Hear from a recruiter: Trends in the Market

If I were giving direct advice to job-seekers:

• Ensure your resume showcases what you can do for companies now: measurable outcomes, real projects, real value.

• Make your resume clean and modern in format so it reads (and parses) quickly and clearly.

• Show your readiness for the modern workplace by highlighting how you work: remote, distributed, collaborative, and values-driven, so your culture fit and contribution come through clearly on your resume.

• Use your story to demonstrate that you’re not just a candidate, you’re a solution.

I’ve been in the recruiting game long enough to know that the hiring landscape isn’t just shifting, it’s being rebuilt. Companies of all kinds are trying new things and abandoning old habits, and if you’re looking for a job right now, you should know what they’re doing (and what they’ve quit doing).

One big change: skills are overtaking degrees. You’ll hear it a lot in terms like “skill-first hiring” and “competency over credentials.” Organizations are saying: “Show me you can deliver, not just that you checked a box.” If your resume still reads like you’re selling what you studied, not what you did, you’re already behind the curve.

AI and automation is everywhere, particularly in the tech industry. Many phases of the hiring process are now happening in systems and bots for many hiring teams - including scanning resumes, matching candidates, even conducting early interviews. That means two things for you: your resume must parse cleanly and still sound human. If you customize a resume for ATS but lose your voice, or vice-versa, you lose.

Another big trend is around flexibility. With remote, hybrid, and global hiring on the rise, your location is becoming less and less important. If you’re applying with “Willing to relocate” on your resume and not showing how you work remotely or across time zones, you’re showing old thinking in a new market. This is also closely tied to an increasingly trendy idea of hiring for “culture fit” and a “culture add”. Companies aren’t just looking for people who can do the work; they want people who align with how they work. That means your resume should hint at more than just your accomplishments: it should show how you collaborate, communicate, adapt, and contribute to a team’s values. If your experience demonstrates the way you operate, not just the tasks you completed, you’ll stand out as someone who fits the environment they’re intentionally building.

So what aren’t companies and recruiters doing? Unfortunately, they’re not yet fixing their broken processes. Vague job postings are still being listed that ask for exorbitant amounts of experience for “entry-level” roles. Candidates are still being ghosted. So while you should play the game, you also shouldn’t assume the game is fair. Being proactive, clear, and strategic is non-optional if you are looking to get hired. 

Hiring isn’t a passive process anymore. You need to stand out, but in the right way. If you adapt faster than they do, you win.