The impact of advanced AI tools on recruitment

True AI tools are getting better and better…

ChatGPT is a chatbot launched by OpenAI in November 2022. It is built on top of OpenAI’s GPT-3 family of large language models, and is fine-tuned with both supervised and reinforcement learning techniques.

ChatGPT was launched as a prototype on November 30, 2022, and quickly garnered attention for its detailed responses and articulate answers across many domains of knowledge. Following the release of ChatGPT, OpenAI reportedly doubled in value to $29 billion.

There has been a huge amount of interest with more than a million people signing up to try the platform in the first five days. Global tech media was buzzing, with the internationally available BBC Click tech magazine show doing a feature. This was followed by the TopGear car enthusiasts program actually posting a chat with the bot on its website.

The reason for this is that ChatGPT interacts with users conversationally, making it possible for the chatbot to answer follow-up questions, challenge incorrect arguments, admit its mistakes, and more.

Whether you need the foundation of a speech for a seminar, or a complex topic explained simply so you can write a blog post for your recruitment website, ChatGPT has attracted a lot of fans. But what are the implications for the recruitment sector and staffing agencies?

Established benefits of machine learning technologies

AI typically this improves the recruitment process by:

• Automating repetitive tasks – AI tools automate tasks such as screening resumes and scheduling interviews, allowing recruiters to focus on more high-level tasks.
• Improving matching – AI tools analyse a large amount of data quickly, such as job requirements and candidate qualifications, matching the best candidates to job openings.
• Increasing efficiency – AI tools help recruiters quickly identify the most suitable candidates, saving time and increasing the speed of the recruitment process.

The advent of ‘true’ AI chatbots is getting closer

Typical chatbots are configured using logic flows to provide automated responses to enquiries sent through email, chat messengers and social channels like WhatsApp. Typically, in recruitment, these chatbots might look for keywords like ‘vacancy’ or ‘hourly rate’ and then provide appropriate responses.

When it comes to knowledge and the written word, ChatGPT takes automation to a new level, the level of ‘true’ AI. For recruitment and staffing agencies, the software could write a barebones job description for a job board post or an entire blog about a complex topic like taxation for freelance and contract workers for any region of the world.

The technology is not there quite just yet…!

However, OPenAI warns ChatGPT can produce problematic answers. For the recruitment sector, this means such AI tools may have unintended consequences, such as reinforcing existing biases in the recruitment process. Some examples of this include:

• Data bias – AI chatbots are trained on large amounts of data, which may contain biases. If the data used to train the chatbot reflects existing biases in society, such as gender, race, or age bias, these biases will be reflected in the chatbot’s behaviour and decision-making.
• Language bias – AI chatbots that use Natural Language Processing (NLP) may perpetuate biases in language, such as gender-specific pronouns or stereotypes. This can lead to the chatbot responding in ways that are insensitive or offensive to certain groups of people.
• Decision-making bias – AI chatbots can make decisions based on the data they have been trained on, which may reflect existing societal biases. For example, a chatbot trained on CVs and resumes with certain keywords may be more likely to recommend candidates with similar backgrounds, perpetuating existing inequalities in the recruitment process.
• Lack of transparency – AI chatbots can be difficult to interpret, which can make it hard to identify and rectify any biases present in the system.

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