Background

  • Employers use AI to filter job candidates
  • One of those filters is the extent to which a candidate’s resume matches the job description (JD)
  • Thus, a best practice for applying to jobs is to tailor your resume to the JD for each role to which you apply

Options

Job seekers in 2026 have roughly 3 options.

  • No AI. Manually write resume variants for each role. This is obviously time consuming for the modern job seeker applying to dozens of roles per week.
  • 100% AI. A prospective employee might prompt Claude or ChatGPT to modify their resume to match a given JD. Or they might use a purpose-built tool like jobscan that does it for you.
  • Hybrid between AI and my writing. This is what I do.

The hybrid approach

I don’t want to use AI to write my resume.

  • I trust my own words more than Claude for something high stakes like a job application
  • I don’t want to lie to companies with stuff AI made up
  • I know my career the best

Step 1: All the bullets

So I made a massive (2,500 words & counting) text file called all the bullets.txt that has a list of all the things I’ve done at the four companies I’ve worked for over fifteen years, like "Planned and executed integrated sales campaign motions across events, webinars, digital ads, and email sequences"

Step 2: Claude Skill

I made a Claude Skill that does the following:

  1. Reads whatever JD I paste in
  2. Chooses the best matching bullets
  3. Prompts me if there’s a gap between the JD and my bullets. If there’s a gap for which I have a credible answer, it’s just not in the text file yet, I write it and instruct Claude to add to the file.
  4. Creates headings and places the bullets under them
  5. Writes a snippet draft
Download the skill Once I review the draft, I ask Claude to create a .doc file using a templated version of my resume w/ placeholders. Finally, I edit that draft in Pages, double check everything, and export to PDF.

Conclusion

This process has been working well for me. I’m not saying I get an interview for every role to which I apply, far from it, but my hit rate is acceptable. I also feel good about this balance between using AI while keeping my integrity intact.