Since the launch of ChatGPT in the latter half of 2022, natural language processing and our understandings of it have catapulted online social conversation from “how will this affect me?” to “when will this affect me?”.

From content creators to videographers, security experts to VC funders, AI is clipping along as the great business game changer of the near future – but how does this affect recruiters, job seekers, consultants, and employers?

Rather than offer only our opinion, we thought we’d compile a list of some of the leading opinions on AI in HR, recruitment and work, to give a general overview of the state of business play as it is today, and where experts in the field believe the most impact will be felt in 2023 and beyond.

AI and Data.

The primary focus of most automotive and AI-based advances in recruitment has been around building more data-driven decision-making in hiring.  

This includes AI innovations in everything from basic administration – form filling and chatbots for example – to more complex tasks like smart signatures, automated reference checking and more. But the reaches of AI and data collection, storage and analysis doesn’t stop there.

Some good reads about how AI is helping make data more visible and more usable include:

• AI Recruiting in 2023: The Definitive Guide – Phenom.
• The Benefits And Dangers Of Using AI In Recruitment – Forbes.
• The impact of AI on recruitment – AIHR.
• Stop Fearing AI and ‘Big Data’ in Recruiting – SHRM.
• How Artificial Intelligence is Impacting The Recruitment Sector – Hubert.

AI and HR.

AI, of course, isn’t just being used to leverage digital processing power over mundane tasks – it can also be used to improve HR cultures, staff development and HR functionality, from compensation strategy to due diligence and data security. 

Some good reads on AI and HR can be found:

• What is the Role of AI in Human Resource Management? – Analytics Steps.
• The Business Case for AI in HR – IBM.
• Possible Applications of AI in HR – Hppy.
• The significance of AI in HR – People Matters.

AI and employer branding. 

AI’s impact on the written word and data is one thing, but what about AI’s impact on less “tangible” assets, such as branding, visuals, marketing and the candidate experience?

How will perceptions of business and employer credibility, even the lengths to which candidates understand what is true and what isn’t, stand in the wake of AI growth?

The future is unknown, but some interesting reads on AI and EB include:

• Does Artificial Intelligence (AI) Enable Recruitment Improve Employer Branding? – IJBM.
• Artificial Intelligence & Employer Brand: The Possibilities Are Endless – The Martec. 
• Employer branding: Impact of disruptive technology on this industry – First Post.
• Future of HR Technology and Employer Branding post-Corona Era – Orai.

AI and candidate relationship/candidate experience. 

Will this new dawn of digital power overtake our long-standing analogue culture of relationship building between professionals, or will new tech simply augment the very human core of good recruitment practice?

Views on this are wide-ranging and very interesting:

• 10 Ways AI Improves Candidate Engagement During Recruiting – HolaSpirit.
• Candidate Experience in times of Artificial Intelligence – HubSpot.
• Using AI to enhance candidate experience in high volume hiring – via Research Gate.
• The Industrial Revolution for human intellect – Deloitte.

The Rectec View. 

Whether we like it or not, a future where media, marketing, adverts, content, social feeds and entertainment are either created by or augmented by AI is coming, probably quicker than we all thought. 

Entire industries – from programming to graphic design to copywriting – are changing as the sheer breadth of AI potential becomes known. 

AI will impact recruitment. But we believe there will be limits:

• We feel there will be barriers to entry within the SME sector due to cost, scale and relevance (e.g. automation is widely used in mass hiring strategies, not single one-off hires). 
• Only in very specific industries will candidates want to be vetted by AI – candidate comms, testing, initial communications, job marketing and even first-stage interviews are already largely remote and digital, and will increasingly be completed by AI. But the final call on whether one person will work for another will still be a human decision. Human oversight is essential for successful hiring.
• And, lastly, the lengths to which AI has access to open source information determines how effective it is. This will undoubtedly change in the future and AI will be given access to everything everywhere, but how will AI react to inherent biases in data sets, and how will it fix – rather than exacerbate – issues around bias, discrimination and lack of opportunity for workers? Can AI fix this long-standing critical issue with hiring, or should we be looking elsewhere?

In short, AI will transform the industry, but, at least initially, it won’t change people!

A quick, responsive process is what you need to attract and engage the best talent.

At Rectec we help organisations to find the best Applicant Tracking System or best Recruitment CRM to suit your needs, accompanied by our unique complementary technology marketplace, to help you build the perfect recruitment tech stack for your business.

The post AI and the future of recruitment, according to the experts. appeared first on Rectec.

But as we sit on the cusp of Web 3.0, and as companies continue to rapidly digitise in the wake of COVID-19 and our new normal of hybrid working patterns and new candidate expectations, how will our industry – replete with numerous ATS providers and recruitment tech – continue to evolve?

It’s worth noting how employers are factoring in tech, and specifically AI, into the future of work.

