ACM CareerNews for Tuesday, September 9, 2025
ACM CareerNews is intended as an objective career news digest for busy IT professionals. Views expressed are not necessarily those of ACM. To send comments, please write to [email protected]
Volume 21, Issue 17, September 9, 2025
Tech Unemployment Rises Despite Job Growth
CIO Dive, September 5
IT unemployment rose for the second consecutive month as employers contended with a complex economy in August, according to the most recent data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. Tech unemployment reached 3% in August, up from 2.9% in July. The national unemployment rate also increased to 4.3% last month. Despite the increase in joblessness, employers across the economy added 247,000 net new tech positions. Moreover, hiring intent data continues to show employers pursuing tech talent across a range of disciplines, from AI and data science to tech support and cloud engineering.
After months of uncertain economic conditions and trade war concerns, the August jobs report reflects a complex picture for IT employment. Businesses are recalibrating their modernization plans, while implementing changes that directly affect hiring strategies. Employers are not necessarily pulling back from growth, but they are searching for more targeted ways to achieve it. Within the tech sector, legacy IT roles are being replaced by AI and data infrastructure hiring. As a result, there is demand growth for data scientist and architect roles.
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What Opportunities Exist For Senior Professionals Returning to the Job Market?
Silicon Republic, September 2
For more senior professionals, the recent tech hiring landscape has thrown up some complex new challenges. Quite simply, very experienced candidates with long years of experience in the tech sector may be finding themselves on the job market for the first time in years. According to recruiters, an issue that continuously crops up is the misguided perception that a well-established professional is too senior for a role. For example, an employer may query how long the professional is willing to stay in the new position, especially if it is considered a drop down from their previous role.
Now is the time for recently unemployed senior professionals interested in diversifying to consider pivoting into new areas. The artificial intelligence (AI) space is a great example, as more and more organizations look to develop their AI know-how. According to hiring managers and recruiters, AI is no longer being driven by technology concerns. Rather, it is being deployed by organizations as a tool to solve specific industry problems. AI companies do not just need data scientists, they need people who can translate business needs into practical use cases. That is where candidates can leverage their industry knowledge and reframe their experience to position themselves as the bridge between AI and industry.
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Worried AI Will Take Your Job? The New Platform From OpenAI Could Help Get You One
ZDNet, September 5
While AI is typically blamed for replacing humans in the workforce, a new offering from OpenAI is looking to leverage those AI capabilities to get you a job. The company unveiled its OpenAI Jobs Platform, which is designed to act as a job matchmaker. It uses AI to access its repertoire of experienced candidates and connect them to opportunities that match their skill set. The goal is use the OpenAI Jobs Platform to connect AI-ready workers with companies that need AI skills.
According to OpenAI, the new platform aims to use AI to help companies looking to hire new talent meet their needs, whether that is a specific skill, like AI knowledge, or help with a specific task. The platform is designed to help small and large companies alike. In addition, there will be a track dedicated to helping local businesses compete and local governments find the AI talent they need to better serve their constituents.
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Fed Finds AI Is Not Rapidly Replacing Jobs Yet Even As More Firms Adopt It
Quartz, September 4
Companies are adopting artificial intelligence into their workflow more, but have not gone as far as to let the tech greatly influence the pace of layoffs. Service firms nearly doubled their AI usage this year compared to the same time last year, with 40% saying they are utilizing AI technology compared to 25% last year. Manufacturers also saw a jump in usage, with 26% saying they have adopted the tech compared to 16% last year.
Within service firms that use AI, 13% expect the technology to influence layoffs over the next six months. However, about the same amount of service firms said they anticipated AI-induced layoffs in the same survey last year, but just 1% of service firms reported laying off employees because of AI over the last six months. Within manufacturing firms, none reported AI-induced layoffs this year or the year prior and said they do not anticipate any over the next six months. Looking ahead, however, layoffs and reductions in hiring plans due to AI use are expected to increase, especially for workers with a college degree. Instead of laying off already employed workers, firms are more likely to retrain them on AI, with nearly half of both service and manufacturing firms planning to retrain workers on the tech in the next six months.
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To Counter AI Cheating Companies Bring Back In-Person Job Interviews
Computerworld, August 26
AI-enabled cheating has surged, particularly in virtual technical job interviews. Would-be job candidates increasingly use AI tools off-camera to feed them answers, such as responses to coding challenges, and in some cases turning to deepfake technology to impersonate applicants. To battle that trend, more and more companies are bringing back in-person job interviews. According to a recent Gartner survey, 72.4% of recruiting leaders reported they are currently conducting interviews in-person to combat fraud.
Top tech and Internet companies have re-instituted in-person interviews for some job candidates over the past year. The problem is that remote work and advancements in AI have made it easier than ever for fake candidates to infiltrate the hiring process. As a result, some companies are adapting their hiring process to include increased verification steps and enhanced background checks that may involve an in-person component. If a candidate is not explicitly invited to use AI during the assessment process, then it should be considered off-limits. As AI continues to transform work, a growing number of organizations now believe face-to-face interactions are necessary to assess the human qualities that cannot be automated, such as judgment, empathy, creativity, and connection.
