Traditional hiring processes have long been bogged down by time-intensive inefficiencies. Think: scouring the internet for candidate profiles that may or may not be a fit, spending hours writing up interview notes, dealing with manual scheduling messes. The list goes on and on. This leaves recruiters with less time to focus on the higher-leverage, more strategic parts of the job that they’re always saying they wish they could spend more time on.

But the emergence of Artificial Intelligence (AI) has changed the game, presenting a modern fix to these age-old challenges. With its ability to automate repetitive tasks, AI doesn't just conserve your precious time as a recruiter. It can also help give you deeper data and insight into what’s going on, make hiring more consistent and efficient, and even help reduce human biases. 

The end result is that AI empowers recruiters to shift their focus towards more strategic parts of their role, while automating traditionally toil-filled tasks. In this article, we'll dive into how AI can supercharge the hiring process, exploring how recruiters can leverage AI tools to save time and focus on hiring the best candidates.

The AI-Driven Hiring Process

There are many technologies that underpin the AI innovations we’ve seen in the past year and beyond. While there’s no need to go too deep into the technical details, here’s a quick primer on some of the key applications that make AI such a powerful technology. 

Machine learning (ML) recognizes patterns and learns from data iteratively without human intervention. Think of it like an observant, always-learning companion that grows sharper with each recruitment cycle. As an example, ML can help scan through thousands of resumes much faster than a human ever could, suggesting the ones that best match the requirements you’re looking for. ML is also the technology that powers video interviewing software to assess things like candidate's facial expressions, body language, and tone of voice to infer fit for a role. 

Predictive analytics analyzes current and historical data to project potential future occurrences. In recruitment, this could translate into forecasting a candidate's success in a given role based on their past performance and current competencies. It's like having a crystal ball that provides some insight into a candidate’s potential compatibility with the role before they even step through the door.

Natural Language Processing enables computers to understand human language as it’s naturally spoken and written. This helps power tools like ChatGPT and virtual chat bots that enable more seamless candidate communication at scale. 

Together, these technologies have the power to redefine the hiring process by turning vast amounts of data into actionable insights and transforming the way we interact with job candidates. 

How AI Enriches the Hiring Process

AI tools have the power to level up the recruitment process at every step. As Recruiting Brainfood founder, Hung Lee, said in a recent conversation with us, “I think almost every aspect of recruiting is going to be infused with AI. I see it as that universal condiment you can stick on any part of the dish."

Here we’ve outlined a few practical examples of how artificial intelligence can transform different parts of the hiring process. 

AI in Candidate Assessment

While sometimes considered one of the more controversial applications, AI can play a role in aiding candidate assessment. What we’ve heard from expert practitioners is that AI can be particularly helpful as the initial filter in sifting through candidate profiles or to provide more data points and context to effectively make judgements on whether candidates are the right fit later in the recruiting process. 

For example, in our webinar on this topic, Annie Jackson, Head of Talent Acquisition at Cleo, explained that AI helps give her team the tools to help more effectively assess candidates, not to necessarily do the assessing itself. Cleo uses AI to help screen resumes from job applicants more efficiently, generate tailored interview questions and job descriptions, and to create standardized rubrics for objective evaluation.

The bottom line is that while AI can be a helpful companion, the final hiring decision should always hinge on human judgment. As our co-founder and CEO, Siadhal, explains, “AI can give you much higher resolution, higher definition ways to look at human beings but that still leaves you to judge what the requirements are for a role and what you care most about.’” 

How AI Enhances the Candidate Experience

AI can also boost the candidate experience, an essential factor in attracting and winning top talent.

Some recruitment teams are leveraging chatbots to help handle initial interactions with candidates. These AI-driven tools can do things like answer frequently asked questions or provide basic information about the company and the role. Rather than just offering up generic messages, AI can analyze a candidate's profile and provide personalized responses. In situations where a recruiter would otherwise not be able to answer all job seekers’ inquiries, these can be especially powerful tools, especially when it comes to responses on application status. 

As Kevin Grossman, President of the Talent Board, explains, “Every candidate should get closure on their application, and AI and automation can help with that. Communication and engagement is what job seekers want. And it elevates their positive sentiment towards the recruiting process, as opposed to getting no communication or closure at all.” 

