Q: Where is it all going? Will humans have any say at all in the future, or will machines do the hiring? Can anyone make sense of the emerging trends? (CD, email).

A: How jobs will be filled in the future is a question that concentrates the minds of those in the recruitment industry. Candidates, too, have a vested interest in knowing how it will all roll out, writes Maureen Nalubega, LinkedIn Specialist, Slí Nua Careers.

LinkedIn is a good place to start. They’ve a handle on where things are at, and where they are going. When they published their Global Recruiting Trends 2018, they identified what they called ‘the four ideas changing how you hire.’ The report flags changes already in train and which are likely to grow more and more popular in the years ahead.

“Hiring talent has become highly transactional. The tedious candidate searches, the endless scheduling, and the repetitive screening can be inefficient and mind-numbing. It’s time for a new era of recruiting that focuses on the more gratifying parts of the job — the human part, the strategic part”, they explained.

The report outlined “four big hiring trends that are doing just that — killing the transaction, making hiring more strategic, and letting recruiters and hiring managers focus on discovering high-potential talent.”

LinkedIn say the trends, identified from “a survey of 9,000 talent leaders and hiring managers across the globe” and “numerous expert interviews” are diversity, new interviewing tools, data and artificial intelligence (AI).

Diversity:

“78% of talent professionals and hiring managers say that diversity is the top trend impacting how they hire. Diversity used to be a box that companies checked. But today, diversity is directly tied to company culture and financial performance. Our data shows that 78% of companies prioritize diversity to improve culture and 62% do so to boost financial performance.”

New interviewing tools:

“56% of talent professionals and hiring managers say that new interview tools are the top trend impacting how they hire.” The techniques coming into vogue are online soft skills assessment, job auditions where companies pay candidates to do real work so they can observe them in action; casual interviews – for example, over a meal; virtual reality (VR) where companies immerse candidates in simulated 3D environments to test their skills; and video interviews.

Data:

“50% of talent professionals and hiring managers say that data is the top trend impacting how they hire.”
As LinkedIn say, “the most sophisticated companies are piecing together every bit of data they have to try to compete. Just as they might have a social media strategy or an events strategy, they now have a talent intelligence strategy too.”

Artificial intelligence:
“35% of talent professionals and hiring managers say that AI is the top trend impacting how they hire.”

AI allows for automatic candidate searches and chatbots – machines that talk back – are able to deal with questions from candidates. For companies, AI offers huge time savings, though, as of yet, it is seen as being more useful in “sourcing, screening, nurturing, scheduling and engaging candidates” – only 6% of hiring managers see it as being “helpful” in interviewing candidates.

Technology is making certain parts of the process much quicker and easier, but there is still a strong emphasis on “the human part, the strategic part”, as LinkedIn say.

 

Featured image courtesy of Pixabay.

                                               

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