Over the past few months, I’ve been sitting in on a number of industry sessions and client conversations, and one theme keeps coming up again and again: hiring is getting noisier, not better.
On paper, high applicant volume still looks like a win. More candidates, more choice, better outcomes… right? I’m not so sure anymore. What I’m seeing—and what many of you are probably experiencing—is that volume without verification is becoming a liability.
We’re now operating in a world where a candidate isn’t just a candidate. They might be real, they might be heavily AI-assisted, or they might not even be who they claim to be.
That’s a very different hiring landscape than even three years ago.
The Rise of “Too Good to Be True”
In one of the sessions I attended, a stat stuck with me: projections suggest that by 2028, as many as 1 in 4 candidate profiles could be fake or materially misleading.
That’s not just resume exaggeration; we’ve always dealt with that. This is different.
We’re talking about:
- AI-assisted profiles that are polished beyond reality
- Candidates who can speak convincingly to work they didn’t do
- Identity fraud—people interviewing as someone else
- Coordinated fake candidate schemes designed to get someone on payroll
And increasingly, deepfake technology is entering the mix—synthetic video and voice layered into interviews.
In another demo I attended, the technology to detect this is already evolving quickly: real-time face and voice verification, behavioral pattern tracking, even systems that can flag when someone is likely asynthetic identity versus a real person. That should tell us something. If detection tools are advancing this quickly, the problem they’re solving is already here.
AI in Recruitment: Helpful, But Not There Yet
I’m a big believer in using technology to improve recruiting. I’ve spent years leading teams that implement it.
But I’ll say this clearly: AI still has a long way to go in recruitment.
Right now, it’s great at:
- Speed
- Pattern recognition
- Surface-level matching
Where it struggles is where recruiters actually create value:
- Judgement
- Context
- Depth
- Human nuance
And that’s exactly where fake or inflated profiles can slip through.
AI can help us screen faster—but it doesn’t necessarily help us trust better. In some cases, it’s actually amplifying the problem by making it easier to generate highly convincing candidate profiles.
Why Precision Hiring Matters Now
This is where I think we need to shift our mindset. It’s no longer about how many candidates we can process. It’s about how precisely we can validate and assess them. Precision hiring, to me, means:
- Slowing down just enough to verify what matters
- Designing processes that surface truth, not just performance
- Protecting hiring outcomes—not just filling roles
Because the cost of getting this wrong is real. Even catching a bad hire early can cost tens of thousands of dollars. And beyond cost, there’s risk—access to systems, data, clients. This isn’t just a recruiting problem anymore. It’s a business risk.
What Recruiters Can Actually Do (Right Now)
The good news is we’re not powerless here. A lot of what works is still rooted in strong recruiting fundamentals—just applied more intentionally. Here are a few practical shifts I’d recommend:
- Reintroduce Verification Early
Don’t wait until offer stage. Identity and credibility checks need to happen earlier in the process, especially for remote roles.
- Go Deeper, Not Broader in Interviews
Surface-level questions won’t cut it anymore. Go 3–5 layers deep:
- “Walk me through how you did that.”
- “What was the biggest challenge?”
- “What would you do differently?”
Fake or AI-assisted candidates tend to break down under depth.
- Use Live Validation Techniques
For technical roles, lean into:
- Live coding
- Whiteboarding
- Real-time problem solving
These are much harder to fake than polished take-home assignments.
- Trust (and Train) Your Instincts
Recruiters are picking up signals already:
- Delayed responses on video
- Inconsistent answers
- Vague explanations
We need to normalize documenting and escalating these—not ignoring them.
- Build a Simple Fraud Playbook
This doesn’t need to be complex:
- What are red flags?
- What’s the escalation path?
- Who gets involved (Talent Acquisition, Information Technology, legal)?
Organizations that treat this proactively will be ahead of the curve.
- Use Technology Thoughtfully
There are tools emerging to help—resume analysis, metadata checks, even deepfake detection. But the key is this: use tech to support recruiter judgement, not replace it.
Final Thought
We’re entering a phase where hiring isn’t just about attracting talent—it’s about verifying it.
Volume used to be a competitive advantage. Now, without precision, it can actually work against us. The recruiters who adapt fastest won’t be the ones who move the quickest.
They’ll be the ones who learn how to slow down in the right places—and ask better questions.
