We’ve looked at hiring
from both sides now

Nell Norman · 2 November 2026 · 6 min read

PromptMates documented their first hire with Jack & Jill from both sides of the table. Joe Atkinson was hiring, and Nikola Wójcik was the candidate. What follows is their account, in their own words.

Pre-application

Nikola Wójcik · Community & Events Manager

How Jack helped me understand what I was really looking for

I first started using Jack & Jill around three months before graduating from university.

It started as an experiment, but I was hooked immediately, especially as someone who sees conversations as a chance to brainstorm.

What I loved about talking to Jack was that the conversation centred on what I really wanted my next step to look like, and the kind of career I wanted over the coming years, rather than simply pinpointing a job title.

As a generalist, I found it hard to narrow my job search to very specific positions.

Searching on LinkedIn felt overwhelming.

I was limited by job titles that didn’t really speak to me, and I often struggled to understand what each title actually meant.

Joe Atkinson · Co-founder

Briefing without a job description

We never wrote a job description.

The brief came from six months of conversations between me and my co-founder Jason about what we needed to achieve across community & events and the gaps we had to get there.

Without AI, uncovering the level of detail Nikola shared with Jack would have meant a screening call with every candidate.

More likely, we would have missed people who didn’t fit an obvious keyword match for what we were looking for.

Applications

From

Nikola Wójcik

Subject

Highlighting what my CV couldn’t capture

I always hated updating my CV. No matter how hard I tried, three bullet points never showed what I really had to offer.

Many of my experiences were short and done alongside my studies. Describing them to Jack helped me build a profile with concise descriptions of the things that actually mattered to the people hiring.

Thanks to that, I had interviews for roles that suited my experience, at companies that wouldn’t usually hire someone straight out of university. Some of the roles Jack recommended were ones I would never have seen as a match for myself.

From

Joe Atkinson

Subject

A shortlist that got better every round

The normal way looks very different. Lots of outbound sourcing, messaging lots of people and hearing back from some of them. Then screening calls, often with people who weren’t interested once they heard more about the role, or who turned out not to fit once we learned more about them.

This time, Jill presented candidates and we gave feedback on each set of profiles. Every new set took that feedback on board, so the profiles got closer to what we needed each round. Nikola only applied to roles that matched what she wanted, and we only spoke to candidates who matched what we wanted.

Interviews

Nikola Wójcik10:02 AM

My experience of being hired by PromptMates

I was first connected with Joe through an email saying PromptMates would like to talk to me about an opportunity.

The interviews felt far more conversational, because most of the details about my experience were already in my profile.

That meant we could focus on what I could really bring to the company, instead of walking through my CV.

New

Joe Atkinson10:14 AM

A first call that started in the right place

Because the running clubs and the transferable skills were already clear, even a short 30 minute intro call went straight to the right areas instead of staying general.

Our first conversations were no longer high-level fact-finding missions.

Right from the start, we could have interesting, deeper conversations that felt like we were truly getting to know each other.

We still ran the interviews ourselves, and most things worked.

Takeaways

Nikola WójcikCommunity & Events Manager

What I believe this means for companies hiring

I think I’m a good example of how Jack & Jill creates real understanding between a candidate and the company hiring. On my CV alone, I would probably have been overlooked by a company like PromptMates that was looking for someone with more experience, yet my experiences were what they were looking for.

Jack & Jill gives companies the space to understand the person and the story behind a CV that might otherwise be rejected. It works both ways: candidates get matched with roles they might never have found or applied for, because the title didn’t look like what they thought they were searching for.

Joe AtkinsonCo-founder

Lessons for TA teams

Some takeaways on the potential impact and unlocks from deploying AI agents for recruiting:

Reimagining the first call. When you already know a lot about the candidate, the first call creates an opportunity to explore specific areas in depth and give the candidate the best chance for success, versus generic high-level questions that only scratch the surface.
Briefing on context, not a job description. Ours came from six months of conversations about what would level up the business.
Looking for transferable skills, not titles. We hired someone who didn’t have the job title, or most likely the track record, for the role. For us, organising running clubs for busy founders told us more than a job title would have.

We’ve looked at hiring
from both sides now

Pre-application