{"id":530753,"date":"2026-07-03T08:09:12","date_gmt":"2026-07-03T08:09:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/530753\/"},"modified":"2026-07-03T08:09:12","modified_gmt":"2026-07-03T08:09:12","slug":"job-interviews-are-becoming-ai-tests-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/530753\/","title":{"rendered":"Job interviews are becoming AI tests \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

McKinsey<\/a>\u2019s assessments of aspiring junior consultants include a \u201cproblem-solving\u201d interview that presents candidates with a typical client challenge. This might be how to reallocate and retrain beauty advisers for a cosmetics company, or whether a truck-maker should invest in electric fleets.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are trying to mirror the problems they will encounter,\u201d says Marie Christine Padberg, partner of talent attraction at the consultancy.<\/p>\n

Since the end of last year, McKinsey has added a new component to the recruitment interviews: the use of AI<\/a>. It wants candidates to show how they use it to research and analyse data, and test and refine their ideas.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe assess judgment and how they use it,\u201d says Padberg. \u201cWe don\u2019t test how to prompt or how many tools they know. It\u2019s more, \u2018What you do with the output, how do you engage the AI sources?\u2019\u201d <\/p>\n

Recently, the consultancy has encouraged candidates to bring their preferred AI tools, rather than use the in-house chatbot, Lilli. \u201cIt\u2019s more interactive and less structured, which our candidates like.\u201d<\/p>\n

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For now, such AI tests in interviews are largely restricted to entry-level roles \u201cwhere the vast majority of hiring happens\u201d, adds Padberg. The company is also experimenting with using AI to do the first interview screen \u2013 to gather information such as a candidate\u2019s availability, preferred location and salary expectations \u2013 for a small number of support roles.<\/p>\n

Such AI tests are increasingly becoming part of interviews and challenges for candidates applying for non-technical roles.<\/p>\n

\u201cBefore, using AI would be cheating; now [hiring managers] want to see it being used. Claude [chatbot] has been a real trigger,\u201d says Ken Schumacher, founder of Ropes, a recruitment verification service.<\/p>\n

\u2018We have disqualified people who are not crossing the AI bar at the senior level, especially. We need people not to be afraid to learn new things\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2014 \u00a0Sinohe Terrero, Envoy<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you\u2019d applied for a role three years ago, you\u2019d be asked how to deal with a tricky team member,\u201d adds Doug Rode, regional managing director for the UK and Ireland at recruiter Michael Page. Today, it is more likely to be \u201cthree ways you would use AI\u201d.<\/p>\n

Rode observes that abilities with AI are increasingly being assessed in interviews for management consultancy, strategy, research, and legal and marketing roles, either by asking candidates to explain how they use it day to day, or through a practical test. This might include asking them to improve on a poor prompt, or talk through the use of AI in scenario-based questions. <\/p>\n

Recently, a candidate for an operations role in construction was required to show how they would use AI to improve efficiency in site management. <\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019re having to talk to candidates about it,\u201d says Rode. Some \u201cfeel uncomfortable\u201d in such scenarios, but he hopes more applicants see it as \u201can opportunity to show off their skills\u201d.<\/p>\n

The rise in AI screening reflects the expanding role of the new technology in working life and a recruitment process that uses AI to screen and interview candidates. <\/p>\n

Sander van \u2018t Noordende, chief executive of recruitment firm Randstad, sees such interview tests as \u201cpart of a much broader workforce adaptation to AI\u201d. \u201cDemand for AI skills is accelerating rapidly, so it\u2019s no surprise employers are now asking even non-technical candidates to demonstrate how they use AI in practice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sinohe Terrero, chief financial officer and chief operating officer at Envoy, the workplace management company, is also starting to use technology tests in interviews. He says it is not just about being comfortable with the technology, but \u201ca sign of intellectual curiosity\u201d. \u201cWe have disqualified people who are not crossing the AI bar at the senior level, especially. We need people not to be afraid to learn new things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Recruiters are also finding that AI tasks help them gain a deeper insight into candidates\u2019 abilities during the interview process.<\/p>\n

Arjun Kannan, co-founder of property management tech start-up ResiDesk, says the deployment of AI tests in interviews has instigated good conversations that mimic real-life work situations.<\/p>\n

He recently set candidates applying for a marketing role the challenge of positioning a product for a fictional customer. One used Claude code to create a leasing landing page that he says made \u201cthe conversation sharper than a written plan would\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe point wasn\u2019t to make a page we would ship, the point was to get to a page that sharply defined the details of their vision, and we spent the last 40 minutes reacting to specific copy and layout choices instead of talking broadly about messaging. The quality of the output was much less important than the quality of the discussion.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The test gives candidates an opportunity to show how they would work in a real job, he says. \u201cIt goes the other way too \u2013 I want them to see how we\u2019d actually work with them, instead of the skewed power dynamics in a typical interview. Once there\u2019s a real draft of an artefact on the table, they get to see how we share feedback, whether we\u2019re honest about it, and whether it\u2019s useful. That\u2019s the part where people decide if they actually want to work here.\u201d <\/p>\n

The biggest challenge with traditional interviews, he says, is that they do not give an opportunity to show the actual job. \u201cIt\u2019s a little like auditioning a musician for an orchestra by having them write sheet music instead of playing a piece.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u2018There\u2019s different levels of proficiency, but they can learn. We are assessing the adaptability of people and their agility\u2019<\/p>\n

\u2014 \u00a0Marie Christine Padberg, McKinsey<\/p>\n

Before these tools, the closest version for his company to what\u2019s happening was to pay a candidate to work on a project over a week or two. \u201cWe still do that when it makes sense, but it\u2019s a big ask when someone has three other interviews. Using AI tools together lets us compress a lot of that into a few hours.\u201d<\/p>\n

In a recent interview for a product marketing executive position at Envoy, a candidate demonstrated their use of AI to automate workflows. Another, going for a senior accounting role, was asked to discuss prompts and data used to create technical memos.<\/p>\n

Terrero says: \u201cIt\u2019s all about time saving. People are coming in with ideas on how you get machines to do the heavy lifting. What I\u2019m trying to do is get my teams to spend time on the intelligent work.\u201d<\/p>\n

This fits with the company\u2019s wider strategy of encouraging AI take-up, including evaluating its use as part of employees\u2019 performance reviews.<\/p>\n

Rode advises candidates in the same way he would for any practical tests. \u201cThink about how you might answer, rather than practising. It\u2019s no different from showcasing your skills [like] showing me three pieces of content you made.\u201d<\/p>\n

Padberg is keen to point out that technical tests are just \u201cone read across multiple reads\u201d.<\/p>\n

Among the junior candidates, proficiency is \u201cpretty high, most have used it in their studies before. There\u2019s different levels of proficiency, but they can learn. We are assessing the adaptability of people and their agility. The tools we\u2019re using today won\u2019t be used in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

Nathaalie Carey, chief human resources officer at Prologis, a real estate logistics company, has a similar view that AI proficiency is not always essential to secure a job: \u201cIf people are open and inquisitive, we can help bring them along on [AI].\u201d \u2013 Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"McKinsey\u2019s assessments of aspiring junior consultants include a \u201cproblem-solving\u201d interview that presents candidates with a typical client challenge.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":530754,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[220,218,219,61,60,24498,80,1962],"class_list":["post-530753","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mckinsey","tag-technology","tag-work"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530753","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=530753"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/530753\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/530754"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=530753"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=530753"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=530753"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}