Am I Interested In Your Company? - The Collected Works of jjmojojjmojo " property="og:title"/>
Am I Interested In Your Company? - The Collected Works of jjmojojjmojo " property="twitter:title"/>
Am I Interested In Your Company? - The Collected Works of jjmojojjmojo " name="title"/><br>Why Am I Interested In Your Company? - The Collected Works of jjmojojjmojo
I've recently been looking for work, and I've been getting hung up a lot on application forms. About 3/4 of the time, there's a litany of questions sitting between "apply for this job" and "submit your application".
Some are fun to answer, some are fairly routine, but the lack of any meaningful context makes them a stress point for me, and it may be hurting your chances of finding the kind of talent you need.
I think there might be a better way, but I'm not sure if you're going to like it.
One class of question, in particular, illustrates the issue.
It takes various forms:
"Why do you want to work here?"
"What interested you about this position?"
"What makes you a good fit?"
The answer is always the same: Because my skills line up with the job listing.
That's it. That's the only answer.
I feel obligated to dig into the company culture, poke around any blogs or press materials and try to come up with something insightful. You made me open LinkedIn, you monster.
I can collect some insight and craft something unique, perfectly copping the tone and culture of the company and interpolating the essence of the post. I admit it's a bit uncomfortable, but I do have this skill.
The process generally takes way too long. But you know what? When I'm given a task, I want to do it to the fullest of my ability. So I always try, and sometimes I think I do pretty well. But even when I'm convinced I'm absolutely killing it (I'm not), it always feels hollow.
If I didn't care, I could pull something like:
"As a software leader with over 25 years of experience transforming culture at key inflection points, I've heavily leveraged ${TECHNOLOGY_FROM_POST} to increase ${SOME_METRIC} while protecting ${SOMETHING_OF_VALUE}. I'm really interested in ${COMPANY} because it's proven to ${LIFTED_DETAIL_FROM_COMPANY_BLOG} and I love ${SOMETHING_CEO_SAID}, I feel it really gels with my work style."
Those variables are interchangeable for any post, any company. The ubiquity of these questions implies that this would be acceptable, right? Ok, sure, but what signal is that sending? I mean that in the sense of a signal to the person making hiring decisions, but also what is it saying to me, the applicant? I think you want me to be formulaic. But that doesn't reconcile with the explanations I've found (like these from Indeed, Harvard Business Review, MIT's CDO, and Ask A Manager) - it seems that this question is actually asking for something bespoke and creative (but of course, not too creative...right?).
That tension has to come through in responses, and especially in application forms. At scale, the tension must resonate into a cacophony of useless noise. We see hiring managers and recruiters complain about the bombardment of poor quality applicants, so this has to be the result. How are you supposed to filter that? And how am I supposed to stand out? There seems to be a huge gap in ROI here.
These complaints, and these questions, have existed as long as I've been in the industry (est. 1999 😎). Yet both persist today, so the questions aren't working, right? Recent reports of generative AI making the process so much more difficult for those hiring, and those looking for work, further make me wonder: what's the real issue here?
"...The numbers tell a stark story. Almost one in every two (46%) job seekers in the U.S. say their trust in hiring has decreased over the past year, with 42% blaming AI directly. AI bias is increasingly becoming a concern. Thirty-five percent of job seekers in the U.S. think AI has shifted bias from humans to algorithms, and close to one in five (18%) say it’s amplified bias by learning from historical patterns. Only 8% of candidates believe AI makes hiring more fair. Among U.S. Gen-Z entry-level workers, 62% have lost trust."
"...The data reveals that recruiters and hiring managers in the U.S. are not on the same page. Seven in every ten (70%) hiring managers say AI helps them make faster and better hiring decisions with fewer recruiter resources. Recruiters are more ambivalent. While one in every two (50%) say AI has improved hiring overall, mainly by saving time on screening and scheduling, 25% admit they’re not confident in their AI systems at all, and 8% say they have no idea what their algorithms prioritize. Only 21% are very confident that their systems aren’t rejecting qualified candidates."
Greenhouse Software, "An AI Trust Crisis: 70% of Hiring Managers Trust AI to Make Faster and Better Hiring Decisions, Only 8% of Job Seekers Call it Fair"
Pictured: The author posing as a cynic in 2026.
A cynic may posit that...