The Problem Isn't That AI Will Take Our Jobs - It's That We're Doing Jobs That Shouldn't Exist

Talent Acquisition stands at the edge of its most profound reinvention in decades, if not ever. As Generative AI continues reshaping our workflows and skills-based hiring accelerates, I'm increasingly struck by a realization that may be uncomfortable for many in our industry: The problem isn’t that AI will take our jobs—it's that we're doing jobs that shouldn't exist in the first place.

This isn't about devaluing the work of talented TA professionals. It's about acknowledging a hard truth. Much of what consumes our days represents compensatory activity for processes designed in an analog era that have failed to evolve. These processes were broken by the digital revolution years ago, yet we've normalized their dysfunction to the point where we rarely question their fundamental validity. We don't just accept these broken systems - we build careers around navigating their inefficiencies.

The human cost of these broken systems extends far beyond our own professional frustrations. For candidates, the modern recruiting process has become increasingly dehumanizing—a labyrinth of automated rejections, ghosting, and endless hoops to jump through. Overwhelmed recruiters lack the capacity to provide the personal attention candidates deserve. We’ve created a system where neither side feels truly valued or effective, and stress and disappointment have become the default experience rather than the exception.

Consider the time recruiters spend screening resumes, matching candidates to roles, and conducting initial interviews. We've known for decades through rigorous, peer-reviewed science that these traditional evaluation methods are poor predictors of job performance. Yet we've built careers around these fundamentally flawed activities and developed specialized skills that give us remarkably little insight into a candidate's potential. Is it really surprising that AI can do these tasks faster, and should we question why we're doing them at all?

Similarly, consider the time wasted crafting job descriptions with requirements that barely correlate with success. Or the time devoted to managing hiring manager expectations around "unicorn candidates" that don't exist. Or the administrative burden of scheduling and rescheduling interviews, tracking candidates through byzantine approval processes, and generating reports that few people read.

These activities don't exist because they're the best way to match talent with opportunity. They exist because our recruiting processes are broken, and we've built careers around managing that brokenness rather than fixing the underlying problems.

What if we reimagined Talent Acquisition from first principles? What if we started with what actually predicts job performance and built processes specifically to identify and assess those attributes? What if we designed candidate experiences that were respectful of people's time and dignity rather than filtering mechanisms designed primarily for our administrative convenience?

In this light, AI isn't a threat but an opportunity to eliminate work that shouldn't exist, freeing us to focus on what truly creates value: meaningful connections, understanding potential, fair assessment, exceptional experiences, and building extraordinary teams.

Over the past six months, I’ve had many conversations with TA professionals about AI, and a consistent cognitive dissonance has struck me. People readily acknowledge that significant change is coming, but don't believe it will negatively impact their specific role. There's a collective vision that AI will handle the administrative burden while allowing recruiters to focus on the "human" aspects they enjoy most.

This comforting narrative misses a crucial point: what we define as the "human" aspects of recruiting are often precisely the activities that shouldn't exist in their current form. We cling to these tasks not for their effectiveness, but for their familiarity. These aren't valuable activities being threatened by AI, but compensatory behaviors for broken systems that need fundamental reimagining.

The real opportunity isn't to use AI to do the wrong things faster. It's to leverage AI as a catalyst for reimagining Talent Acquisition entirely. What if identifying and matching talent didn't require the vast administrative infrastructure we've built? What if we could design processes that were simultaneously more efficient and more human?

During the pandemic, we saw how quickly entrenched practices could change. Video interviewing went from a five-year adoption timeline to mainstream acceptance in weeks. The current AI revolution offers a similar opportunity for radical reinvention, not just of tools, but of fundamental approaches.

For individual TA professionals, this presents a choice: protect your current role or architect what Talent Acquisition should become. The former is defensive and has diminishing returns; the latter puts you at the forefront of creating actual value.

For TA leaders and organizations, the imperative is clear: your function needs complete reimagining, not incremental improvement. Question whether you're doing the right things at all. Is your TA function organized around activities that genuinely create value, or around compensatory behaviors for broken processes? If it's the latter, AI won't just change how you recruit - it should change what recruiting means entirely.

We stand at a crucial juncture where we can either cling to familiar activities even as they become increasingly irrelevant, or we can embrace the opportunity to reinvent our profession around genuine value creation. The future won't be determined by which recruiting activities AI can replicate, but by which activities actually deserve to exist in the first place.

The revolution is coming. The question is whether you'll be defending work that shouldn't exist, or creating the future of work that should.