Hired or hidden? AI’s new power in the job market
Business Daily
BBC
4.4 • 816 Ratings
🗓️ 5 May 2026
⏱️ 18 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Artificial Intelligence has upended the market for entry-level jobs, but could AI be blocking graduates from getting a foot on the jobs ladder altogether? In this episode, we look at the new AI arms race in recruitment.
Tech advancements have allowed graduates to apply for more jobs than ever, and hiring managers can let AI do the initial shortlisting and interviews, so why do both sides of the employment equation feel short-changed? And what can graduates do to stand out in a crowded market of thousands of applicants when an AI app is making the decision? We discuss the pros and cons of the AI hiring pipeline.
If you'd like to get in touch with the team, our email address is businessdaily@bbc.co.uk
Presenter: Ed Butler Producer: Josh Martin
(Picture: Young woman sitting at a kitchen table looking at a laptop screen searching for job. Credit: Getty Images)
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | BBC Sounds, Music, radio, podcasts. |
| 0:08.0 | Hi there, I'm Ed Butler. |
| 0:09.9 | Welcome to Business Daily on the BBC World Service, where today we're going to be engaging |
| 0:14.9 | what you might call a double-take, exploring different perspectives surrounding one major issue. Today, our theme is AI. Sure, we know |
| 0:24.9 | that artificial intelligence is irreversibly changing the world of work. Jobs are going to disappear. |
| 0:30.1 | Other jobs will be created. But today I'm looking to understand how AI is disrupting recruitment |
| 0:36.5 | specifically, because from what you'll hear soon, |
| 0:39.1 | the experience for job seekers has become pretty bleak. Is AI helping the job search? That's Business |
| 0:46.2 | Daily from the BBC. Yes, today I'm going to be looking at all of these subjects around AI and specifically recruitment, |
| 0:57.8 | and I'll do it in the company of Daniel Chait. He's a CEO and co-founder of Greenhouse, a recruitment AI software firm that helps companies in the US hire the right people. |
| 1:08.0 | Hello there, Daniel. How are you doing today? |
| 1:09.9 | Hi, Ed, great to be here. |
| 1:10.9 | And Professor Elizabeth Keelan from King's College, London. She's with us too. She's studied |
| 1:16.6 | developer bias in AI software tools. Hello, Elizabeth. Hello, how are you doing? Very good. Indeed. |
| 1:23.8 | Thank you both for being with us. Let's get into this. Some numbers. Did you know the unemployment rate for US college graduates has soared to 5.6% at the end of last year, this according to the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. That's outstripping the general unemployment rate by some margin. There are other red flags as well within the past year in the UK. The big four |
| 1:45.0 | accountancy firms who usually hire a lot of graduates. They've cut their recruitment of graduates |
| 1:50.7 | by as much as 44%. In both cases, AI seems to be the key in terms of the reduction of hires. |
| 1:59.4 | It's a reality facing graduates around the world, of course. |
| 2:02.5 | Karina is Ukrainian, but she's completing her master's in governance in Cardiff in the UK. |
| 2:09.2 | She's already had work experience at the United Nations, |
| 2:12.3 | but she's been rejected, she says, for hundreds of job roles in the UK. |
| 2:17.1 | I've been looking for a jobs since the end of February |
... |
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