Doing tedious and repetitive tasks providing faster response times, increasing ability to meet goals and allowing for real time personalization & predictive analytics.
Today’s companies are implementing AI technology around a framework for how to evaluate if these technologies are right for your organization. There’s a lot going on in the space and we need the questions answered, but let’s first talk about the rise of AI.
I know we’ve all heard, at conferences, the internet, in our inboxes talk of artificial intelligence, there’s a lot of stats out there.
A study from Ecentra said 81% of companies who embrace artificial intelligence saw a 10% growth and just over half realized more than 20% growth.
There is a lot of material about artificial intelligence, including: Automation, early saving time, saving money, and creating business impact. On the flip side of that coin…
Forbes said 65% of companies have not seen business returns from their AI investments.
So, what really is going on here?
There’s lots of ways to solve our problems, but what are the problems really?
When I look at AI, I think specifically of the subset of artificial intelligence called machine learning, which is the most common and prevalent form currently used in talent acquisition.
Machine learning: A study of computer algorithms that improve automatically through experience and the use of data it’s seen as a part of artificial intelligence.
Some key components to think about with this definition: Tools are improving automatically based on the data and we learn about how they take that input. Also, what questions to ask vendors to make sure the data is being used in the right ways, to make sure that what we want to happen more efficiently.
Talent acquisition is changing
The future of staffing, the future of recruiting, the future work is now. Now is the time to adapt, adjust and rethink that relationship between the human driven processes and the technologies. Here is a framework to think about talent acquisition and what are key drivers when considering this complex echo system:
Workforce from static to flexible:
- Jobs are being more flexible with location
- Re-skilling
- Job switching
Diversity by design
Diversity involving all kinds of diversity, not only diversity that you can see, such as ethnic, racial and gender diversity. But cognitive diversity, different types of thinking, as well.
Technology, systems of intelligence
Technology is no longer just places you store data and transact upon it. They’re becoming intelligent systems that will actually engage with your job candidates or with your employees.
Candidate Experience
The end-to-end candidate experience is something that’s been talked about forever, but particularly in these high volume jobs.
72% of job candidates now that have a negative experience will share that negative experience online.
Studies including Virgin Media say they lost $6 million a year, because job candidates who had a negative experience switched to a competitor. Disney job candidates spend eight times more money at Disney parks than an average customer at large. Job candidates are your best customers in many ways. They can be future candidates and brand advocates. Let’s treat candidates the way that we would want to be treated.
Value on safety and security
We see this after events like wars, pandemics, where we are going back to the basics in some ways where yes, candidates want perks and benefits that make work feel good. At the same time, the bottom line is can I feel safe? Can I feel secure? Not just physically, but, with that paycheck, is something going to happen. That’s going to cause our company to be in trouble. When instability is happening in the world, like a pandemic, they cause kind of that, people re prioritize.
Business resilience
Companies are designing for business resilience — ones that will be here for long periods of time, regardless of what’s happening at a macro level or regardless of things that are outside of their control.
The time is now to be equipped with the right knowledge to make the right decisions, especially as we think about that future state of talent acquisition. A future that includes technology but is ultimately still human driven. Change is upon us. AI is one of those ways that can help us, but it it must be done right — ethics-first.
I will leave you with this quote:
It is not the most intellectual of the species that survives. It is not the strongest that survives, but the species that survives is the one that is able best to adapt and adjust to the changing environment in which it finds itself.
We have an opportunity to reset how we’re thinking about our use of technology and how to continue to make talent acquisition a very human driven process.
