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At a time when skilled labour is becoming increasingly difficult to find, jobs need to be filled faster and faster and the recruitment process to find suitable employees is becoming more and more complex, the call for support is becoming louder. Be it in the form of suitable technical systems, more staff or artificial intelligence.
The former is heavily dependent on the company's internal structure and IT and requires precise checks to determine whether the systems are suitable for the company. Furthermore, employees who are to work with these systems need to be trained and require support, at least in the initial phase. Depending on the size of the company, this can take a lot of time.
There is also the possibility of recruiting more staff. However, this often fails due to budget constraints and the conviction of company managers that there is a need for more staff.
When it comes to artificial intelligence, companies are increasingly considering whether it would be a good alternative or supplement to the first two options. After all, we are now used to talking to machines in our everyday lives. We tell Siri or Alexa to play our favourite music or call our girlfriend, and at mail-order company Otto, for example, chatbot Clara answers all our questions. And thanks to ChatGPT, making work easier in offices through technical support has taken on a whole new dimension. So why not conduct job interviews with a robot?
Artificial intelligence (AI) deals with the automation of intelligent behaviour and machine learning. AI is modelled on the human brain and is constantly evolving and learning.
AI is already being used in many areas of our everyday lives and enables us to save costs and time or streamline processes in areas such as medicine, the automotive industry, agriculture, the energy sector and production. It therefore makes sense to use AI to support other areas as well. In the future, AI will be able to automate repetitive tasks in particular, regardless of the sector or industry. For HR professionals, this will create more freedom to focus on complex issues and strategic decision-making.
The possibilities of AI in recruiting range from the use of chatbots to answer enquiries via career pages, the optimal design of job advertisements and the selection of channels, the systematic analysis of incoming applications, the integration of AI in assessment centres and the conducting and analysis of job interviews.
Some companies are already relying on their artificial employees for recruitment. Corporations such as Pepsi and Ikea, for example, use "Vera" to select applicants and conduct job interviews independently before the really relevant applicants are selected by "Vera" and handed over to a flesh-and-blood HR employee. "Vera" searches for suitable applicants on job portals, conducts video chat or telephone interviews independently and answers applicants' questions. It is constantly improving, as "Vera" is an artificial intelligence that learns with every interview.
"Vera is software developed by the Russian start-up Strafory and is currently used in companies that receive several thousand applications. Above all, "Vera" is used in these companies to pre-select relevant applicants, as this initial selection in particular takes a lot of work and time.
Another example is "Matilda". This robot was developed at the University of Melbourne and equipped with 76 questions to conduct 25-minute job interviews after reading application documents. "Matilda" is able to read emotions in applicants' faces and respond to them empathically.
While "Vera" is primarily intended for jobs such as clerks, waiters or construction workers, "Matilda's" catalogue of questions is particularly suitable for sales positions. Either way, both AIs must continue to develop in order to actually relieve the burden on companies' recruitment departments in the future and to be used for the selection of a wide range of specialists.
At present, AIs such as "Vera" and "Matilda", which carry out robotic recruiting, are not yet widespread in German HR departments. In Asia and America, this trend is already much more advanced and has been able to establish itself there in the initial contact with interested candidates. In Germany, chatbots and tools for analysing and matching applications are currently mainly used. In this way, they offer recruiters support without completely neglecting the personal aspects of recruitment and the candidate experience. Even though AI is still in its infancy, the company OpenAI has given the go-ahead for a new way of working with its artificial intelligence-based text generator ChatGPT. Just one year after the international rollout, the successor model GPT-3 was presented. This model is based on a dataset of more than 45 billion words, allowing ever more powerful responses to be generated.
ChatGPT offers enormous potential to optimise the recruiting process and increase efficiency. Here are just a few application examples:
Intelligent first contact: ChatGPT acts as the first point of contact for applicants and answers questions about job vacancies, the application process and the company. This ensures a positive candidate experience and increases the loyalty of potential top talent.
Fast and efficient CV screening: Thanks to its ability to analyse text content, ChatGPT can scan CVs and cover letters to highlight relevant skills and experience. This speeds up the initial filtering process and allows recruiters to focus directly on the most promising candidates.
Effortless interview scheduling: ChatGPT automates the scheduling of interviews by matching the availability of candidates and recruiters and arranging appointments. This significantly reduces the administrative workload for the HR team.
Transparent application process: Fast and transparent communication is crucial for applicant satisfaction. ChatGPT can automatically communicate interim statuses in the application process and send standardised rejections. This keeps applicants up to date and makes them feel valued.
Seamless onboarding: After recruitment, ChatGPT supports new employees during onboarding. The AI assistant answers questions about company guidelines, provides important information and thus ensures a smooth start to working life.
If this is too much AI in the application process, you can still benefit from ChatGPT and have templates created for the various topics. Even if the tool is already very powerful today, it is necessary for HR employees to check the answers once again.
The advantages of AI in recruiting are not only the many thousands of interviews that AI can conduct per day. It also doesn't get tired or sick, speaks different languages and can work around the clock regardless of time zones. A recruiting robot can also adjust the gender and thus fully adapt to the candidate's requirements. Furthermore, robots do not discriminate and do not make decisions "based on gut instinct". In particular, "unconscious biases" - unconscious, biased inclinations - which every human being carries within them, can significantly reduce discrimination in recruiting processes through the use of robots, as they analyse objectively and neutrally and are not aware of any prejudices or antipathies.
As already described, AI is characterised above all by continuous learning. It is therefore also learning more and more about candidates and is able to find out more information about applicants on the internet in a matter of seconds and put it together. As a result, AI has a more comprehensive picture of an applicant than a flesh-and-blood recruiter. As a result, AI may be even better able to judge whether a candidate is a good fit for the company or not.
But isn't the variance of employees an aspect that makes companies efficient and creative in the first place? There is a real danger that companies will only consist of a "one-size-fits-all" workforce in the future if AI is used extensively. How can constructive discussions and conversations develop if all employees fit together perfectly?
Another flip side of the coin is data protection. HR professionals are particularly debating the question of whether it is still compliant with data protection regulations if a robot collects voluntarily and involuntarily published data about applicants on the internet and uses it to make job decisions. This is another reason why many companies are still critical of the use of AI in recruitment departments. The Hasso Plattner Institute also warns against the disclosure of sensitive data. The programme records all the data entered, which can potentially lead to problems with data security. As with any technology that stores such information, there is a risk of data breaches and other security problems.
Before using recruiting robots, companies should ask themselves whether they really want to put a forward-looking decision, such as job allocation, in the hands of AI. Of course, the advantage of non-discrimination in applicant selection is absolutely relevant and the reduction in costs is also an important argument for many HR departments. However, interpersonal skills and the consideration that employees should have specialist expertise and also fit in with the other team members should not be disregarded. To do this, we need human recruiters who can judge whether candidates fit into the corporate culture both professionally and personally.
Every company must keep pace with digital change in order to avoid being left behind in the highly competitive labour market. Suitable specialists are becoming increasingly difficult to find, which makes the recruitment process more difficult, more time-consuming and requires creative ideas from HR staff. Simply advertising a vacancy is no longer enough. The relevant specialists must be actively sought out and approached. The decision in favour of support from artificial intelligence is therefore only a matter of time.
AI, with its extensive and objective analysis options and also as a chatbot, should indeed be used as support, but it will never replace personal contact between recruiters and applicants.
