AI Recruiting Academy › Module 6: AI across the recruiting desk
The short answer
AI can draft a job ad in seconds, but a draft built from a job title alone comes out generic, and generic ads attract the wrong people. Give the AI your intake brief, the real pay range, the real benefits and the first 90 day goals, and tell it not to add anything you did not supply.
Then edit it like a recruiter: cut invented requirements, check the wording for bias, confirm the pay range meets local law, and make it sound like your company, not every other ad online.
How many recruiters use AI to write job ads?
It is one of the most common uses of AI in hiring. In SHRM’s 2024 survey of HR professionals, 65% of organizations using AI for recruiting used it to write job descriptions, and 42% used it to tailor job postings.
Most job boards and applicant tracking systems now build it in. Indeed’s job description tool drafts a posting from a title and a short description and says nothing goes live without your review. LinkedIn’s job posting assistant drafts the post for promoted jobs. Workable has offered a built in generator since 2023.
Do AI written job ads actually work?
They save time, but a lazy draft can cost you hires. Researchers ran a field experiment on a hiring platform for remote jobs, reported by MIT Sloan. About 75% of employers used the AI drafting tool when offered it. It cut writing time by 44% and made employers 19% more likely to post a job.
The catch: posts written with AI were 15% less likely to lead to a hire. The researchers found the AI posts were more generic and less informative, so more of the wrong people applied and good fits could not tell whether the job suited them. The time the employer saved was lost again by candidates, and then by the recruiter reading their applications.
The lesson is not to avoid AI. It is to feed it the specific facts that only you know.
How do you write a job ad with AI, step by step?
1. Start from the intake brief. The brief from Lesson 1 holds the must haves, pay, location and goals. Without it, the AI guesses.
2. Tell the AI what it may not add. No extra requirements, no degree unless you asked for one, no invented perks.
3. Ask for a set length and plain language. Textio’s analysis of millions of postings found the best performing ads run about 300 to 660 words, and that listing two or three real benefits was linked to filling roles faster.
4. Check the wording for bias. Run the draft through a checker and fix what it flags.
5. Check the law and the listing format. Pay range, location and the details Google needs to show the job in search.
6. Read it as the candidate. Would the person you want to hire know what the job is, what it pays and why they should care?
A prompt you can copy
Write a job ad for [title] at [company]. Use ONLY these facts: must have skills [3 to 5], nice to haves [list], pay range [range], location or remote [details], benefits [3 real ones], team and first 90 day goals [details]. Do not add any requirement, degree or years of experience that I did not list. Aim for 400 to 600 words, speak to the reader as "you", use short paragraphs and keep bullet points to a minimum.
How does bias get into job ads?
Through word choice. A well known study in the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology analysed more than 4,000 job ads and found ads for male dominated jobs used more masculine words, such as “competitive”, “dominant” and “leader”. Women found those ads less appealing because they felt they would not belong, not because they doubted their ability.
AI can make this worse, because it copies patterns from millions of existing ads. Develop Diverse, a vendor that sells inclusive writing software, reported that GPT 4 job ads scored lower on its inclusivity measure than ads written by people. Treat that as vendor research, but check every draft either way. Module 4, Lesson 1 explains how bias gets into AI.
| Watch for | Examples | Try instead |
|---|---|---|
| Gender coded words | Dominant, aggressive, rockstar, ninja | Skilled, driven, strong at |
| Age coded words | Digital native, young team, recent graduate | Comfortable with [tool], collaborative team |
| Physical demands that are not needed | Must lift 50 pounds, for an office job | List only the physical tasks the job really involves |
| Inflated requirements | Degree required, 10 years of experience | The skill itself, and how a candidate could show it |
Our free job description bias checker flags these words for you.
Should a job ad ask for a degree?
Only if the job really needs one. AI tools tend to add degree and years of experience lines because so many old ads include them. Research by Harvard Business School and the Burning Glass Institute found that many employers announced they had dropped degree requirements, but the change showed up in fewer than 1 in 700 hires. Where firms did hire people without degrees into those roles, those workers stayed longer.
Ask your AI assistant to review every requirement and flag any that could be a skill instead of a credential.
Do you have to put the salary in a job ad?
In a growing number of places, yes. According to law firm Jackson Lewis, these require pay ranges in job postings as of 2026:
| Where | Rule |
|---|---|
| California, Colorado, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Vermont, Washington and Washington DC | Pay range in the job posting |
| Cincinnati, Cleveland, Columbus and Toledo, Ohio | City level pay transparency rules |
| Connecticut, Nevada and Rhode Island | Pay range on request or at set points in the process |
| Delaware | Posting rule scheduled for 2027 |
| European Union | The Pay Transparency Directive requires starting pay in the ad or before the interview, bans asking for pay history and requires gender neutral job titles. Countries are adding it to national law now |
Rules differ on employer size and remote roles, so check with your legal team. Candidates want the number anyway: Indeed’s Hiring Lab found 60% of US postings on Indeed showed pay information in early 2025, up from 18% in 2020. An ad without pay now stands out, and not in a good way.
What does Google need to show your job in search?
Google shows jobs in its own search results when the careers page carries job posting markup. The required fields are the title, the full description, the date posted, the hiring organization and the location, or a remote flag for fully remote jobs. Most ATS careers pages add this for you. Google does not allow keyword stuffing and may take action on sites that leave expired jobs up, so close ads when roles are filled.
Quick answers
Is it OK to have AI rewrite a competitor’s job ad?
No. Their text is their copyright, and it describes their job, not yours. Start from your own intake notes.
Will candidates know an ad was written by AI?
Often, when it is generic. Specific details about the team, the work and the pay are what make an ad read as real.
Can AI write the internal job description and the public ad?
Yes, and they should differ. The job description defines the role for HR. The ad sells it to candidates. Ask for both from the same brief.
How often should I refresh a job ad?
If a posting gets few good applicants in the first week or two, rewrite the opening and the must haves before you widen the budget.
Explore in the directory
Module 6: AI across the recruiting desk
- How can AI help with hiring manager intake meetings?
- How do you write job descriptions and job ads with AI?
- What is a recruiting chatbot, and does it help candidates?
- How does AI help with reference checks and job offers?
- How do agency recruiters use AI to win new clients?