# Job hunting with Claude or ChatGPT without inventing facts > Give the assistant one source of facts about you and tell it to use nothing else. Have it check each posting's requirements against those facts before you spend time on it, tailor a resume only for the jobs that fit, review every line it cannot back up, and answer screening questions from answers you saved. Let it prepare each application; read it and press Submit yourself. By Arivu, founder of Shortlist. Published 2026-11-05, updated 2026-11-05. Source: https://shortlist.cruscible.com/guides/job-search-with-ai-assistant AI assistants are good at the parts of a job search that wear people down: reading long postings, rewriting a resume for the tenth time, drafting yet another answer to "Why do you want to work here?". They are bad at one thing that matters more than all of it: knowing what is true about you. Ask for a resume that fits a posting and a capable model will produce one, including the two tools you have never used, because they were in the posting and the resume reads better with them. That is the risk to design around. The workflow below keeps the assistant useful and your applications true. It works with any assistant; where Shortlist is connected ([how to connect it](/guides/use-shortlist-from-claude-chatgpt)), it does the checking for you. ## 1. Give it one source of facts Everything starts from a single document that says what you have done: jobs with dates, what you built and the numbers that go with it, skills, education, links, and your standard answers (notice period, salary expectation, work authorisation, willingness to relocate). Keep it longer and more detailed than any resume. The resume is a selection from it. Then make the rule explicit, every time: *use only this document; if something is not in it, ask me.* With Shortlist connected, your profile is that document, and Shortlist applies the rule itself: scores, resumes and answers come only from the profile. Without it, paste the document at the start of the conversation and repeat the rule when you ask for anything written. ## 2. Sort the postings before you tailor anything Most of the time in a job search goes into jobs you should not apply to. Before writing a word, have the assistant read each posting against your facts: > Here are four postings. For each, list the requirements, mark each as required or preferred, and say whether my profile shows it, quoting the line. Then list anything that would rule me out. The quotes are the point. A requirement marked "met" with no line from your profile behind it is a guess. With Shortlist connected, ask it to score each posting: the score uses fixed weights, and years of experience and named tools are checked in code rather than left to the model's judgement ([the method](/guides/how-shortlist-scores-a-job)). ## 3. Decide on the evidence, not the number A score is a summary. Read what sits under it: - **A dealbreaker** (a required certification, years well beyond yours, a location you cannot work from) usually means skip, unless you know someone there. - **"Not shown in your profile"** is not the same as "you lack it". If you have used the tool and your profile does not say so, fix the profile and score again; the next ten postings that name it benefit too. - **Missing preferred items** rarely decide anything. Our guide on [applying when you are not fully qualified](/guides/should-i-apply-if-not-fully-qualified) goes through when a gap matters. ## 4. Tailor only the jobs you will apply to For each job you choose, ask for a resume written from your facts with the posting's words used for skills you actually have. Then ask the question that keeps it honest: > Which lines in this resume are not supported by my profile? Shortlist answers that without being asked: its resume comes with a fact check that lists every line it could not find in your profile, and the high-severity ones should be fixed or removed before you send it. Change what you do not like in plain words ("move the Kafka work up", "shorter summary", "drop the internship") and ask again. [Tailoring a resume without lying](/guides/tailor-resume-without-lying) covers what tailoring can and cannot change. ## 5. Answer screening questions from saved answers Application forms ask what your resume does not say: notice period, expected salary, sponsorship, years with a specific tool. Many tracking systems reject automatically on these ([how screening questions work](/guides/screening-questions)), so a guessed answer is worse than none. Paste the form's questions and ask for answers from your facts, with the questions it cannot answer listed separately. Shortlist does this and never answers personal questions (gender, ethnicity, disability, veteran status): they come back to you, every time. ## 6. Keep a simple record Ask the assistant to keep the list as you go: company, role, score, date applied, what happened. With Shortlist connected, the jobs you score and the applications you mark as applied are already kept (while activity history is on), so "which jobs above 70 haven't I applied to?" is one question. ## What stays with you Three things should never be handed over: 1. **Submitting.** Read the whole application as the recruiter will see it, then press Submit yourself. An assistant that submits for you will one day submit something you would not have. 2. **Personal questions.** They are yours to answer or decline. 3. **The last read of the resume.** If a line would make you uncomfortable in an interview, it does not belong there. ## A short session, start to finish 1. "Get my profile from Shortlist and tell me in three lines what kind of roles it fits." 2. "Score these five postings and rank them. Skip anything with a dealbreaker." 3. "For the top two, what is missing from my profile that I might actually have?" (Update the profile if so.) 4. "Write a resume for the first one and show me the fact check." 5. "Here are the form's questions. Answer them from my profile and list what I need to answer." 6. Fill in the rest, read it all, press Submit. ## FAQ ### Can ChatGPT or Claude write my resume? Yes, and they write fluently. The risk is that they write what reads well rather than what is true. Give them your facts, tell them to use nothing else, and check every line against your experience before you send it. ### Is it acceptable to use AI for job applications? Generally yes, as long as everything you send is true and you can speak to it in an interview. Recruiters care about accuracy, not about who typed the sentence. Some employers ask candidates not to use AI in written answers or assessments; follow what the application says. ### How do I stop the assistant making things up? Give it one document of facts, tell it to use only that and to ask when something is missing, and ask it afterwards to list any line it cannot support with a quote. A tool that fact-checks against your profile, like Shortlist, does the last step for you. ### Should I let an AI answer screening questions? Let it draft them from answers you saved, and check them. Knockout questions on salary, notice period and work authorisation reject applications automatically, so these are the answers to be most careful with. ### Will recruiters know I used AI? Often not, and it matters less than whether the application fits the job. Generic answers, claims that do not survive the first interview question, and many applications to roles far from your experience are what stand out.