Scribd
Upload
101 views12 pages

Recruitment ChatBot

A recruitment chatbot can help recruiters and candidates by automating administrative tasks like collecting resumes and screening questions, answering common questions, and scheduling interviews. While chatbots save recruiters time and keep candidates engaged, challenges remain around variations in texting styles and creating a sufficiently human-like conversational experience. Some organizations using recruitment chatbots successfully include the U.S. Army, Georgia State University, and Sutherland.

Uploaded by

Aditya Mohapatra
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
101 views12 pages

Recruitment ChatBot

A recruitment chatbot can help recruiters and candidates by automating administrative tasks like collecting resumes and screening questions, answering common questions, and scheduling interviews. While chatbots save recruiters time and keep candidates engaged, challenges remain around variations in texting styles and creating a sufficiently human-like conversational experience. Some organizations using recruitment chatbots successfully include the U.S. Army, Georgia State University, and Sutherland.

Uploaded by

Aditya Mohapatra
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 12

A HOW-TO GUIDE FOR USING

A RECRUITMENT CHATBOT
2

INTRODUCTION 2

WHAT IS A RECRUITMENT CHATBOT? 4

THE BENEFITS OF USING A CHATBOT 5

THE CHALLENGES OF USING A CHATBOT IN RECRUITING 7

HOW INNOVATIVE ORGANIZATIONS ARE USING RECRUITMENT CHATBOTS 8

A SUMMARY OF HOW TO USE A RECRUITMENT CHATBOT 9

From the author:


My personal motto is: show me the data.

My love of people analytics, data-based


recruitment, and HR tech started with my Master’s
in Industrial-Organizational Psychology. I enjoy
writing about topics such as AI for recruiting,
unconscious bias, and workplace diversity. Ji-A Min,
My work has been featured in The Atlantic,
Head Data
SHRM, ERE, and Recruiter.com. Scientist at Ideal
3

INTRODUCTION
In 1950, Alan Turing predicted that by the
year 2000, computers would be able to pass
as human during a text conversation.

How will the adoption of chatbots affect recruiting?

With today’s tighter labour market, candidate experience


has become increasingly important to attract talent.

Workopolis found 43% of candidates never hear back


from a company after one touchpoint. On the flip side,
it’s a challenge for employers to communicate well
with all their candidates. For high volume recruiting, 20
this would require communicating with thousands of
candidates, in addition to a recruiter’s normal screening
functions and other duties.
7

The solution that could benefit candidate experience


without burdening recruiters with more work is part of
the AI recruiting tech stack: the recruitment chatbot.

To help you better understand the benefits and


challenges of adopting a chatbot to help screen and By 2020,
pre-qualify candidates, we created this how-to guide for Gartner
recruiters and talent acquisition professionals. predicts
the average
person will
have more
conversations
with chatbots
than with
their spouse.
4

82% OF JOB SEEKERS


BELIEVE THE IDEAL RECRUITER INTERACTION
IS A MIX BETWEEN INNOVATIVE TECHNOLOGY
AND PERSONAL, HUMAN INTERACTION
5

SECTION #1:
WHAT IS A RECRUITMENT
CHATBOT?
A recruitment chatbot – or “conversational agent” –
is a software application designed to mimic human
conversational abilities during the recruiting process.

Similar to virtual personal assistants such as Alexa, Siri, and Google Now, a
recruitment chatbot uses AI technology such as natural language processing
to understand a person’s messages and know how to respond.

A chatbot can be used within various media:

email SMS social media messaging specific software


profiles like apps like Slack such as an ATS
Facebook

A chatbot can mimic a human’s conversational abilities in the sense that it’s
programmed to understand written and spoken language and respond correctly.

To what extent a chatbot can pass for another human being, however, still remains to be seen.
6

SECTION #2:
THE BENEFITS OF USING
A CHATBOT
Interest in chatbots is accelerating due to the benefits
they hold for both recruiters and candidates.

Benefit #1: Candidates are comfortable


interacting with a chatbot
The #1 request from job seekers is “more communication.”

As Alexa, Siri, and Google Now become more common in our personal lives, communicating
with a chatbot during the recruiting process is being embraced by candidates.

In a recent survey by Allegis, 58% of candidates were comfortable interacting


with AI and recruitment chatbots in the early stages of the application
process. An even larger percentage – 66% – were comfortable with AI and
chatbots taking care of interview scheduling and preparation.

Today’s candidates are aware the recruiting process might not be human-to-human
at every touchpoint, but value the chance to receive information in whatever way
they can. Randstad found 82% of job seekers believe the ideal recruiter interaction
is a mix between innovative technology and personal, human interaction.

As that attitude continues to evolve, so will the recruitment chatbot.


