It’s been a good 2 year journey since I shared my first experience in the article ‘What an IT-Recruiter needs to know’. Down the line a lot has changed. The introduction of Artificial Intelligence in IT recruitment industry has been a life changing event for me. I would like to share my journey with the recruitment counterparts and see if it can help you guys the way it has helped me.
From worried & doubtful to happy & confident
When I started in 2016…
After entering the IT industry, my job role as a recruiter was very clear to me. It was not just attracting and sourcing a pool of candidates, but selecting the best fit for the organisation was my primary task.
Definitely, we IT-Recruiters can easily get plenty of applicants from various sources, but we can’t simply send all of them for further interviews. We will get a hard push back from the Hiring Manager if we do that. The sourced profiles are to be screened and shortlisted based on many said and unsaid requirements before we can start showing them to the hiring managers.
There were days when I had a lot of applicants, but couldn’t find the time even to screen each one of them, let alone calling them to check their level of interest and suitability for the role. Day by day, the number of unprocessed applicants would keep piling up.
Not being from a technical background, I had a hard time judging the technical ability of the candidates. Resumes are usually overflowing with technologies and IT skills written all over in their project details, but does that imply that the candidate is really that proficient in every skill he has mentioned in his CV?
That is not the only tough part. Indeed, I tried my best to shortlist the most suitable candidates according to my selection strategy and set them up for Interviews with the hiring managers. Rejections were more than selections at most of the times, and it was not generally that I knew why a particular candidate, who I thought would pass the Interview, did really fall flat. This was demotivating me and I’m sure you must also have faced this now and then.
Many times, the commitments of our recruiters have been questioned due to candidates getting rejected resulting in the positions getting delayed to be fill as we have failed to get that right person for the job role. We also lack that audacity to keep up with hiring managers in the wake of having a lot of dismissals.
Introducing AI to my work
I saw Artificial Intelligence emerging at the same time, and was keen to know how it can bring changes to my daily tasks. There were many articles on the internet and going through them, I found out few online courses like the AIERC. I thought of giving it a shot.
Learning about AI was surely life changing in many ways. The daily work of screening, which I had been doing keeping the vital perspectives in mind, was the same thing AI did for me. AI granted me a much reasonable ground for selection and rejection. It helped me make fast decisions of shortlisting and yes, I did get the best candidates amongst all.
AI tools gave me ready-made trackers filled with candidate details. I got a short and a smart summary of every profile. I also learned about a mobile quiz application which helped me to check the technical proficiency of the candidates. I readily got their marks as and when the candidates attended the quiz. It gave me a firm base for their selection.
Now, I use AI on every position I work on and it is doing wonders for me. I know whichever candidate I am passing for the next round is not just based on screening, but also on the grounds of their technical ability. I am now sure that the hiring managers are interviewing only the most suitable candidates for the job role. It has increased the rate of selections.
To be honest, having AI do much of the time-consuming and repetitive works has allowed me to spend more time on productive tasks like speaking to candidates to evaluate their personalities, soft skills, and overall cultural fit.
I would like to share an experience with you where I used AI tools to work on an urgent position. I forwarded two most suitable candidates to the interview rounds. One of them cleared all rounds, but the other candidate failed in the last round which was with the BU Head. Earlier, I never walked to the BU Head to ask about the rejections, but this time I had to. Both the candidates were up to the mark and the AI tools gave me that confidence for them. I got to know from the Head that the second candidate got rejected due to his high salary expectations. I was able to explain to the Head why this candidate was the best fit for the position and a deserving one. He was outstanding in his quiz score, in the suitability to that job role and also was a speaker at International conferences.
After knowing this, the Head agreed to conduct another round of discussion and finally, this candidate got hired. After seeing this candidate performing brilliantly in the organisation and being an active speaker at in-house seminars too, we now believe our decision was right.
The hiring manager was impressed and started trusting the process I was following. It boosted my confidence level. I also started getting input from many Interviewers that their time is not getting wasted as they get to deal only with the quality candidates. They became more open to discuss the JD with me in detail and started giving Interview feedbacks promptly. I felt respected for my work for the first time.
We recruiters need to be confident about every candidate we screen, every candidate that goes to the further level of Interview and every candidate we hire. The laborious work of filling the trackers, calling every candidate to get details, sourcing more and more candidates due to continuous rejections from hiring managers, stressing over to fill up positions, etc. are the tasks we have been wasting our time in. Are these tasks really letting us keep up with our self-esteem?
Our self-esteem depends on the quality of work we do, and not on the quantity. AI is helping us to do quantity of work without compromising on quality. AI is surely going to disrupt the entire recruitment industry and also change the job role of a recruiter in the near future. Recruiters need to adapt and evolve to keep up with this change like I did.
Thank You!
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Devika has worked in the recruitment industry for 3 years, ultimately gaining experience in human resource practices, client management, sourcing and recruiting at different levels. She specializes in technical recruitment and believes that her work is finding people careers rather than jobs.
Currently, she is working as Technical Recruitment Specialist with Rezoomex. When not working, she opts to read books or go for a coffee with her pals.