Have we reached a point where not having GenAI knowledge leads to automatic rejection in interviews?

Last week I did an onsite with a company where the job description listed GenAI as “nice to have.” I don’t have GenAI on my resume, but they still spent about an hour grilling me on it.

I didn’t know a lot of the concepts they asked about, so I was upfront about that. I talked through the personal GenAI projects I’ve worked on and shared what I do know, trying to keep the conversation honest and engaging. The interviewers didn’t seem disappointed, but it’s hard to tell.

I haven’t heard back yet, and now I’m wondering if that part of the interview could lead to a rejection. Everything else in the onsite went really well.