‘Beating the AI bot’ is a phrase we hear often when working with clients and their families, because it often feels as though the AI used by employers to screen applicants is out to get us, and that recruitment has become a cyber battlefield where the human David must slay the AI Goliath to have a chance of sitting across the table from a real live human being in an interview. Our view is that, just as with David’s innocuous-looking sling, a candidate’s most powerful weapon is something they happen to be carrying with them already. It is their human skills.

This got me thinking and I remembered something Stephen Fry said in an interview with Zoe Ball in response to a question about what kind of career he might be engaged in if he weren’t ‘in television’. He thought perhaps he’d be teaching, but reflected that really, career aspirations should centre on how one wants to behave, rather than what job one wants to have. He said, ‘Be a verb, don’t be a noun’.

there are many different wines, just as there are many different types of people. Successful career conversations are paired with the client's context and personality. The central and most essential consideration is to meet the client's needs in a way that is compatible with their personality and way of thinking. An expert coach enables the client to lead and discover the right solutions for themselves.