It’s a tough time to be looking for a job.
In addition to tight markets, cutbacks and the elimination of work due to AI, there is the simple act of getting one’s foot in the door.
“The process was impersonal even before ChatGPT,” says David Gofman.
“But now human beings are not actually reading resumes. They’re screened by software.”
More recently, he notes, job-seekers are being invited online for what they think are interviews.
Instead, they talk to a chatbot. The conversation is recorded, processed, then — who knows what happens?
“It’s not transparent at all,” Gofman says. “You don’t know how you did, or what you were evaluated on.”
Gofman has a front row seat to the angst experienced by job-seekers — and many other young people.
David Gofman, at graduation.
A 2009 Staples High graduate and now a psychotherapist, he’s returned to the area and opened a mental health counseling and career coaching practice.
In high school Gofman was involved in WWPT radio, and played on the state champion volleyball team.
He studied media production, and played and coached club volleyball, at Ithaca College, then earned a master’s in sport and performance psychology at the University of Denver.
Gofman spent 5 years at a Westport mental health group, helping young men struggling to navigate life. During COVID he and his wife Danielle moved to Roanoke, Virginia, where he was interim CEO of a community health center.
Last summer they returned to Westport. He established his practice on Sylvan Road South. In addition to life coaching, he specializes in patients with chronic pain.
Danielle is also a therapist; she works virtually.
David and Danielle Gofman, with their children.
Gofman empathizes with his young adult and early professional clients. Some are on the cusp of graduating; others are a few years into the careers, but don’t always like where they are.
They feel both the general anxieties of young people, and uncertainty about the future of work itself.
Meanwhile, the impersonal — and negative, no-reply, non-feedback elements of the application process — saps confidence, and reinforces doubts about what lies ahead.
Gofman tries to help clients align their job search around their personal values and interests.
Despite doomsday predictions, he says, “AI is not taking over a lot of jobs.”
As for algorithms that seem to rule the resume process, Gofman advises, “Control what you can control. Establish a network. Build relationships. Rely on those people.” That’s especially true, he says, when searching locally for work.
“Print out a resume. Knock on doors. You don’t always have to apply online,” he says.
And, he adds, “work on your interpersonal skills. Practice them, so you feel confident.”
David Gofman (Photo/Kristyn Miller)
Though Gofman was in much the same place less than 20 years ago — with plenty of college and career pressure — a lot has changed.
“I was in high school at the threshold of technological change,” he says. “Smartphones and social media were just coming in.” AI was still the stuff of science fiction.
Job applications were read by human beings, not software.
Now, David Gofman is one human being trying to help others navigate a new, and very difficult, world.
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