The Role of AI in HR and Recruitment

Human resource management (HR) has long been considered one of the most “human” branches of business. It was poorly amenable to optimization: it used only certain tools that covered specific needs and had a small effect across the company. The reasons for this limited efficiency are obvious: HR management requires human participation and individual consideration of each case.

But what traditional computer programs cannot do is within the purview of artificial intelligence. Its introduction has launched a real revolution in the field of recruitment and personnel management. Today we will look at top solutions that will soon become key industry trends.

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Fully automated recruiters

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If you are a small startup or small business, artificial intelligence like Talla or Fetcher AI can take over all the HR functions. They perform the following tasks:

• sorting resumes by key criteria — experience, level of previous companies, quality of writing, etc.;
• organizing interviews — the AI will check your Google calendar, find free “windows” in it and offer them to the candidate to choose from — you will only have to confirm;
• analysis of the candidate's activity on social networks — if it is fundamentally different from the data in the resume, the system will warn you of a discrepancy;
• interview assistance — artificial intelligence is able to analyze non-verbal signals and report when a candidate is nervous or unsure of their abilities.

This solution allows the manager to perform all the functions of the personnel department and recruiters independently. He can devote a minimum of time to hiring staff, focusing on strategic objectives.

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Semantic search for candidates

Employers have been using contextual advertising for quite some time to find employees, especially for top-level vacancies that involve high salaries and serious responsibility. However, in many scenarios, it turns out to be ineffective due to fundamentally different understanding of the situation by the business and the candidate. They often use different keywords and query details, so neither one nor the other gets the expected result.

Online platforms like Phenom give them a helping hand in the form of semantic search. They analyze not only the candidate's request itself, but also the context. By studying user behavior, traffic source, intent and other parameters, these systems select ideal results, increasing conversions and offering only relevant vacancies. On average, they reduce the search time for candidates by 1.5—2.5 times.

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Data-based skills assessment

Virgin was losing $5.4 million a year by hiring candidates with the wrong level of skills and knowledge. On average, US companies incur costs of $5,000 per entry-level job and about $24,000 per mid-level employee due to hiring errors. Intelligent platforms like Eightfold help reduce these costs. By studying the company's internal workflows, they form a list of necessary skills much more effectively than HR officers, who are often disconnected from the company's real activities.

Such systems may also have tools for developing aptitude tests. In addition, they refine the assessment by analyzing the candidate's interview behavior and his digital footprint on the Internet. Eightfold also offers interesting solutions for managing an existing team. By assessing job performance and the availability of related skills, the program allows you to draw up staff training strategies and effectively manage employees' career trajectories, planning promotions in advance.

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Gamification of learning

Numerous studies show that people are much better at absorbing knowledge and putting it into practice when learning is organized in a playful way. This is not even psychology, but biology: rewards for assignments and participation in ratings activate the dopamine system, which is responsible for pleasure and loyalty, including to the company.

For example, Quizlet and Kahoot! platforms use the following game elements:

• multiple choice quizzes;
• game leaderboards;
• timers for responses;
• instant feedback;
• competitions between teams;
• awards and badges;
• visualization of progress.

Artificial intelligence allows HR professionals to develop similar tests, games, and other learning tools without diving deep into the topic, which can take months, if not years. It makes it possible to create programs at various levels — for beginners, confident specialists and even experts who are looking for ways to improve their skills.

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Optimizing hybrid and remote work

The coronavirus pandemic has launched an irreversible trend — the outflow of employees from offices. It was preserved even after the lifting of legislative restrictions. Hundreds of thousands of people wanted to stay at home, even if this meant a slight reduction in wages and the deprivation of non-material bonuses. On the one hand, for businesses, this meant increasing loyalty and reducing office maintenance costs. On the other hand, the organization of work in a team has become very complicated.

Platforms like BambooHR help organize distributed teams in the following ways:

• track time spent with details on teams, tasks, projects and jobs;
• appoint those responsible for the implementation of tasks and projects, and receive regular reports;
• hold virtual meetings with minutes;
• receive immediate feedback and ratings on various decisions;
• provide new employees with assistance during the adaptation period.

Artificial intelligence serves as the “cement” that connects the individual functions of these platforms and strengthens them, allowing them to obtain better results in the long run. It is contained in every module: it analyzes employee productivity, warns about upcoming deadlines, converts voice into text and generates training materials based on a ready-made knowledge base.

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Monitoring the well-being of employees

Burnout is called one of the global problems of the 21st century and is even equated with a pandemic. It drastically reduces the quality of human life and provokes the development of various diseases, both mental and physical. For businesses, burnout means an average decrease in productivity of 15— 45%, which in creative tasks can reach 60— 65%. In other words, no one is interested in driving employees to burnout.

However, the threshold beyond which productivity turns into burnout is different for each person. To predict how to approach it, a company needs to employ psychologists or use artificial intelligence. AI can analyze a person's mood by the tone of emails and internal communications. Even minor fluctuations in the performance of an individual workplace can signal close burnout.

After receiving such information, the manager can decide to reduce the workload, provide compensation or change the atmosphere in the team. The program will tell him when decisions can be made over the long term and when they should be immediate.

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Augmented reality interviews

What prevents companies from inviting employees to jobs instead of conducting interviews? The idea seems tempting, but in reality it turns out to be expensive and inconvenient: the normal functioning of the business is disrupted, employee productivity decreases, and the level of confidentiality decreases.

Instead, you can organize digital copies of workplaces in augmented reality. This makes it possible to conduct the most effective tests for the professional aptitude of future employees. Instead of answering general questions, they will complete routine tasks to demonstrate their real level of productivity. The technology is quite new and is just being tested. However, large companies may adopt it in the near future.

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Conclusion

Artificial intelligence has revolutionized recruitment and personnel management. He helped automate tasks that for decades had been considered too “human”, sensitive and personal to be trusted in their machine. Today, in small enterprises, managers can independently do all the work of a HR officer without being distracted from the strategic aspects of management. And large corporations can significantly reduce the cost of maintaining HR services.

If you want to increase the productivity of the HR department and recruiters, contact Start.Duck specialists. We have many ideas that can significantly increase your company's productivity and competitiveness in the current business climate. We develop each project individually, taking into account the needs of a particular client, the characteristics of its staff, the industry and the target audience. This makes it possible to introduce new technologies with minimal resistance, getting a quick return on investments in artificial intelligence.