AI in Recruiting: Balancing Humans and AI Work

Advanced technologies have always made an impact on the recruitment process. However, the impressive potential of artificial intelligence (AI), generative AI and advanced automation is shifting the way people view talent, source talent and get work done.

The old recruitment process focused on the surface of recruiting, ‘A task needs to be completed, so let’s find a person to do that task.’ However, ‘just filling seats’ can be time-consuming, inefficient and often misses other opportunities that may be more successful. However, by incorporating AI and automation tools, workforce specialists can shorten time-to-hire, improve screening and assessment, and reveal hidden talent pools as well as additional opportunities for great candidates.

What Can AI Recruiting Tools Do?

The various ways that AI, generative AI and agentic AI can be used in the recruitment process continue to be discovered; however, some proven options are already making an impact across industries. Current AI recruiting technology can shift the role of recruiters and sourcers by automating up to 80% of the recruitment process – freeing recruiters for nurturing candidates, building relationships, consulting and advising, and making strategic decisions.

Some key tasks that are being automated in recruitment process outsourcing (RPO) programs include:

• Fielding frequently asked questions (FAQs)
• Reviewing and evaluating resumes
• Matching and vetting candidate skills to tasks required
• Improving job descriptions to attract the best talent
• Assessing more than one job opportunity per candidate
• Conducting initial screenings and customizing talent and hiring manager engagement
• Enabling market and data insights driving sourcing strategies

Of course, these are just a few of the AI-enabled options that can enhance your talent acquisition efforts and empower recruiters to greater efficiency and job satisfaction.

How Recruitment AI Tech Is Shaping Candidate Experience

So far, the greatest impact generative AI and agentic AI systems have had on recruitment has been in supporting the candidate experience through greater, more consistent communication – particularly with candidates at the beginning of the TA process. These systems can review and sort through uploaded resumes. Chatbots, for example, can answer initial questions. Then, the recruitment AI tech can facilitate omnichannel communication, assist with scheduling and even run background checks. Other technologies, such as Sense.AI and digital interviewing platforms, such as HireVue, can create a seamless and engaging candidate experience as the candidate progresses towards hiring. All of these tasks are very important, while also being very time-consuming if performed manually. This creates a huge opportunity for recruitment teams to accelerate and expand impact without sacrificing quality.

Chatbots and Conversational AI for Recruitment

As AI has advanced, chatbots have become more sophisticated and easier to interact with. A product called Paradox, as noted in a recent article from Talent Tech Labs, has raised the bar for chatbot capabilities and candidate experience, “We’ve seen from Paradox’s results that the more intelligent and insightful the chatbot’s responses are, the more likely that candidates will continue to use it and ask more nuanced questions. Since Contextual Conversation has been in production, fewer candidates are asking to connect with a live recruiter because the chatbot is able to answer their questions.”

Many staffing companies have already incorporated conversational AI into their systems, so these technologies are quickly moving from a competitive advantage to a business necessity.

In addition, Allegis Group’s proprietary AI-enabled sourcing tools– which we use at AGS Managed Services (AGS) – can help nurture candidates who may be a better fit for a different role than the one for which they applied. This opens opportunities for valuable candidates to find the right fit, the recruiters to hire faster and the business to thrive with the right people in place. This improves the overall experience for everyone involved and increases the chances of successful placements.

These functions allow the system to pre-vet candidates, freeing recruiters to review the candidate assessments conducted by the AI recruiting system, nurture relationships with candidates who are further down the funnel and to better match the right people to the right roles.

How AI Recruiting Systems are Benefiting Recruiters’ Day-to-Day Work

In a recent survey, 44% of recruiters and 67% of hiring decision-makers report that saving time is the main advantage of using AI in the recruitment process, and 39% of recruiters think AI could simplify their jobs. Significantly, 86% of recruiters say AI makes the hiring process faster. Integrating AI into the day-to-day TA work can increase productivity, reduce time-to-hire, improve candidate and hiring manager experience and enhance the overall effectiveness of the TA process.

Recruitment AI Can Improve Hire Quality and Costs

The ability of AI to improve quality of hire is important not just for hiring manager satisfaction, but also the bottom line. Let’s consider the cost of a new hire and the even higher cost of backfilling roles:

When considering a new hire, Indeed.com reports that “hiring costs can vary significantly based on the company, hiring process, location and role... Some companies may pay between $2,000 and $20,000, not including salary and benefits.”

The average cost of turnover per employee can be thousands of dollars once you include the loss of knowledge and productivity. This doesn’t include the intangible cost of additional stress on the workforce trying to cover the lost employee. The article also mentioned that “some studies predict that every time a business replaces a salaried employee, it costs six to nine months of their average salary, while others predict one to two times the employee’s yearly salary.”

These costs can increase the longer the roles remain open, so a shorter time-to-hire process can significantly impact the organization’s financial outlook.

AI Recruiting Still Needs a Human Touch

As I mentioned earlier, 80% of TA processes can be automated; however, that remaining 20% is critical to closing the deal and onboarding top talent – and needs a human touch. While the AI recruiting technology provides an excellent vetting process and essential data for making hiring decisions, all of the information and assessments are then required to filter through a TA specialist who can determine organizational cultural fit through person-to-person and AI enabled interviews, deeper dive into the candidate’s values, interests and goals, and assessment the candidate’s potential for growth within the organization.

Further, AI governance is needed to mitigate any potential biases in the software. For example, at AGS, we follow stringent third-party risk management processes to ensure the AI tech results are unbiased, explainable and auditable – meaning the logic and processes behind the decisions can be clearly understood and justified, reducing the risk of bias.

Determining Human vs AI Processes

Assessing what tasks should be managed by an AI system and what tasks should be managed by a human is an important factor in developing a TA workforce plan. One way to make this determination is to categorize the tasks to be performed and identify the most appropriate and valuable skills for each category of tasks.

Human-centered tasks will cover tasks when AI may not be the right approach, such as those requiring creative or complex problem-solving, emotional support, counseling or ethical decision-making. While AI-centered tasks could include data analysis and forecasting, pattern recognition, and recommendation systems for products or services.

Once you assess the work that needs to be completed, it can become clear when you can incorporate AI recruiting systems and when you need to unleash the power of human enterprise.

Navigating Challenges with Confidence

As the AI and automation are further embedded into recruitment operations, CRM and interviewing technology can be incredibly helpful to streamline processes and deliver high KPIs. The need to remain competitive will inspire continued adoption by businesses across the globe; however, with any change and investment in technology, you will encounter hesitation.

Reasons for the hesitation may include some common challenges such as perceived costs, a lack of internal AI expertise, data interoperability, as well as privacy and security concerns. These issues can be mitigated by sourcing or upskilling talent for workers with AI knowledge. You can also partner with a team that already has expertise and AI systems they can use for your business.

Once you understand the capabilities of AI for your TA process and how it benefits your team, you should develop a plan to integrate the technology into your systems or partner with a company that can use AI to support your program. While considering the next steps, HR leaders should review the technologies available, the challenges faced by the company, the benefits of AI technology, how it will change the day-to-day process, and when you should forgo AI and instead rely on human ingenuity.