David Bernard | September 06, 2021
The accelerated integration of Artificial Intelligence into HR is poised to transform the recruitment market. Its rapid expansion has advanced a long-predicted change, as the industry responds to Covid-19 and the upheaval that almost all workforces have endured.
But how can HR best embrace this swift change, ensuring that AI and human practice is synchronised, to optimise the recruitment process? David Bernard, CEO of predictive recruitment platform AssessFirst, evaluates how AI can help firms to hire, retain and develop the perfect candidate.
A year ago, if you happened to encounter discourse concerning AI and recruitment, you would likely be reading one of two types of articles. The first would explain why AI will lead to widespread job losses. The second would counter that no, in fact, AI will lead to abundant recruitment and job opportunities.
And then came the pandemic. It became apparent to most that social restrictions would stretch beyond weeks or even months and the perceived relationship between recruitment and AI shifted: from the forecast of opportunity for recruiters to the implementation of AI solutions.
The Economist referred to the adoption of new technological solutions as “tech-celeration” in a report that collated business leaders' opinions - most of which spoke of our ten year evolutionary leap in digital adoption.
For those hiring managers not able to assess candidates with traditional face-to-face thoroughness, AI has offered recruiters remarkable solutions. Rather than simply assessing degrees, scanning CVs and inviting candidates in for an interview, recruiters can use tailored, self-adapting algorithms with which to find ideal candidates.
The emergence of artificial intelligence
In a traditional recruitment process, a single person or team of people is responsible for identifying and evaluating the candidate's soft skills. The efficiency of this practice is dependent on the recruiter's experience but, even with the most adept recruiters, the process can be problematic.
The very practice of conducting an interview, which is more complex than it is credited for, can result in the recruiter missing particular candidate skills - or misunderstanding them - due to cognitive biases. Similarity bias, confirmation bias, initial impression bias, projection, and groupthink are common occurrences when we need to make quick or pressured judgments.
And there is little a recruiter can do about these biases. Since they are the result of the complexities of the subconscious, recognising when we are conceding to these biases is difficult. The probability of acknowledging them and adjusting our decisions accordingly during an interview is negligible.
So what problem is this feeding? It leads to inconsistent judgments that vary from one candidate to the next. It fuels the lack of diversity in the workforce that most HR and business leaders are trying to address.
However, AI allows recruiters to use data from behavioural assessments and provide candidates with a standardised assessment. A fair vehicle - driven by customisable parameters – so that employer and prospective employee benefit equally.
Using AI to optimise the probability of success
Although AI integration has been accelerated by the pandemic, digital adoption was already surpassing traditional recruitment processes for companies like Vodafone, Tesla, and Google. These organisations – at one time ahead of the curve - are now discovering others are following suit.
At AssessFirst, we’ve found that our customers benefit most when candidate profiles are compared to top performing employees – or any employees for that matter. This ensures that desirable personality traits and skills for a particular role are found with accuracy and precision.
The probability of success within a particular role, within a particular team, or working for a particular manager, is suddenly predictable.
The threat of AI for human autonomy
We are amid an irreversible recruitment sea-change. And some fear that AI will eventually sweep away the need for human contribution. As a CEO of a tech company, I don’t believe this to be the case. Recruiters should see AI as means to assist the process rather than replace the recruiter.
Consider the prioritising of traits over degrees. This requires the computing of data from hundreds or thousands of candidates, analysed in the context of a fluid hiring process and environment.
Handling huge quantities of data like this at speed, with accuracy is impossible for the human brain. But this is what AI is built to do. HR and hiring managers can then immerse themselves in the human aspects: leaving data-handling to the intricacies of machine learning.
Rapport-building, mentorship, work-trials, and tasks will always require the human hand and eye. And, whilst a traditional interview is far from precise and objective, offering a role to a candidate without any human interaction is, most of the time, inconceivable and immoral. The judgment of skilled recruiters allied with data collected from AI will be required and desired indefinitely.
We must also acknowledge that implementing AI gives rise to new job roles and functions. People will be required to monitor, track, and adjust algorithms and data input. And, as the scope of AI tasks increases, humans will be needed to expand and refine that input and monitoring process.
AI presents recruiters with the ability to hire and manage candidates with greater efficiency than ever before. But, as John Giannandrea, Apple’s senior vice president of Machine Learning and AI strategy, has remarked: “The real safety question, if you want to call it that, is that if we give these systems biased data, they will be biased.”
This clarifies a key concern for all recruiters. AI is not a panacea, but a greatly beneficial and essential tool that requires the guiding hand, and learned minds, of human skill and interaction.
Read MoreDavid Bernard | September 03, 2021
We live in a world where equality, in numerous forms, continues to reside at the forefront of many people’s minds. From gender to race and everything in between, things have certainly improved, but there is still a very long way to go.
Today, there are a mere six female CEOs in the UK FTSE 100, with the average male CEO earning 17% more than the average female CEO. Gender equality has been in the spotlight far longer than other protected characteristics such as race, religion, sexual orientation, disability, age and it continues to remain prominent.
