Dreams of Ats bots

I’ve been talking about ghosting and ATS bots for so long that my subconscious finally threw in the towel and turned the whole ordeal into a Netflix mini-series. Not a glamorous one, mind you—nobody’s winning Emmys here—but the kind of dark comedy you watch at 2 a.m. when you’ve run out of true crime. It’s titled Ghosted by the Machine, rated PG-Desperate, and stars me as the exhausted hero just trying to survive another day in the cursed carnival we call job hunting.

The opening scene is simple: me, in pajamas, uploading my résumé for the fiftieth time this week. The bots circle like vultures, scanning for keywords with all the compassion of a parking meter. They don’t care about my achievements, my grit, or the fact I once held a team together during budget cuts that could’ve taken down Rome. No, the only thing that matters is whether I used the word “synergy” enough times. Spoiler: I didn’t. Immediate rejection. Cue the Netflix intro music.

Then comes the ghosting. It’s not subtle—it’s a full production. Imagine pouring your heart into interviews, charming managers, sending a thank-you email so polished it could hang in the Louvre. And then… silence. No call. No email. Just me staring at my inbox like I’m waiting for a text from someone who swore they’d “circle back by Friday.” Recruiters don’t break up with you—they vanish like horror movie villains, leaving you to question whether they ever existed at all.

Of course, the comic relief comes from the job postings themselves. They sparkle with lies, promising “entry-level opportunities” before demanding ten years’ experience, seven certifications, and fluency in Python, Excel, and apparently dragon whispering. It’s not a career path, it’s a superhero origin story. The bots eat it up, though, filtering out anyone with less than the résumé of a Marvel character. And the humans? They never even see your name—because ATS decided you weren’t “the right cultural fit” before breakfast.

But here’s the real twist: buried under the chaos, I keep laughing. Because if you don’t laugh, you’ll cry, and tears don’t look good on Zoom. There’s something oddly freeing about treating rejection emails like plot twists and ghostings like cliffhangers. The bots think they’re in charge, but I’ve turned the whole system into entertainment. Every time one tells me “application incomplete” when I know it isn’t, I picture a room full of Netflix executives greenlighting season two. Every time I get ghosted, I imagine a dramatic montage with me staring out a rainy window, whispering, “Just text me back.”

And maybe that’s why this ridiculous mini-series is worth watching. Because beneath the chaos, there’s a hero in all of us: applying, reapplying, showing up, rising again. We’re not just candidates—we’re characters in the strangest show ever written. A show where persistence is the plot, sarcasm is the dialogue, and the finale hasn’t been filmed yet.

So yes, my dreams have become a Netflix mini-series. And until the bots are defeated and the ghosts finally call back, I’ll be here—living the script, drinking the coffee, and laughing at the absurdity of it all.