AI posing problems for applicants and employers in recruitment arms race

Applicants are using AI to frame CVs and apply for roles while employers are using it to spot those who have used the technology

Artificial intelligence is being used by many applicants to help frame their job applications and CVs. Photograph: iStock
Artificial intelligence is being used by many applicants to help frame their job applications and CVs. Photograph: iStock

Like academia, it seems, recruitment finds itself in something of a nuclear arms race between its two main constituent groups.

Job applicants are increasingly using AI to more easily tailor job applications and dramatically ramp up the number of posts that they apply for.

HR departments, meanwhile, which initially viewed the technology as a way of better coping with existing workloads, now find themselves reliant on it to counter the greatly increased volume and more specific nature of the applications they receive.

There are related problems too with fraud and disaffection, according to new research by recruitment consultancy and software firm Greenhouse, whose CEO Daniel Chait, suggests we need to find a way to somehow restore more human interaction into the process so the right employers and employees can find each other in the future.

The survey findings make for grim reading with almost a third of job applicants who responded saying they believe AI has simply shifted the bias inherent in the process from human beings to an algorithm.

Most of them, meanwhile, are using AI to help with the process and most employers are using it to spot the applicants who have used it. Neither side is happy, according to Greenhouse, with a significant proportion believing the model is broken.

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Those involved in higher-level education already know all about the problem and there are other areas, too, in which one of the great appeals of the tech - its easy accessibility to all - is also proving to be one of its biggest challenges.

Chait says more human engagement is required in the hiring process so people can actually find out about each other. In the meantime, he says fraud is a growing problem with employers sometimes not sure the applicant is who they say they are and genuine applicants suspicious that postings may be part of a financial scam.

In the circumstances, the idea of more people sitting across from each other to discuss a vacant job certainly sounds appealing.

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Richard Cantillon

Cantillon

A man with a profound understanding of how money is made and lost, the Kerry-born economist Richard Cantillon (1680s-1734) is a fitting namesake for this long-running column. Since 2009 Cantillon has delivered succinct business comment on the stories behind the news.