And here, CEO and founder of AssessFirst, the innovative artificial intelligence recruitment firm, David Bernard, asks why, if we are losing the battle for gender equality in the FTSE 100, we should expect to see diversity, equity and inclusion successes across a much wider cross section of the business community.
A race to equality and diversity
The business case for gender, cultural and ethnic diversity is strong, and is only getting stronger.
Since 2015, McKinsey has conducted extensive research and produced compelling reports that demonstrate ironically, whilst the business case for diversity is robust, international progress is weak.
The latest reports show that those pushing ahead with gender diversity are 25% more likely to financially outperform companies in the bottom quartile. What’s more, for ethnic and cultural diversity, the top quartile companies are 36% more likely to be profitable than bottom quartile companies.
The UK (aside from the US) leads the way with gender equality on executive teams. But representation here only grew by 5% between 2014 and 2019. McKinsey's global data set for 2017-2019 shows a mere 1% increase. This pitiful and indeed slowing progress is a problem. We need to do better.
Yes, the UK and the US lead the way with gender diversity, but there is still a long way to go, and neighboring countries need to make quick and impactful changes.
And, let’s not forget, whilst gender equality is of pressing importance, businesses and leaders should ensure that other cases, such as culture and ethnicity, are considered no less important.
A knock-on effect
I see a lack of diversity and equality in workforces as a psychological manifestation of who we are.
We, as are all humans, are programmed to find differences in our perceptions distasteful. We just do not like change - even if we adapt to it in the end - and even 'feedback' on our actions is naturally offensive to us.
So, with that in mind, it is inevitable that we have ended up in a situation where we have an echo chamber of talent that isn't necessarily supported by objective performance data.
The problem manifests itself everywhere; from the executive hires in the world's biggest companies to the latest bartender pulling pints at the local pub.
Conventional hiring and recruitment, such as only using a CV to identify and rank talent, is part of the root cause of bias decision-making (however implicit it may be) because the initial filter sifts candidates based on their upbringing, education, experience, or even appearance.
We are, thankfully, at the start of a movement of change. But this is a problem that is hundreds, or maybe even thousands, of years in the making. We need to unpick that problem with a collaborative and collective effort.
Covid-19 impacted diversity, equality and inclusion progress
There has been a polarization of diversity, equality and inclusion efforts, also known as DE&I, as a fallout of Covid-19, the ongoing pandemic and the ensuing lockdowns.
In the spring of 2020, companies rightly turned their attention to the Covid-19 crisis. Most have continued to do so – either to stay afloat or even gain a competitive advantage – which meant DE&I became more of a focus for some whilst a matter of less significance for others.
Those that deprioritized DE&I - perhaps as a short-term measure to consolidate HR and hiring resources - have weakened their position; whether that is in their ability to retain, recruit, or mobilize their workforce, or even all those stages in the talent lifecycle.
Diverse talent is often most at-risk during times of challenge and hardship, as downsizing can have a disproportionate impact on roles held by those from more diverse backgrounds. And with increased home-working practices, all manner of inequalities can manifest in ways that will hit the bottom line and badly impact minorities.
For example, those who are managing childcare responsibilities during periods of isolation or school closures or those who are living in shared accommodation may be frequently working against the odds in order to keep pace with their peers.
Without a diverse collective of perspective catering to a diverse workforce, these problems can multiply to cripple performance from the ground up.
The acceleration of DE&I
The generational leap of tech-first remote working for so many companies provided an opportunity to build inclusive and agile cultures. Though we may be coming out of the ‘crisis', there remains a golden opportunity – and one that businesses should seize.
Traditional management structures, reinforced by physical office environments, have been fundamentally changed forever - even if we see a hybrid home-office working pattern become the norm from this point onward.
With this revolution, HR departments find themselves in a situation a pathway to achieving diversity and inclusion goals seems more realistic.
Make or break: what’s next?
There is no silver bullet. There is much to consider and even more to do.
But, with a few simple changes, real and meaningful progress is possible. What encourages me is that with all the companies that I speak to, particularly within the UK, there is almost wholesale agreement that this is an important issue - notwithstanding the economic arguments. However, the same cannot be said for all other countries across the globe.
The most common question I receive from those who recognize the criticality of this however is, "But, where do we start?"
And to that, my response is always the same; "What is the data telling you? What is your workforce saying about your DE&I efforts?"
We must know what the scale of the problem is before we can tackle it. Every single company is unique, and the manner of their ideal solution is unique to suit.
Once the problem is identified, I recommend a few ideas that can be considered to start spinning the wheels of change:
1) Get unbiased views of candidate potential (internal and external)
2) Consult with your DE&I team, committee, or lead when publishing job descriptions
3) Implement DE&I training for your workforce
4) Offer remote working opportunities where practical and appropriate
I'm proud that AssessFirst continues to help companies of all shapes and sizes with their DE&I goals through our data-led psychometric technology. We practice what we preach with our own remote workforce and using this technology as part of our own talent lifecycle management. But I recognize that fantastic technology is most effective when it is embedded as a part of a wider reaching strategy.
