Podcast: Playing the job market

Increasingly, job seekers need to pass a series of tests in the form of artificial-intelligence games just to be seen by a hiring manager. In this third of a four-part miniseries on AI and hiring, we speak to someone who helped create these tests, and we ask who might get left behind in the process and why there isn't more policy in place. We also try out some of these tools ourselves. This miniseries on hiring was reported by Hilke Schellmann and produced by Jennifer Strong, Emma Cillekens, Anthony Green, and Karen Hao. Jennifer: Often in life … you have to "play the metaphorical game"… to get the win you might be chasing. It's just a complicated game.. Gh - ah.. Game.." Jennifer: But what if that game… was literal? And what if winning at it could mean the difference between landing a job you've been dreaming of… or not. Increasingly job seekers need to pass a series of "tests" in the form of artificial-intelligence games… just to be seen by a hiring manager. Anonymous job seeker: For me, being a military veteran being able to take tests and quizzes or being under pressure is nothing for me, but I don't know why the cognitive tests gave me anxiety, but I think it's because I knew that it had nothing to do with software engineering that's what really got me. She asked us to call her Sally because she's criticizing the hiring methods of potential employers and she's concerned about publishing her real name. She has a graduate degree in information from Rutgers University in New Jersey, with specialties in data science and interaction design. And Sally fails to see how solving a timed puzzle... or playing video games like Tetris... have any real bearing on her potential to succeed in her field. So companies want to do diversity and inclusion, but you're not doing diversity and inclusion when it comes to thinking, not everyone thinks the same. So how are you inputting that diversity and inclusion when you're only selecting the people that can figure out a puzzle within 60 seconds.