According to a Nexford University study, 26 percent of hiring managers now consider AI fluency a baseline job requirement, and 35 percent specifically look for AI experience or coursework on resumes.
But here’s the problem: The work we’re hiring for today didn't exist in the mainstream six months ago. The AI experience recruiters screen for is minimal or largely self-taught.
I’ve navigated the problem of hiring for non-existent technical expertise three times in my career. I co-founded a proprietary trading firm during the shift from pit to electronic trading. Then I built a Forrester-leading performance marketing agency when that discipline was still being defined. Now, I’m in the second year of running a Chicago-based AI consultancy that helps companies with AI implementation and change management. Each time, the same truth emerges — you can’t always rely on credentials and direct experience for successful hiring in a space that's changing daily.
The Lesson Performance Marketing Taught Me
At a marketing agency, we faced a version of this problem as we worked to hire more than 1,000 employees. We needed marketers who could analyze massive data sets, identify patterns, run experiments and optimize based on results. Traditional marketers were trained to be creative storytellers and, while many candidates described themselves as analytical, our math test showed a different story.
The test wasn’t about passing or failing. It showed who could think critically under pressure and who approached problems with curiosity. That insight changed how we hired by allowing us to realize what skills we needed. We expanded our search to include people from accounting, law and finance, then taught them marketing fundamentals. They became some of our strongest performers.
Inside the AI Hiring Crisis
The situation facing companies is far worse today thanks to AI. In 2015, you could find professionals who’d spent years working with data. In 2025, however, meaningful AI experience is still measured in months. Many hiring managers are chasing credentials that don’t yet exist, which keeps roles open as they overlook talent.
An Amazon Web Services study revealed that close to three in four employers prioritizing AI talent can’t find qualified candidates with the specific skills they're seeking. Hiring managers are screening for credentials that don’t exist yet, then wondering why they can't fill roles. The key is to shift your focus from formal experience to the qualities and soft skills that aren’t usually found on a resume.
6 Traits That Predict Success in AI-First Roles
After three decades of building companies through technological shifts, I’ve largely stopped screening for credentials. Instead, I look for six character traits that predict whether someone can thrive when expertise doesn’t yet exist.
1. Team Over Ego
AI work depends on collaboration. Success comes from people who learn quickly from each other and stay open to feedback. I look for signs of that in a candidate’s background via things like steady involvement in team sports, volunteer work or group projects that require commitment and accountability. These experiences reveal humility and a willingness to grow. I also look for candidates who’ve excelled when their individual performances serve collective goals.
On a resume, this shows up as sustained participation, not just membership. Four years of varsity athletics tells me more than the phrase “team player” in a skill set section. Leading a college robotics team that competed nationally signals something different from a solo thesis project. Volunteering consistently with the same organization for years demonstrates commitment beyond personal advancement. This is the pattern I’m looking for: Evidence that someone understands how to subordinate their ego to a mission and how to trust teammates and collaborate toward a goal.
2. Coachability and Continuous Learning
The best AI practitioners are excited by the idea that mastery is a moving target. When I review resumes, I look for evidence of learning across domains — someone who taught themselves to code while working in finance or pursued certifications in fields adjacent to their main expertise.
Did they take lateral moves to learn new skills? Do they list courses, workshops or self-taught capabilities alongside formal education?
I often ask recent hires, especially those fresh out of computer science programs, about their job search experience. Their answers reveal how they navigate uncertainty and what motivates them to keep learning. I pay attention to how they describe setbacks, collaboration and moments of growth. The goal is to understand how they approach new tools, adapt to new challenges and learn from experience. Those conversations show me who will thrive as technology keeps moving forward.
3. Courage to Take Smart Risks
AI requires constant experimentation. You try an approach. If it fails, you try another. I look for people who are comfortable with uncertainty and motivated by innovation rather than paralyzed by ambiguity.
This shows up as career pivots, entrepreneurial ventures (even failed ones) or roles where they built something new. A resume that shows someone left a stable job to join an early-stage startup tells me they can handle ambiguity. So does evidence of side projects, open-source contributions or launching initiatives within larger organizations.
4. Motivated by Collective Success
Individual brilliance matters less than team performance in AI development. I screen for people who’ve demonstrated they care about shared achievement by mentoring others, contributing to team wins, sharing knowledge publicly through teaching, writing or speaking.
This trait is harder to spot on paper, but it reveals itself. Did they mentor junior colleagues? Start a study group? Contribute to documentation or internal training? The language matters too: resumes filled with “I achieved” rather than “we built” or “our team delivered” reveal underlying motivations.
