If there’s any industry that understands the importance of innovation, it’s the tech industry. As entrepreneur Ben Horowitz explains, “technology means ‘a better way of doing things.’ If you’re not continually innovating, your [company] is going to die.”
While innovation is undoubtedly important, it’s rarely a seamless process. In most cases, there are constant barriers that prevent innovative products and practices from being accepted by the masses. One of the hardest barriers to shake off? Misconceptions and misinformation. You can’t have your team adopt something they don’t trust, right?
In the recruitment space, artificial intelligence (AI) has emerged as one of the best solutions to help talent acquisition professionals reinvent outdated hiring processes in an increasingly digital world. However, misinformation and misconceptions have stopped some organizational leaders from even considering the benefits and impact of this technology, let alone implementing it in their tech stack.
Like most game-changing innovations, it will take time for leaders to embrace AI recruitment tools organically. In the meantime, it’s only right that we do our part by addressing some common misconceptions surrounding AI in the recruitment space.
Making the distinction between augmentation and automation
When it comes to AI recruitment technology, the terms automation and augmentation are often confused. While this linguistic mixup may seem inconsequential, their implications for recruiters’ roles and responsibilities are massive.
Automation involves completely replacing human decision-making and actions with technology. The most notable example of this technology is found in factories that use assembly machines. With those tools, there’s minimal to no effort involved on the part of humans, as automation completes tasks for us.
On the other hand, augmentation involves facilitating and improving human decision-making and actions with technology. A notable example of this technology would be the spell check features on Microsoft Word. When we misspell a word or make a grammatical mistake, Microsoft Word will highlight those errors with a colorful squiggly line. Instead of replacing it for us, it informs us that a revision could be made. Most importantly, we still control if we want to make that revision.
Fortunately, we are seeing more hiring software today understand that recruiters, not AI, drive successful AI recruitment models. For that reason, the emphasis has always been to make the AI recruitment model augmentative but bolstered with simple automation to accelerate manual tasks, like scheduling emails, finding contact information, and parsing resumes.
Automating these manual tasks leave recruiters with more time to get into the real nitty-gritty of recruiting, such as building trust with potential talent, promoting an organization’s brand, and matching candidates with the right opportunities. By doing so, as Hiretual’s CEO Steven Jiang explains, “AI will make recruiting more human.”
Losing control to technology
It’s safe to say that the last twelve months have felt a bit out of control. With the events of 2020 still fresh in our minds, the last thing any of us want to do is give up control of anything else. For some organizational leaders and recruiters, this concern over control has tainted their view of AI recruitment technology.
If AI recruitment technology was modeled around automation, the concern over losing control would be valid. However, unlike the static process of automation, augmentative AI recruitment consists of a dynamic infrastructure that informs human decision-making. It leaves individuals in control of their decisions, actions, and, most importantly, the technology itself. At Hiretual, our augmentative AI technology is built upon machine learning (ML) and natural language processing (NLP). With these building blocks, our system integrations and searches can be contextual and iterative based on what recruiters choose to use it for.
Not only do recruiters maintain control over their recruitment process and technology, but they also have the ability to influence the future capabilities of this tech. The flexibility of AI allows service providers, like Hiretual, to partner with customers and build out features based on their requests. Over the years, our best features were informed by customer needs, including market insights, security clearance filters, search ATS, and others that have become integral parts of our product. Through augmentative AI, organizations maintain control of their recruitment process and tech stack while influencing its evolution, as well.
Redefining recruitment
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A few years ago, a recruiter might start their day spending hours scrolling through a recruitment platform looking for candidates that qualify for an open position. Today, recruiters can use AI sourcing to tap into multiple platforms and filter through hundreds of thousands of candidates within seconds. A few years ago, a hiring manager might have to wait for a data scientist to get back to them with insights about their talent pool’s average market value. Today, an AI recruitment platform will provide insights and reports on team performance, talent pipeline metrics, and diversity analytics in an accessible and centralized location.
Recruitment is no longer transactional work with surface-level screening, drawn-out processes, and inconsistent touchpoints. It’s a dynamic model that empowers recruiters to multitask and plan ahead while taking care of current problems. With efficiency increasing from AI embedded technologies that augment the recruiter’s capabilities, recruitment will be redefined. The only concern becomes if people acknowledge these changes before they fall behind.
Staying ahead of the pack
As we move forward into the coming year, it’s also important to move forward with our business practices and technology. Despite the abundance of data and information made accessible through innovations, misconceptions and misinformation will always be an unavoidable hurdle in the way of widespread acceptance and implementation.
With adaptability and digital resourcefulness shaping the future of work and business in the coming decade, it’s only a matter of time before AI recruitment tools become both a norm and must-have for organizations worldwide. Until then, those that have already started using these technologies will continue to see the benefits before everyone else.