The Collapse of Technical Hiring in the Age of AI
For years, hiring in the tech industry has operated as an elimination game. Companies receive thousands of applications, filter them through automated résumé screening, throw candidates into algorithmic problem-solving challenges, and whittle them down through a series of tests and interviews. It was never about assessing talent—it was about processing volume efficiently.
But now, AI has shattered the system.
Proctoring software, once the last line of defense against cheating, is completely compromised. Undetectable AI overlays feed candidates answers in real-time, circumventing every safeguard put in place. These aren’t primitive, copy-paste cheats. They’re invisible, real-time augmentations that extract exam questions, generate perfect solutions, and overlay them directly onto the screen, unseen by monitoring software. The integrity of online technical assessments has been annihilated.
Recruiters—who never truly understood what they were hiring for—are now lost. They relied on keyword-matching algorithms, résumé templates, and standardized tests. Now that AI effortlessly crafts flawless applications and aces coding challenges, they have no means to separate skill from automation. The vast machinery of HR, optimized for processing high applicant volumes, is obsolete overnight.
The response? Some will panic, trying to ban AI tools, introducing futile countermeasures—kernel-level monitoring, biometrics, more invasive surveillance. But the truth is inescapable: AI augmentation isn’t going away. If you want to hire real talent, you can’t rely on generic tests that AI passes effortlessly. You have to rethink how technical ability is evaluated.
In-person assessments will return, but that alone won’t fix the problem. If all companies do is take their broken process and apply it face-to-face, they’ll still fail. The only real solution is the abolition of blind filtering—no more mass elimination rounds, no more automated résumé rejections, no more outsourced evaluations. Hiring must return to what it should have always been: engineers assessing engineers, based on real-world work.
The companies that embrace this shift will thrive. The ones that cling to their broken pipelines, trusting in outdated filters, will keep hiring AI-generated candidates with no real skill. The illusion of technical hiring is over. Now we see who actually knows how to build.