Career coaching provides value to job seekers, but it is labor-intensive, requires knowledge of many career options and localities, and is often difficult for job seekers to navigate. These limitations leave many job seekers—particularly those with fewer resources to find and engage with coaches—at a disadvantage in the labor market. The recent rise of generative artificial intelligence (AI) may present an opportunity to provide low-cost, personalized coaching to job seekers on a large scale. Some early research into using AI to assist with career coaching has found promising results.

SkillUp Coalition is a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping individuals skilled through alternative routes—meaning people who have skills obtained outside of college—secure employment with high opportunities for career advancement that can be achieved regardless of a college degree. Through its online platform and step-by-step career guidance options, SkillUp has connected more than 3.5 million workers to career support, training, and job opportunities. In collaboration with its national and local partners, SkillUp curates career paths, training programs, coaching resources, and job listings that lead to living-wage, high-opportunity careers. SkillUp’s website hosts this catalog of materials, allowing job seekers to browse opportunities.

While SkillUp’s current platform provides users with information, it does not yet provide all the personalized support and information job seekers could benefit from in their careers. Generative AI may be able to offer such personalized guidance to job seekers, which could lead to higher engagement with the varying populations using SkillUp, and help them to find new opportunities. An AI-enabled resource on SkillUp’s platform could help its users navigate its catalog in a way that connects with them, allowing SkillUp to reach more people and meet new demands more easily. SkillUp therefore codesigned and tested an AI chatbot to present opportunities to users from its catalog. This brief describes that test and its results. Overall, users randomly assigned to a version of the website with only the chatbot engaged significantly less with SkillUp’s offerings than those who could browse its traditional catalog.