them filter.
It can help them prioritise.
But it cannot surface experience you have never clearly described.
So if you are applying for roles at the moment, don't try to make yourself suitable for everything.
Be clear about what you have done.
Be specific about where you have done it.
Show the results you have created.
Use the language your industry actually uses.
You don't need to become more generic to keep your options open.
You need to make your value easier to understand.
Because before a recruiter can decide whether they want to speak to you, they need to be able to find you.
