There are times when a company suddenly has a surge in open roles. In these cases, recruiters are put in a position where they need to weed through a large volume of resumes quickly. High-volume recruitment comes with its unique challenges, especially if these roles need to be filled ASAP. Here are some tips on how to navigate high-volume recruitment that would ensure that your candidate experience doesn’t suffer.
What are Chatbots and How Do They Work?
Recruiting chatbots are AI-powered robots designed to help with communication by replicating the way recruiters interact with candidates. That can include one or more of the following tasks:
- Welcoming visitors to career websites and landing pages.
- Helping with collecting candidate information for administrative purposes.
- Asking basic questions about skills and experiences.
- Answering basic questions candidates might have.
- Scheduling meetings and interviews.
Recruiting chatbots are designed in such a way as to mimic human recruiters as closely as possible. This gives candidates the impression they’re talking to a real person, making them more receptive and building rapport.
How Chatbots Help With Hiring
As we mentioned above, chatbots can have a number of uses when it comes to recruiting. Businesses often find that using chatbots makes the hiring process more efficient while providing better results:
Improved Candidate Experience
One of the most important things candidates value is plenty of clear communication. As a survey by Allegis shows, over half of the candidates questioned were comfortable communicating with chatbots, both in the early stages and when it came time to schedule interviews.
With chatbots constantly evolving and learning to communicate in a more natural way, candidate experience can only improve. This is helped by the fact that unlike human recruiters, chatbots are available 24/7. This flexibility can be a great help for candidates with unconventional working schedules.
Taking on Administrative Tasks
As we already mentioned, chatbots can also help recruiters manage administrative tasks that would otherwise take up a lot of time and effort better spent on making hiring decisions.
These tasks are divided into two main categories. First, chatbots are used to collect candidate information during the sourcing process. This way, recruiters have immediate access to candidates’ contact info and resume.
Second, chatbots can schedule interviews and meetings. This is especially important in the case of a remote interview since finding a time that works for both the interviewer and the candidate can be tricky.
Screening Applications
Screening candidate applications is one of the most time-consuming parts of the hiring process. This is especially true with a high number of applications, as recruiters are under even more pressure to make the right choice quickly.
Chatbots can help with this process by conducting a sort of pre-interview. The bots will ask candidates questions in order to find the ones with the right skills and experience for the position.
Qualifying Candidates
Chatbots can outperform human recruiters both in the number of conversations they can have at the same time and the fact they can answer any candidate questions almost instantly. This leaves them in a unique position when it comes to qualifying candidates.
Asking candidates questions and then comparing the answers to a list of predetermined filters, chatbots can grade and rank candidates by how well they would fit in with your company.
Once all the applications have been screened and all the candidates interviewed, recruiters are sent a shortlist of the most promising potential hires. Recruiters can then focus on interviewing these candidates, getting to know them better and coming to a hiring decision.
Answering Questions
Asking candidates questions isn’t the only thing chatbots can do. Much like in the case of customer support, chatbots can also be used to answer any questions candidates may have about the company and the job opening.
Even if a chatbot can’t answer a more complex question, they can still get the candidate in touch with a recruiter that might be able to help.
Fostering Diversity With Language
More advanced bots are also able to process complex communication, like slang and industry jargon. The best ones are programmed in a way that makes the conversation flow and feels natural.
This also lets them communicate with a wider range of candidates, some of whom might be put off by a conversation that sounds too formal.
Saving Time and Effort
As previously mentioned, chatbots can help recruiters reclaim a large chunk of their day by taking on time-consuming and process-heavy tasks. This mostly refers to resume screening and administrative tasks.
This newfound time lets recruiters focus on what they do best – forming meaningful connections with candidates and using their expertise to make great hiring decisions. These relationships will both help them attract top talent and create a talent pool they can fall back to in case of any new job opening.
While chatbots hold a lot of promise for the recruiting industry, their potential is nowhere near exhausted. As AI and machine learning continue to evolve and improve, chatbots will get better and better at sourcing and screening candidates, arranging meetings and interviews, and providing interactive onboarding.
With the right balance of chatbot efficiency and human decision making, we can enter a whole new era of recruiting – one where the best candidates and top companies can come together effortlessly.