5. Critical Thinking and Problem-Solving
AI roles need analytical minds that love figuring things out. These jobs require people who can break down complex problems, connect data to decisions and use evidence to guide action. Often, these are multilingual thinkers. They may be fluent in multiple spoken languages or comfortable across different coding languages, demonstrating cognitive flexibility.
At my company, every new hire takes an AI assessment to understand where they are in their AI journey. It’s not a test of knowledge. It’s a snapshot of experience and comfort with AI tools. The assessment maps each person’s current stage of adoption, from foundational learning to advanced integration, helping us tailor growth and support to their needs.
6. Adaptable and Open to Change
AI moves fast. The best people see change as opportunity, not disruption. They thrive in dynamic environments where curiosity and flexibility drive momentum.
On resumes, this appears as changes in industry, roles or technology that someone navigated successfully. Someone who started in traditional finance, moved to fintech, then to AI consulting has demonstrated adaptability. So has someone who pivoted from engineering to product management or from teaching to edtech development. I’m looking for proof they can let go of what worked yesterday to embrace what might work tomorrow.
Systematizing the Search for Soft Skills and Traits
Recognizing I couldn’t review every resume for these patterns myself, I built an AI agent to help identify these traits.
Traditional applicant tracking systems screen for keywords like “five years Python experience,” “machine learning certification,” “xyz degree.” Our AI agent analyzes resumes for the above character traits, going beyond traditional keyword matching to identify behavioral patterns and look for signals that predict actual performance. Here’s what we look for.
Language Pattern Analysis
Measures the ratio of individual versus collective pronouns throughout the resume. Candidates who naturally use “we” and “our team,” even when describing personal achievements, consistently outperform solo-focused candidates.
Learning Velocity Tracking
Identifies candidates who add two to three new technical skills per role, regardless of their starting point. A marketing coordinator who learned SQL, then Python, then data visualization shows the continuous learning pattern that succeeds in the fast-changing world of AI.
Cross-Domain Bridge Detection
Flags candidates who work at intersections: finance people who learned UX, teachers who built apps, engineers who studied psychology. These non-linear careers indicate the translation skills essential for AI implementation.
Failure Portfolio Recognition
Counterintuitively, candidates with one or two documented failures (failed startups, cancelled projects) who articulate learning from setbacks outperform others. The agent identifies specific language around resilience and iteration.
What You Can Do Tomorrow
Whether or not you build an AI agent to start hiring better for AI roles, there are three steps any hiring manager can implement immediately.
Rewrite Your Job Descriptions
Remove requirements for “X years of AI experience.” Instead, be honest about what the role requires: “You’ll learn new tools weekly. You’ll experiment, fail and need to bounce back quickly.” You’re screening for resilience.
Add a Practical Assessment
Don’t test AI knowledge. Give candidates a tool they’ve never used before and a problem to solve in real-time. You’re evaluating how they approach unfamiliar territory. Do they read documentation thoroughly? Ask clarifying questions? Try multiple approaches when the first one fails? Admit when they’re stuck and ask for help? Are they frustrated or excited by the challenge? These behaviors matter more than the right answer.
Interview for Character, Not Credentials
Here are five interview questions to uncover all six traits that predict success in AI-first environments.
5 Interview Questions to Uncover AI Skills
- The Learning Under Pressure Question: “Tell me about a time when you had to quickly master something completely new while working with others who were depending on your contribution.”
- The Pivot and Impact Question: “Walk me through a significant change in your career or approach that initially felt risky but ultimately led to better outcomes for you and others.”
- The Knowledge Sharing Scenario: “Describe a situation where you developed expertise that gave you an advantage, and you had to decide whether and how to share that knowledge with colleagues or teammates.”
- The System Breakdown Question: “Tell me about a time when a process, system, or approach you had mastered stopped working effectively. How did you diagnose what was wrong and what did you do about it?”
- The Collective Challenge Question: “Describe a project where success required genuine collaboration and where you had to let go of your own preferences for the team's benefit.”
The Challenge Ahead
AI is becoming part of every job. Marketing, finance, operations and HR are already feeling it. Leaders everywhere need to get better at recognizing people who can learn quickly and help them grow along the way.
The organizations that do this well will build stronger teams and more adaptable cultures. They’ll move faster and stay ahead as technology keeps changing. Those who focus too narrowly on credentials will find it harder to keep pace.
