{"slug": "the-root-cause-of-not-getting-hired", "title": "The Root Cause of Not Getting Hired", "summary": "Fraser Merrifield, founder of FORM Careers in Glasgow, said AI has made both hiring and getting hired harder, but most horror stories are myths, with his clients averaging two interview stages and CV-rejecting AI mostly nonexistent. He noted a 12-month window on the 'AI-native engineer' hype and warned that leaning on senior hires repeats the mistake that caused oil and gas talent shortages. In one case, 200 applications for a graduate role yielded one candidate who called and got the job as the only person interviewed, and he remains three years later.", "body_md": "In this episode of Root Cause we sit down with Fraser Merrifield, founder of FORM Careers in Glasgow and the self-described craft brewer of digital recruitment, to get to the root cause of the gap between what the hiring market says it wants and what it actually rewards. Fraser spent over a decade placing engineers in oil and gas, then bet on software in his late 30s, went fully solo, and now runs deliberately small on what he calls bullshit-free recruitment. He barely reads CVs anymore, and he'll tell you why a perfect one makes him suspicious.\n\nWe dig into why AI has made both hiring and getting hired harder while most of the horror stories stay myths: his clients average two interview stages, and the CV-rejecting AI mostly doesn't exist. Fraser explains the 12-month window on the \"AI-native engineer\" hype, what happens when an engineer burns through more in tokens than their salary, and why leaning on senior hires is the same mistake that left oil and gas with a talent shortage. And the story that sums up the whole market: 200 applications for one graduate role, one candidate picked up the phone, and he got the job, as the only person interviewed. Three years later he is still there.\n\n00:00 Cold Open: Six Yes/No Claims About the Job Market\n\n00:41 Introduction of the Episode and the Guest\n\n03:35 Writing Like a Human: Pop Culture and Starting in Lockdown\n\n05:56 Five Views or Five Million: How to Read Your LinkedIn Visibility\n\n07:45 Everyone's CV Is Perfect Now, So What Stands Out?\n\n09:23 The Online Mood Hoover: Positivity vs Ranting\n\n12:22 The Blitz Round: Yes or No\n\n13:06 Why AI Made Both Hiring and Getting Hired Harder\n\n14:48 Just Another Hype Cycle? The 12-Month Window\n\n16:11 When Engineers Burn More in Tokens Than Their Salary\n\n17:53 Eight-Stage Interviews: Would You Even Want That Job?\n\n20:36 Can Bullshit-Free Recruitment Scale?\n\n22:06 CVs After AI: Rejecting the Quick-Appliers, Rewarding the Extra Mile\n\n25:25 One of 200 Applicants Picked Up the Phone. He Got the Job\n\n27:06 Glasgow AI and the Return of Offline Networking\n\n29:10 The Undercurrent of Real People on LinkedIn\n\n31:18 How Fraser Actually Uses AI (and How It Argued Back)\n\n37:38 Fraser Flips the Script: The Most In-Demand Skill in Five Years\n\n43:21 Juniors vs Seniors: The Oil and Gas Warning\n\n46:11 Asking About Training Without Entitlement\n\n47:17 Question from Evan Marshall: When Are We Getting Robots?\n\n52:14 Question for the Next Guest: Top Five Movies\n\n52:45 Movie Recommendations: Her, Ex Machina, Transcendence\n\n54:24 Closing\n\nFind Fraser at:\n\n• LinkedIn - [https://www.linkedin.com/in/fraser-merrifield-7b54524/](https://www.linkedin.com/in/fraser-merrifield-7b54524/)\n\n• Form Careers - [https://weformcareers.com/](https://weformcareers.com/)\n\n• Glasgow AI Meetup - [https://www.meetup.com/meetup-group-xnqxwqzu/](https://www.meetup.com/meetup-group-xnqxwqzu/)\n\nFind me (Nune) at:\n\nLinkedIn:\n\n[https://www.linkedin.com/in/nisabek/](https://www.linkedin.com/in/nisabek/)Substack:\n\n[https://www.thoughtfultechnologist.com/](https://www.thoughtfultechnologist.com/)Envimate:\n\n[https://envimate.com/](https://envimate.com/)", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-root-cause-of-not-getting-hired", "canonical_source": "https://www.thoughtfultechnologist.com/p/the-root-cause-of-not-getting-hired-2c0", "published_at": "2026-08-10 15:25:22+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-17 14:13:12.079562+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["artificial-intelligence", "ai-policy"], "entities": ["Fraser Merrifield", "FORM Careers", "Glasgow AI Meetup", "Nune", "Envimate"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-root-cause-of-not-getting-hired", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-root-cause-of-not-getting-hired.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-root-cause-of-not-getting-hired.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/the-root-cause-of-not-getting-hired.jsonld"}}