Is Artificial Intelligence Recruiting Hype? The Highlights from the Talent Acquisition and Technology Conference
I traveled to Denver last month to attend one of my favorite conferences of the year TAtech in Denver. In between the great food and the numerous craft beer breweries, many of the sessions I attended talked about the future ways we will recruit talent. Over $1 billion was invested in recruiting technology in many startups just in the last year. 90% of the starts ups had the word “artificial intelligence” somewhere in their platform.
So how will AI, Facebook, and Google help make your job easier and find better candidates? This is what I heard and my thoughts:
Artificial Intelligence: This will win buzzword of the year in the recruiting industry. Basically, AI is machine learning (another buzzword) where computers will not have to be programmed because they learn on their own and get smarter over time. For recruiting, in theory (and already happening), AI can source, contact, interview and hire the best person for the job without a human even being involved. Some AI companies can send you a list of passive candidates that their technology identified that they are ready to move jobs; even if the candidate themselves don’t know!
Out of everything I saw at TAtech, the product that makes the most sense to me in the AI category is a company called Mya. Mya uses chatbot AI technology to be the initial screener of EVERYONE who applies to any of your jobs. It is basically phone screening every job seeker via a chat. The AI part is Mya is able to not only hold a conversation with each candidate, it knows what questions to ask, digs for additional information and can determine if the job seeker is a good fit. Mya also automatically schedules the interview with the recruiting team. I have seen this live and it will save companies so much time while also giving all applicants a chance to get moved to the interview stage. Talk about improving your company’s reputation during the candidate experience! The black hole will not exist at your company and Mya may set interviews for people that a human may not have even considered. I am fired up for this one!
Facebook/Google for Jobs: Facebook, Google and Microsoft (they own LinkedIn) are “lifestyle” companies that want to be everything to everyone. Part of real life is jobs so it is natural that these companies want to provide platforms to help job seekers and employers connect. Facebook’s Gaurav Dosi presented at the conference and introduced Facebook for Jobs. Many challenges are ahead for FB in making this mainstream but for smaller companies without applicant tracking systems, this may be another source for candidates. Also, OrlandoJobs.com will partner with Facebook to get your jobs into their search. Google for Jobs is off and running. Google is using AI to understand the end users’ preferences and search history so when they are looking for “education jobs”, they will only see relevant jobs. We already have a partnership with Google so posting your jobs with us will also get them in the Google for Jobs results.
Uber for Recruiting: The gig economy is not slowing down. One of the best presentations I saw that dealt with this was from a company called Snagajob. Need someone to answer a phone for a couple hours today from 3-5pm? Just like Uber, go to the app and “request” someone to come in and answer phones. The available talent pings you back and shows up at 3pm. On demand talent through your cell phone. Just like Uber, you rate the talent and they rate you.
I really had to think this through. But I also had to put aside that one day I would hop in a stranger’s car or stay at a stranger’s house. For certain types of jobs, I think this will work very well! (They are testing it in one city right now)
I do think a lot of the AI stuff is not that big of a deal yet (except Mya and Google Jobs). So many products with so many claims come out of these conferences every year but in the end, only a few make a real impact. The real challenge is being able to implement any of these products into your current systems or have the capital and the guts to really shake things up in your office with some cool robots!