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AI and human understanding will win the war for talent

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One of the most well known tropes in startup and tech culture is that your business is only as good as the team behind it. You can’t do anything without having a strong team, and the most important job for every manager is to hire quality talent that fits into the preexisting team dynamics. The HR and recruiting industry has dedicated itself to finding the people who are right for your company, but the process of skimming resumes and calling in highly rated candidates for an interview hasn’t changed for the past decade or so.

However, the newest trend, AI, is infiltrating all industries. While it might be a very good thing, you shouldn’t put all your hiring eggs in that AI basket. The best solution combines the strengths of HR and AI.

AI in the hiring process

We’ve all been hearing (and reading) about how AI will completely take over our lives. We’ve also been frightened into thinking it will soon replace all of us. While the job of getting people jobs will not be replaced by AI anytime soon, the tech can offer major improvements to the process.

To find the right talent, you need to have the ability to scan resumes quickly, read people immediately, and imagine the future of the applicant sitting in front of you. While some of that work can be replaced by AI, currently we are nowhere near an AI that can read people and assess their fit within the culture of the workplace. But some of the processes for finding the right people to join your company — such as immediately asking for more information, screening, and highlighting special candidates — can be done more quickly and efficiently with AI.

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The integration of AI is not just about saving the company time and resources. It also saves time and uncertainty for the candidate. Getting back to top talent to set up an interview a week from now is the best way to have them move on to the next opportunity. If you can provide instantaneous feedback on every application, you get a leg up over other companies looking to snag that candidate, instead of wasting their time and missing a hire.

Onboarding with chatbots

The optimal way to maximize efficiency is combining human and technological resources. A chatbot can onboard new candidates as quickly as possible, as opposed to a form that might never get filled out. If you build a real AI chat bot, you can give candidates real-time feedback on their applications and ask questions to gather information before any interview is scheduled. The bot can even automatically analyze the candidate’s resume and information while onboarding and give them real-time responses relevant to them, making sure that the right people get called in for an interview and that the interviewer has the right information before even asking the first question.

After the chatbot has done its job and flagged the relevant candidates according to your parameters, the human element kicks in. Hiring managers don’t have to read the whole resume, supporting documents, and answers to a questionnaire because AIs can create a personalized summary of documents. The AI behind the hiring process can create a five-bullet summary of everything that’s important to know about each candidate. It can even set up the interview on its own. This means even small companies where C-level executives do the hiring don’t waste time on pre-interview screening, and interviewers have concise information about each candidate before they walk in the room.

The interview is where the human intelligence and expertise shine. Things like a candidate’s cultural fit, connection, and ability to work with others, along with the hiring manager’s overall impression of a person, are vital. Humans can focus on what they do best and automate the rest.

The future of AI in recruiting

At the end of the day, hiring a person doesn’t just hinge on facts and figures, it depends on who they are. And that’s something AIs still can’t assess. But the process of going through those facts and figures to see if someone is qualified can certainly be automated by an intelligent bot. The value is increased by the fact that you can onboard and convert candidates quickly, meaning top talent will be more likely to work for you and you’ll take less time filling important positions at your company. The combination of AI and human understanding is what hiring managers need to win the war on talent — and save a few dollars, as well as time.

Moritz Kothe is the chief executive officer of kununu, a place to find and share workplace insights.

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