Technology and Recruiting: Part I
How Today’s Chatbots Can Make Your Recruiting Processes More Efficient and Productive
Whether we’re pumping gas or trying to find the best available price for a certain pair of shoes, technology is making our lives a little easier and saving us valuable time. That goes double in the business world, as technology continues to make our jobs and duties more productive and efficient. This is true across all industries and all company departments—including recruiting and talent management. Take today’s chatbots, for example.
A few years ago, when companies increasingly turned to chatbots to automate and expediate the customer experience, there was concern that not having a live person to interact with might put off people who had inquiries or customer service demands. That concern has largely proven unfounded. In fact, many online visitors expect and prefer to communicate via a chatbot than a live person when visiting a website or using a mobile application, especially if they are in the early stages of the buyer’s journey.
While chatbots have technically been around for decades, it’s only been in the last few years that they have really become valuable thanks to advances in artificial intelligence and natural language processing. Today, chatbots are most popular for their convenience factor among consumers: 24x7 service, instant responses, and ability to answer basic questions. For businesses they offer even greater benefits. That includes the business of recruiting.
An Improved Hiring Process for Both Sides
With the job market booming, employers need every advantage in the recruiting process possible if they’re to sway talent to join their ranks instead of the competition’s. New technology tools, such as chatbots, can give them an upper hand.
One of the biggest criticisms in corporate recruiting involves the idea that there’s inherent bias in the hiring process. As a result, HR departments are trying to be more transparent in their inclusion initiatives and their abilities to attract a diverse workforce. Using chatbots is good way to avoid the pitfalls of bias, which is often unconscious.
Besides, many of the same questions are asked of all candidates regardless of their background and resume history. Questions that, nevertheless, take up a great deal of a recruiter’s time. However, with the sophistication of today’s chatbots, employers can greatly reduce the recruiting time spent on boilerplate questions and answers, and free up their recruiting teams to provide more value where they are most effective—such as drilling down for more specifics in key areas and determining how a candidate might or might not be a good fit in terms of company culture.
What’s more, the candidate application experience typically improves when chatbots are used effectively as part of the process. Estimates are that 60 percent or more of job seekers abandon the online job application process because of these applications’ length and complexity. With chatbots, the process becomes smoother and more interactive. Candidates simply respond naturally to the questions asked by the chatbots and can provide more context. But that’s not all. While engaging in chat, candidates can also ask questions of their own and get deeper insight into the role for which they’re applying.
Chatbots Provide Real Value—For Only Part of the Process
To get the best value from your organization, it’s important to recognize what chatbots can and cannot do. It’s during the initial stages of the recruiting process where chatbots can be most useful to your organization—during times when you are sourcing and ranking candidates, and scheduling interviews and phone calls with them. These activities don’t require the nuanced reasoning skills and expertise of an experienced recruiting professional, just command of basic vetting abilities that can determine which applicants and candidates are most suitable for further consideration.
When you get to the middle stages of the recruiting and hiring process and it comes time to interview candidates beyond basic screening, that’s when you need the human touch. Chatbots can’t assess how a candidate presents her- or himself to others, and what kind of unique skills someone might bring that can differentiate them from other candidates. Recruiting requires making personal connections that can only take place face to face.
HireLabs Provides the Needed Human Touch
Chatbots already help many businesses streamline the recruiting process and elevate the candidate experience in ways that can help your brand as an employer. However, even with major advances in chatbot technology expected in the future, they will never entirely replace the need for human experience and expertise. That’s where we come in. HireLabs has a team of seasoned professionals who can elevate your hiring so that you get not just qualified talent but the best talent for your specific needs. Contact us today to get your talent pipeline flowing!