While many tools available to recruiters are touted as AI, not all fit the bill. As a hiring or HR decision-maker, it’s essential that you understand the features, as well as the risks and rewards of any automated recruiting tools you choose to deploy. As with anything, you’ll need to maintain a certain amount of involvement to make sure your hiring practices never lose their “human touch.”

Improving Efficiency with AI

HR and hiring managers know that time is of the essence when it comes to closing in on qualified candidates and extending job offers. Improving efficiency is one of many areas where AI can provide real bottom line value, improving efficiency and speeding up formerly lengthy and work-intensive processes that often took far more work hours and overhead costs than their value warranted. These tasks included reviewing resumes, conducting phone and face-to-face interviews, and selecting candidates based on arbitrary and sometimes impossible to calculate qualifiers.

These days, automated software can be used to great effect for shortlisting qualified candidates based on personalized algorithmic criteria. This provides a quick turnaround time to allow hiring professionals to move candidates faster through the review and hiring process while helping to ensure that only the best prospects will move forward. This process was formerly a minefield of human error and rife with risks for making poor decisions which often resulted in poor job performance and a high turnover rate. So the bottom line is, AI recruiting not only improves efficiency, it is also a cost-effective strategy.

Personalized Job Searches for Candidates

Many companies are now using AI to personalize the candidates’ experience. These days, recruiters are optimizing their workflows with machine-learning chatbots equipped with natural language, offering specific and conversational responses to their questions and guiding them through the application and onboarding process. These features make for a more friendly and engaging experience that makes candidates feel that they are being supported in their job search and receiving clear information as promptly as possible.

Conversely, AI technology makes the recruiter’s job easier and helps them to manage expectations of hiring managers and candidates alike. Many types of software have access to a recruiter’s communications, predicting and reporting how long it typically takes them to respond to emails, informing both successful and unsuccessful candidates in a timely matter, and keeping stakeholders in the company updated on deliverable timelines.

Cautionary Considerations

While the benefits of AI are well-documented, there are a few shortcomings that recruiters should keep in mind when proceeding with new technologies. This word of caution is not intended to dissuade anyone from incorporating AI into their existing hiring practices, but to help HR professionals make better-informed choices on how to proceed.

Artificial intelligence does not replace a recruiters’ job; the responsibility will remain to sell open positions and to provide personalized service when needed. In addition, recruiters will still be needed when it comes to building relationships and always working to improve the employers’ brand through the approaches used in the recruitment and hiring processes.

To put it simply, AI software will never eradicate the recruiters’ vital role in candidate sourcing and retention, however, it can simplify and optimize various processes.