Parmy Olson, Columnist

Everybody’s Gaming the Job Market With AI

Behold a perverse system where employers come to value those who can manipulate their hiring tech.

March 28, 2025 at 5:00 AM UTC

Parmy Olson is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering technology. A former reporter for the Wall Street Journal and Forbes, she is author of “Supremacy: AI, ChatGPT and the Race That Will Change the World.”

Job Fair Ahead Of Unemployment Rate Figures — Photographer: Bloomberg/Bloomberg

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A Columbia University student recently shone a light on a disturbing corner of today’s job market. Roy Lee, 21, was fed up with the antiquated way that large tech firms were testing job candidates with computer coding riddles you had to memorize, so he created a tool that his peers could use to beat the system.

A translucent window shows the latest version of ChatGPT, which the applicant can use to copy and paste code during a test over Zoom. The recruiter can’t see any of this when screen sharing. Lee now faces expulsion from Columbia, he tells me, but he’s also received multiple job offers from executives at tech firms, impressed with his hacker mindset and chutzpah.