As technology rapidly changes, it is important to be equipped to navigate the evolving landscape of artificial intelligence as it relates to career paths, job searches, and more.
In this AI Career Toolkit, you will find resources to help you responsibly use artificial intelligence to:
- Explore majors, careers, and career paths
- Apply for jobs, internships, and other workplace experiences
- Navigate your future career and the technology-driven world of work
What is Generative AI?
Generative AI is artificial intelligence that can create original content – such as text, images, video, audio, or software code – in response to a user’s prompt or request. It uses machine learning to create new content based on content it has seen before. Generative AI can be a supportive and powerful companion as you explore careers and majors, apply for jobs and internships, and navigate the world of work. It’s also important to understand the Generative AI has limitations, just like any other technology. This toolkit focuses on how you can use generative AI in your career journey.
UW-Madison Supported AI Career Tools
Microsoft Copilot
We highly recommend using Microsoft Copilot as your generative AI tool for career exploration and planning. This tool is supported by UW-Madison and free for all students. Using Copilot while logged in with your NetID provides important data security and privacy protections. Microsoft will not use your prompts or responses to train its AI models; however, please never enter sensitive personal information.
Other generative AI tools (such as ChatGPT) are often not free and don't offer the most up-to-date information, data security, and privacy protections.
Big Interview
UW-Madison also offers the mock interview tool, Big Interview, to all UW-Madison students for free. Big Interview’s AI feedback feature is an innovative way to improve your interviewing skills and pinpoint your strengths and weaknesses.
When you create a mock interview video, the AI tool will process your video and offer you immediate feedback on how to improve. Get started with Mock Interviews to receive your AI interview feedback!
Considerations When Using Generative AI
Before you dive in, make sure you have a clear understanding of the benefits and limitations of artificial intelligence. Below you will find points to consider before you start using generative AI tools in your career journey. We hope these considerations will allow you to feel confident in your ability to use AI tools wisely and ethically.
Benefits of Using AI
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Accessibility
Generative AI (and the knowledge it can provide) is available for everyone; for all types of learning styles, languages, abilities, and stages in your career; from anywhere; and you can use it 24/7!
Time Saving
Generative AI can help you complete tasks like writing a resume or cover letter quickly and more efficiently, leaving you more time to dig into other things like preparing for interviews and building your career networks of support.
Idea Generation
Generative AI’s responses and ideas are truly infinite! Stuck and don’t know where to start with your career, job application, career fair preparation, networking conversations…? Want help with brainstorming? Generative AI is your tool!
Support at Your Fingertips
Think of generative AI as a companion on your career journey! It can provide you general advice and guidance, help you with research, provide a different perspective, check your assumptions, and edit/revise your writing.
Building Important Career Skills
Generative AI skills are in demand in today’s workforce! No matter the industry, AI -combined with strong critical thinking and problem-solving skills and the ability to approach challenges creatively- can help you tackle the complex problems we face as a society.
Limitations of Using AI
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Absence of Human Interaction
While AI tools are interactive in nature and can feel like you’re having a discussion with someone, they cannot replace the value found in human interaction with your career advisor and other people you trust. Use discussions with these important career champions to gain personal insight, ask questions, sort out feelings, and make meaningful connections…something a machine like generative AI cannot assist you with.
Dependence on AI
While generative AI can be a helpful place to start research and get ideas, it can lead to overdependence on technology and neglecting the ability to think critically and use your own personal voice in your career journey!
Reliability Issues
Generative AI may generate responses that are biased or inaccurate. Use your critical thinking skills and gut feelings (does something not feel quite right?) to distinguish facts from fiction.
Lack of Personalization
Generic prompts will result in generic responses with generative AI. Generative AI lacks context and awareness of your personal story. For example, without very specific prompting, generative AI cannot tell your personal story in a cover letter in a way that is authentic to your own values, voice, tone, or written communication skills. Moreover, it also does not have the ability to determine if listing one skill over another on your resume would impress a hiring manager more. We recommend using generative AI for brainstorming and refining your ideas.
Encountering Bias
Responses from generative AI platforms pull from all information that has ever been published on the internet, including information published by prejudiced humans. AI responses can perpetuate biases. Be aware of potential biases and always critically evaluate information generated. Seek diverse perspectives from mentors, peers, and industry professionals from varied backgrounds to counteract biased viewpoints from generative AI tools.
Data Privacy
Be aware and cautious of sharing personal data with AI tools. Understand how your data is being stored, used, and secured by reviewing the data privacy policy page of the tool you are using.
Personally identifiable information such as name, email address, physical address, social security number, passwords, and organization names should NEVER be inputted into AI.
See more information above about UW-Madison’s instance of Microsoft Copilot that provides important privacy and data protections.
Career Prompt Engineering
Prompt engineering is the process of writing, refining, and optimizing inputs (what you enter into the generative AI tool) to encourage generative AI systems to create specific, high-quality responses. Simply put, your job is to act as a guide, providing the generative AI tool with the most appropriate formats, phrases, and words to get the best results.
At the bottom of this page, you’ll find a link to some prompts (created and tested by UW-Madison career services staff) to help you get started with generative AI for a variety of career scenarios.
As you engineer your own prompts for AI tools during your career journey, here are some things to keep in mind:
- We strongly recommend you use Microsoft Copilot as your generative AI companion in your career journey. It is free to UW-Madison students and offers data security and privacy protections. We will refer to Copilot in the prompts for this reason.
- Never enter sensitive personal information (examples include your name, email address, physical address, social security number, passwords, etc.) into Copilot or any other AI tool.
- Copilot can have character limits, so the shorter the prompt, the better! If you need to paste large amounts of text into Copilot (for example, cover letter or resume information), think critically about what you need to share to get your point across. This might take some trial and error and multiple rounds of questions to fine-tune.
- Use creativity and a “trial and error” approach. Your first input into Copilot might not (and probably will not) yield the best response. The skill of narrowing down on the best prompt to answer your questions will be important as you enter the workforce!
- Get specific! Copilot needs your details and context to produce useful results. Personalize the content as much as you can for your situation without inputting sensitive personal information or writing a complicated prompt that Copilot won’t understand.
- Consider prompt engineering as a conversation with Copilot. Think of this as a discussion with a peer and ask follow up questions to help you seek clarity and understanding. We’ve modeled that process for you in the provided prompts.
- Think critically throughout the process! Do not take everything Copilot provides verbatim. Personalize the output, use it as a draft, ask for feedback, and seek a thought partner and research companion.
- Copilot will never replace the guidance of a career advisor or other trusted human. We provide tips in the prompts on when the expertise of your career advisor will be of the utmost importance.