81 percent India’s hiring managers expect text-based resumes will be obsolete in 5 years: Canva

Canva, the visual communication platform, released new insights from 10,000 hiring managers and job seekers on their experience of using visual design and AI to land their dream job. Canva commissioned Sago to survey 5,000 hiring managers and 5,000 job seekers from India, US, UK, Germany, Spain, France, Mexico, and Brazil, to understand how screening candidates has evolved and why it’s crucial to embrace design to stand out in the crowd.

Amy Schultz, Global Head of Talent Acquisition, Canva, said, “The transformative impact of visuals and generative AI on the hiring landscape has become more apparent, with both hiring managers and job seekers embracing them to enhance the recruitment process. Our research highlights how creativity and the use of Gen AI have notably lowered obstacles for jobseekers in shaping their professional brands, allowing them to stand out in the crowd and land their dream jobs. Hiring managers in India too have shown openness in integrating generative AI to boost creativity, leading to improvement in the quality of talent discussions going forward.”

The top findings from Indian hiring managers and job seekers include:

Text-based resumes will be a thing of the past. 81 percent of India’s hiring managers expect text-based resumes will be obsolete in the next 5 years.

Hiring managers are quite concerned having noticed that almost half of the resumes that reach them have either too much text or extend to too many pages. Despite what hiring managers want, most job seekers have made updates to the text on their resumes (67 percent) and have not addressed the need for visual elements.

Hiring managers want interactive, visual resumes. While most of India’s jobseekers are satisfied with how their resume looks (62 percent), candidates may want to note that 7 in 10 hiring managers prefer more interactive resumes with visual elements like images and graphics (66%) and colors (61 percent).

Hiring managers prefer candidates to have digital portfolios. 84 percent of Indian hiring managers prefer candidates with digital portfolios than those without. India’s job seekers have been up to the task, using digital portfolios the most (52 percent) across all markets.

Hiring managers back the use of generative AI for improving job applications. 93 percent of Indian hiring managers believe it’s acceptable for candidates to use generative AI to polish their resumes or application materials. This is a welcome news for most jobseekers who lack the tools, time, and skills to make their job search easier.

Jobseekers increasingly use generative AI for their application materials. Nearly two-thirds (74 percent) of jobseekers in India admit they’ve used generative AI for their resumes. 82% believe it helps them simplify the resume building process, save time (72 percent), and be more creative (72 percent). With its profound impact in their job search, 92 percent of jobseekers are likely to use generative AI again to build or update their resume.