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AI Hiring Tools Leave Tech Professionals Frustrated and Distrustful
Dice Insights, September 2
AI-powered hiring tools are reshaping how technology professionals search for jobs, but not in ways that inspire confidence. A recent survey of tech workers found widespread frustration with automated screening, with many saying the process favors keyword gaming over real qualifications and leaves them feeling dehumanized. Most respondents said they believe AI systems regularly miss qualified candidates who do not tailor resumes with the right keywords. That has pushed many professionals to alter their resumes to improve compatibility with automated tools, often removing details about personality or accomplishments.
For job seekers, the flaws in AI-powered hiring are quite visible. Often, the platforms fail to recognize transferable skills, a serious limitation in a field where adaptability is often critical. To pass AI screening systems, IT professionals now need to tailor their resumes to include context and keyword-rich language. They should also incorporate descriptions of their technical achievements that showcases their ability to harness the power of AI and machine learning. Unfortunately, if a resume is not optimized with the right language, it may never make it past the first filter. That means listing AI on a resume is not enough. You need to show how you have used it, together with real-world outcomes.
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AI Is Not Killing Jobs But It Is Changing Who Gets Hired
Fast Company, August 14
When it comes to hiring top tech workers, it is important to focus more on capability than on pedigree. What someone can do matters far more than what their resume suggests. With the rise of AI, this mindset is becoming essential. The shift goes beyond productivity and automation. It is about how organizations define job readiness, recognize potential, and avoid replicating the exclusions of the past. If companies keep leaning on degree requirements as a proxy for readiness, they risk missing a growing pool of skilled, AI-fluent talent who are proving themselves outside conventional pipelines.
The ability of AI to act as a force multiplier for talent has completely shifted how many companies function. It has also changed what it means to contribute to an organizations. People with less formal training can do more, faster, if they are equipped with the right tools and a clear mandate. Someone without a formal degree can use AI to complete tasks once reserved for experts such as analyzing data, drafting technical documentation, even writing code. The same tools that replace certain functions can also empower a much wider set of people to participate in the knowledge economy. That does not mean experience is irrelevant. It means the gap between being qualified on paper and being able to deliver in practice is narrowing. However, hiring systems have not always kept pace. This shift demands a change in how organizations evaluate talent. If contribution no longer depends on pedigree, hiring systems built around degrees, brand names, and linear resumes start to fall short.
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Desperate Companies Now Hiring Humans to Fix What AI Botched
Futurism, September 4
Companies that have laid off significant numbers of workers in favor of artificial intelligence are now moving to rehire them back. In fact, that push has resulted in a new line of gig work: experienced tech fixer-uppers, who get paid to improve AI-generated art, writing, and code by making it less sloppy. Sometimes, the results generated by AI are good enough, but often they are not. When that happens, human workers need to be called in to fix the process and generate acceptable results.
While many people are aware that AI is not perfect, there are some managers who become upset because they did not manage to get specific work done with AI. This leaves them searching for potential solutions. In the past, some freelancers might have been adamant about not working with AI. But that has changed, especially as the market for IT talent has tightened. The fact remains that some AI-generated content does not look remotely human at all, and needs to be significantly overhauled. Moreover, chatbots tend to not explain things in adequate detail, leaving plenty of room for human clarification.
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Feeling Cranky About AI and CS Education
Blog@CACM, August 29
Over the past 30 years, the methods and approaches for teaching computer science have continued to evolve. Often, the introductory programming language used for new students is the first thing to change. Then, there are new testing methods and new approaches to standardizing the curriculum. That is often followed by new courses and the creation of new disciplines within the field of computer science. That is what appears to be happening now, with the rapid development of AI, and the push to integrate AI into the CS curriculum.
Everyone uses the term AI, but what they really mean is generative AI, which is based on machine learning. There is no discussion of the myriad other subfields and techniques that have historically been part of AI and still help practitioners solve all sorts of interesting problems. In much discussion about CS education, there is little interest in interrogating the downsides of generative AI, such as the environmental impact, the data theft impact, the treatment and exploitation of data workers. There is little interest in considering the extent to which, by incorporating generative AI into teaching, educators end up supporting a handful of companies that are burning billions in a vain attempt to each achieve performance that is superior to that of everyone else.
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Three AI Futures
Communications of the ACM, August 15
The turmoil and promises of AI have generated much confusion and uncertainty about the future. That is especially true for IT workers, who must now worry about AI eventually taking away their jobs. Three kinds of AI futures have dominated the speculations: a singularity when humans merge with super-intelligent machines; a utopia from pervasive automation; and a huge array of autonomous (but potentially untrustworthy) AI agents providing useful services. While the singularity and the utopia scenarios are unlikely, a future powered and controlled by AI agents remains a disturbing threat.
Nearly two decades ago, AI pioneer Ray Kurzweil introduced the concept of the singularity. This is an event horizon in AI, a time when super-intelligent machines emerge and replace humanity. The centerpiece of his argument is that information technology has doubled its performance every two years for well over a century, and will continue to do so. Extrapolating on this trend, Kurzweil predicts that the singularity will take place by the year 2045. This vision is at once strikingly compelling and deeply disturbing. It is easy to imagine a super-intelligence that exterminates humans, which it sees as fallible and feeble. In an updated version of this scenario, the singularity will not be a takeover by super-intelligent machines, but a complete merger of humans and machines. Instead of exterminating or replacing humans, the singularity will celebrate a new species of super-humans.
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