7

Benefit #2: A chatbot can help recruiters


with administrative tasks
A recruitment chatbot can:

collect ask screening rank candidates answer FAQs schedule an


information questions about on metrics about the interview
from candidates’ such as job and the with a human
candidates such experience, qualifications, application recruiter
as their resume knowledge, engagement, or process
and contact and skills recent activity
information

All of this information can be collected in real life and simultaneously from
hundreds to thousands of candidates. This information can then be fed
into your ATS or sent directly to a human recruiter to follow up.

Over time, the machine learning component of the chatbot will begin to understand which
metrics it should be looking for based on the data it collects and rank candidates accordingly..

Benefit #3: A chatbot can help recruiters save a lot of time


Industry estimates predict a chatbot can automate up to
80% of top-of-funnel recruiting activities.

According to SHRM, the average cost of hire is $4,129 and the average time
to hire is 42 days. By automating a large part of qualifying and scheduling
while simultaneously keeping candidates engaged, a recruitment chatbot
can dramatically lower both cost of hire and time to hire.

It’s important to keep in mind though that a recruitment


chatbot is not designed to replace a human.
8

It’s estimated that 65% of resumes received for a role are ignored. By interacting
with this ignored 65% of candidates, a chatbot is doing the tasks that already time-
strapped human recruiters don’t have the time nor capacity to do in the first place.

If a recruitment chatbot can more quickly screen out unqualified candidates,


recruiters can focus their efforts on what they enjoy doing instead: creating
connections and building relationships with interested candidates are qualified.

SECTION #3:
THE CHALLENGES OF USING
A CHATBOT IN RECRUITING
Interest in chatbots is accelerating due to the benefits
they hold for both recruiters and candidates.

Challenge #1: A lack of standardization in how people text


Because people have different ways of texting (e.g., slang, emojis, short form), it’s
extremely difficult to program a chatbot to understand each and every variation.

A chatbot can make a best attempt based on its programming and the knowledge it’s gained
from previous interactions or turn the conversation over to a human when it gets stumped.

Challenge #2: A lack of “humanness” in a chatbot


There’s still a debate on how “human” a chatbot should – and could – be.

Most of us can agree with a chatbot shouldn’t be too robotic and cold because
this type of “bot-speak” creates a poor user experience. On the other hand, some
argue that we don’t need to aspire to create chatbots that can pass as human.

The happy medium most people can agree on is a chatbot that displays
some elements of a personality such as humour and using slang.
9

Challenge #3: Unknown reaction of candidates to a chatbot


The mainstream adoption of chatbots in other functions such as customer
service suggests chatbots have a promising role to play in recruiting.

Although industry surveys suggest candidates feel positive about interacting with a chatbot, no
one can really predict what a candidate’s reaction will be when they actually converse with one.

Candidates’ reactions will likely largely depend on how well the chatbot can answer
their questions and provide additional information about their job application.

SECTION #4:
HOW INNOVATIVE
ORGANIZATIONS ARE USING
RECRUITMENT CHATBOTS
Here are some examples of innovative organizations
using chatbots in their recruiting.

U.S. Army: SGT STAR


The U.S. Army has a recruitment chatbot called SGT STAR.

Designed to answer FAQs about topics such as basic training, types of jobs available, and
salary, candidates can message SGT STAR through the army’s website. SGT STAR has
fielded 11 million questions to date, which is the equivalent of 55 Army recruiters.
10

Georgia State University: Pounce


Georgia State was the first American university to use a chatbot,
Pounce, named after their panther mascot.

Via text messaging, newly admitted students can ask questions, receive reminders,
and answer surveys. Since its implementation, the university has enjoyed a 4%
increase in enrolment and a 21% decrease in summer melt (i.e., the failure of
students to complete college enrolment after high school graduation).

Sutherland: Tasha
Sutherland, an IT service provider, built its own chatbot Tasha
for candidates during the initial screening stages.

Candidates can interact with Tasha through text message, email or a


dialogue box where she answers basic questions, prompts candidates to
return to the job application if they fall off, and schedules interviews.

Tasha even provides feedback about the candidate experience. If the


candidate does want to abandon the application process, Tasha finds
out why and send this information back to the recruiter.
11

A SUMMARY OF HOW
TO USE A RECRUITMENT
CHATBOT

A recruitment The main benefits


chatbot is software of using a chatbot
that uses AI
include automating top-of-
technology funnel recruiting tasks such as
candidate pre-qualification and
to understand a person’s interview scheduling to speed
messages and know up time to hire and improve
how to respond. candidate experience.

The major challenges Organizations that


of using a chatbot are pioneering the
use of recruitment
in recruiting include the lack
of standardization in texting, chatbots
how “human” a chatbot
should be, and not knowing include Georgia State University,
how candidates will react. the U.S. Army, and Sutherland,
an IT service provider.
Wondering how a chatbot could
help your team? Let us show you!
Keep candidates informed, eliminate the need for
screening calls and only focus on qualified candidates.

SCHEDULE A DEMO NOW!

You might also like