I have hope for the future, though there is ongoing work to do, and there will be for quite some time. But as the UK economy stirs back to life within what feels like the closing chapters of ‘crisis’, we can also bring the equality gaps to a close with renewed urgency.
Working in partnership with a handful of partners in the UK, we created a Diversity and Inclusion strategy guide.
Read MoreDavid Bernard | September 03, 2021
Businesses have never recruited as much as they do today. They spend more time doing it and invest more money to get it done. But why do so many businesses get it wrong? What is the true cost of their mistakes? And is the increased emphasis on personality conceding ground to competence?
David Bernard, CEO of the innovative recruitment technology firm AssessFirst, believes that businesses can improve both their profits and personality-led cultures by modernising the recruitment process.
The traditional hiring process follows a pattern that most of us are familiar with and have experienced. It goes something like this: HR determines what the tasks of the vacancy are with hiring managers and outline the attributes required to fill it. Job adverts are posted and applicants apply. An interview is arranged. The winning candidate is offered the job.
That process has undergone some change over the years, but the essential structure has remained the same. The problem with this model is that we don’t know how successful it is. Most companies can tell you how much they spend in pursuit of the ideal candidate. But far too few of them can explain the true cost per hire.
What we do know is that the traditional recruitment process is broken. I often put my head in my hands when I read the myriad of HR reports that reveal the prevalence of bad hiring. The 2020 Career Builder report offered little reassurance. It stated that 74% of employers hired the wrong person last year. This came at an average cost of £10,843. This is madness.
Profit
Productivity ought to be a key consideration when seeking a new candidate. Ideally, the new hire should be more productive - either through skillset, efficiency or both - so that profit opportunities can be maximised. This makes a bad hire doubly costly. Not only are businesses paying for a wasted recruitment process with inefficient training and slowed productivity, but the cost of missing a chance to improve the quality and volume of output is equally detrimental in the medium-term. Profits that could have increased, instead suffer.
Research by McKinsey & Company suggests that the top 5% of talent is 8 times more productive than average talent. Of course, every employer should aim to be recruiting from as near to that top 5% as possible. Now you might, if you are an employer or recruiter, dismiss this as impossible – ‘that’s ok for the Google’s and Apple’s of this world, but how can I find that top 5%?’ This doesn’t have to be an impossible aspiration. There are solutions that I will come to shortly, but first let’s breakdown just how a bad hire can damage profitability.
The $200,000/$50,000 formula demonstrated by HR Daily is a fantastic illustration of the problem. It outlines how an employee who brings in $200,000 in revenue would make their employer a profit margin of $80,000 on the hire. But an employee from the top 25% of the talent pool would give the business a profit margin of $130,000 because they will bring in more revenue. A bad hire therefore results in a $50,000 loss of profit.
Personality
“The first thing we look for when hiring new staff is personality. In my eyes, personality always wins over book smarts.” - Sir Richard Branson
It is a statement that divides recruiters, business owners and HR professionals.
Whilst the declaration that personality wins over ‘book smarts’ is contentious, it is inarguable that character is a vital and too-often overlooked requirement for any given job role.
Finding candidates that match the core values and culture of a company is a profitable exercise, increasing the likelihood that good candidates can be retained. It also provides the opportunity to diversify your pool of talent, bringing in people who think differently to other staff to challenge norms and existing processes.
Deciding between two or more candidates who appear to offer similar advantages is hard; the choice can be simplified with in-depth personality data. Personality is in fact a predictor of future job performance that exceeds the quality of information that you can obtain from analyzing a person’s CV or qualifications.
Comprehensive personality assessments increase the chance of hiring the best people. And the best people drive healthy profitability.
Personality metrics
At AssessFirst, our AI recruitment platform collects hundreds of data points about a candidate without the candidate having to complete long drawn-out questionnaires. This gives employers two crucial advantages in the hiring process; it provides a breakdown of a candidate’s personality type. And it helps to predict each candidate’s behavior, revealing the tasks, projects and even teams where they will have the most impact.
Gathering objective personality data provides insight that can help to eradicate unconscious biases. All employers are susceptible to, for example, confirmation or affinity bias during the recruitment process. This bias, perhaps more than any other factor, contributes to bad hires.
Those continuing to recruit without the benefits afforded by Artificial Intelligence are prone to being in the 74% of employers that make the wrong hire. Data driven personality recruitment goes well beyond a simple tick-box personality test. It is a deep analytical tool that draws from behavioral science: assessing cognitive and non-cognitive patterns. This is how employers can tap into the top 5% of talent specific to their company and culture.
The recruitment model of ‘advert, application, and interview’ is as antiquated a process as there is in business. AI powered recruitment is more frequently associated with blue chip tech companies, but I think that a much larger cross section of the business community, many of whom are challenged by the uncertain post-pandemic market, cannot afford to get recruitment wrong. And it is personality metrics that will help to ensure they get it right.
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