AI can also relieve recruiters from manual tasks and give them the freedom to focus more on the candidate in the moment. For example, Metaview uses AI to automate the recruiting note-taking process. What this means during intakes, interviews, and debriefs is that recruiters don’t need to worry about frantically typing, trying to capture everything a candidate is saying. With the assurance that the AI is taking perfect notes for them, recruiters can instead focus on being present and building relationships with candidates. 

Harnessing AI in Interview Training 

Forward-thinking recruiting teams can leverage AI to up-level how they train interviewers and hiring managers to ensure consistency and quality. 

There are two main ways we see AI impacting interviewer training. The first is that AI can identify where there are quality issues among your interviewers and hiring managers. Rather than needing to do manual spot checks that will inevitably miss issues, AI will surface all of the inconsistent interviews that are happening in your recruiting process. 

Once you've identified who needs the training, AI can also help assess what component of their interviewing is off. For example, are they interrupting candidates? Or not effectively pitching your organization?  With AI-assisted training, interviewers aren’t just receiving a one-to-many generic coaching.They’re getting the specific training that they need.

Siadhal explains how he thinks this could evolve even further in the future: “AI is going to enable you to take that really nuanced perspective on how to help interviewers and hiring managers. And then I think stage two might be where AI actually starts to do the coaching in a more hands-on way.”

The Role of AI in Revolutionizing Recruiting Data

Recruiting has always been a blend of art and science, where intuition meets data. As artificial intelligence becomes even more entrenched, this balance is shifting as recruiters and hiring managers can easily access even more evidence-based insights. 

AI can help provide the data to better inform the everyday decisions we make in recruiting. As Siadhal puts it, “You can think of AI as essentially like a prediction machine. Whether it’s things like headcount planning or who we bring into the company, artificial intelligence is going to help us make better and better predictions.” 

For instance, by considering a candidate's career trajectory, skill set, and interview responses, AI can help predict how well the individual might fit into a particular role. This predictive analysis can help recruiters more easily find qualified candidates who might have a high likelihood of success in the role. 

AI's ability to handle unstructured data is another advantage it has over humans. Resumes, cover letters, and online portfolios come in various formats and structures. Traditionally, recruiters would have to painstakingly comb through each source, often missing out on valuable insights due to the sheer volume of information. AI can swiftly sift through this unstructured data, extracting relevant insights and presenting them in an actionable format.

The Benefits of AI-Powered Hiring

As is hopefully clear by now, AI’s application across hiring processes leaves tons of benefits for recruiters and hiring managers to reap. Here’s a quick recap. 

AI's Evolving Role in Hiring

Before AI-enabled hiring, a recruiter might have had to spend a big chunk of their day on toil-ridden tasks like sifting through a mountain of resumes, scheduling interviews, or writing up notes for hiring teams. But AI changes all of that. As Kevin Wheeler, Founder of the Future of Talent Institute, puts it, “The role of the recruiter is being completely redefined by AI and where it’s going.”

AI can help recruiters transition from lower-leverage, highly-manually tasks to a more efficient model where they can spend more time on planning and performing. 

Siadhal recently outlined his thoughts on this in his "AI Will Save Recruitment" op-ed. He explains that recruiting teams will bifurcate into specialized units focusing either on planning or performing. 

History has shown that as technology advances, roles within a system tend to become more specialized. The recruiting landscape is no different, and with AI-powered tools leading the charge, more and more manual tasks can be automated, freeing recruiters to use their critical thinking skills in the talent acquisition process.

Currently, AI in recruitment functions more as a tool, streamlining processes and automating mundane tasks. However, as the tech advances, AI systems may become more personalized, evolving into companions.

Think about an AI system tailored to understand your recruitment needs. These AI companions could accelerate productivity by taking over routine tasks, offering insightful analysis to inform strategy, and even identifying areas for improvement in the recruitment process. 

Conclusion

It's clear that AI is already, and will continue to, change the face of modern hiring and recruiters’ role in it. As the pace of innovation continues, recruiters will need to adapt their skill-sets accordingly. And as with any new technology, well-thought-out policies around AI can help ensure impact, while adhering to ethical standards. Hung sums it up perfectly: “AI may not immediately replace recruiters, but I think that recruiters that are AI enabled will replace those that aren’t.” 

So stay curious, get familiar with the always-expanding tools at your disposal, and understand how you can make your hiring process more efficient, less prone to human bias, and ultimately more human.