• Sodexo, for instance, noted in one a piece titled How To Plan a FutureProof Workplace the centrality of tech to building more resilient, “elastic” workplaces,
• Ideal, in their piece AI For Recruiting: A Definitive Guide For HR Professionals, noted how AI is creating efficiency beyond the scope of human ability, especially earlier in the recruitment funnel, and how AI can create insights into their candidate pools,
• Business Insider, in a broad and detailed piece on AI and hiring practice, notes how AI can help in everything from “removing bias from the hiring process, to recruiting top talent, to identifying problems and conditions that cause an existing employee to quit”.

It’s safe to say AI is an objectively “good” thing to have in a recruitment tech stack, and seeing as AI is so integral to improving recruiting processes, when it comes to choosing the right applicant tracking system or recruitment CRM for your enterprise, its wise to consider the reach and impact of AI within a vendors’ package.

So, how does AI fit into this mesh of tech, people and platforms, how will effective AI be used, and what sorts of skills will be needed within recruitment companies and agencies to make the most of AI recruitment tech?

AI and Recruitment

Let’s clear the air a little. There is a lot of doom-mongering around AI, and how it will eventually remove the human from the workplace. But within recruitment, AI is being used in more subtle ways.

Referring, again, to the Workable piece above, “The term ‘artificial intelligence’ is greatly exaggerated”.

While in some sectors the importance of robotics, machine learning, predictive analysis and natural language learning is carving a swathe through the human capital market, in recruitment AI can be neatly summarised thusly (homaging Matt Alder from the above Workable piece again):

• Al is algorithms to match the right people to the right jobs,
• AI is machine learning to improve forecasting,
• AI is smart automation to improve and personalise marketing, outreach, comms and connections.

In short, AI is being leveraged to create relevance, personalisation, and efficiency. Not to remove the human from HR.

AI and Matchmaking Candidates to Jobs

Algorithmic candidate sourcing can be an imperfect tool. The critical challenge hiring managers have to contend with is to what extent AI can handle biases within hiring, and what sort of datasets are useful for machine learning systems to use in creating frameworks of matching talent.

“Develop and modify the inputs fed into your hiring programs and algorithms. Are these inputs job-related? Do they promote or impede diversity objectives? Do the data outputs follow robust privacy and data governance? What standards does your organisation follow to ensure the algorithms are nearing bias neutral?”

Eric Reicin, Forbes Council Member – AI Can Be A Force For Good In Recruiting And Hiring New Employees

AI and how it improves forecasting

Companies like Loxo leverage AI in creating digital forecasting tools for recruiters to integrate into their recruitment tech stack. They include tools like an intelligent recruitment platform to better connect with candidates (their famed proprietary Talent Graph), integrate social channels via public domains, and perfect an automated outreach campaign, using AI to rank talent.

This focus on emboldening teams with information, and using simple programming to help teams hit targets, source efficiently and use actionable information, is game changing.

Smart Automation in Recruitment

Smart, or intelligent automation is defined as, “the use of automation technologies – artificial intelligence (AI), business process management (BPM), and robotic process automation (RPA) – to streamline and scale decision-making across organisations”.

In short, this means AI is one part of a collection of tools that can effectively analyse data – in this case of recruiters, it could be the ability of a recruitment tech tool to better match candidates’ skills with job demands. This information then feeds into a BPM channel (automated recruitment marketing, for example), and helps provide information for RPOs (IE bots, if relevant) to place information in the right place (pay data in payslips, or performance review data in HR staff management systems).

AI, of course, doesn’t work without people. While the tools and trends of AI in recruitment – and the changing nature of recruitment tech overall – continue to innovate, AI has to complement and fall within the undying rule of recruitment: recruitment doesn’t work without trusted relationships. If AI can help improve that trust, then we’re in for a vibrant and efficient future of HR.

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Rectec – and specifically our applicant tracking system and recruitment CRM comparison service Rectec Compare – was born from watching the industry evolve into a sprawling landscape of solutions focused on improving efficiencies, increased recruitment brand awareness, and improving recruitment processes from data handling to video interviewing.

With such a wide spread of solution options, and no dispassionate comparison service for employers seeking information on ATS systems and how to identify the right ATS or recruitment CRM for their company, Rectec was born.

Our own company has continued to grow amid this thriving digital landscape. We’ve recently launched the Rectec Marketplace, and we continue to support our ATS and recruitment CRM vendors and affiliate solutions providers with more access to our immense human capital market…and yes, there are tech tools in place within our very own Marketplace that match affiliate vendors with your needs, mirroring the systems above!

A quick, responsive process is what you need to attract and engage the best talent.

At Rectec we help organisations to find the best Applicant Tracking System or best Recruitment CRM to suit your needs, accompanied by our unique complimentary tech marketplace, to help you build the perfect recruitment tech stack for your business.

You can click here to register for Rectec Compare – and best of all, it’s completely free of charge.

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