In the war for talent, companies are using predictive algorithms and machine learning as tools to identify the best candidates. They're using AI to assess human qualities, analyzing everything from word choice to tone of voice to eye contact. So it says here in this section there are four questions for me to answer. Some of the questions will require you to record a response with video.
HireVue is one such company and I got to test out the interview of the future. Here I am applying for a job as a customer service representative for a paper company. But I'm not talking to an HR rep or hiring manager, it's just me, pre-recorded interview questions and the camera.
Tell us some of the things that you're passionate about and why you'd be a great fit for this role. So it's such a great question, what am I passionate about? I love that question.
According to HireVue, responses to video interviews are full of data. The content of the verbal response, intonation, and nonverbal communication are just a few of the 25,000 data points the company analyzes. What the computer is really doing is decoding visually what candidates are saying.
We can understand things like creative thought. You ask somebody a question, they tend to look up like that and think for a few minutes. That's a really strong sign from a psychological point of view of creative thought.
In analyzing these data points, HireVue says it does a better job eliminating hiring bias than face-to-face interviews. There's something like 150 documented cognitive biases that we all carry around with us every single day. What the technology can do is really look objectively at candidates, irrespective of whether they're a man or a woman, their gender, age, ethnicity.
And so we're really looking at the true person as opposed to the superficial things that an interviewer might be looking at. It also widens the net for finding new talent. We can open the funnel.
We can open the aperture for talent very, very widely and interview in places that we never would have thought to go. Because good talent, great talent can be almost anywhere in the world. Companies like Goldman Sachs, Vodafone, Nike and Carnival Cruise Line all use HireVue. But what's the experience like for the interviewee? In my case, I really enjoyed it.
The worst part is hearing yourself replayed after you answer a question. I can't listen to myself. But how do others like the experience? A quick look at the hashtag HireVue on Twitter shows varying reactions, with some seeming to love it and others reacting less positively. Despite mixed reviews, it doesn't look like AI is leaving the recruitment landscape anytime soon.
When you have all the jobs on the internet, certainly employers have lots of choices, and so does job seekers. But those choices often can be overwhelming for both sides. What we find is the use of AI technology can enable a job seeker to find the best possible opportunities for them to apply for. But body language expert Patti Wood sees some issues with these programs. I don't want people to be excluded because they're not comfortable with this kind of interaction.
Who may be very good at human interaction. On the flip side, Yale behavioral scientist Jason Dana says unstructured face-to-face interviews are overrated. There's a lot of industrial psychology research showing that interviews aren't very good at predicting job outcomes.
At least they're much less good than people think they are. But even Dana sees some red flags. You might have too much homogeneity in the organization and not enough healthy diversity of thought, right?
You just keep hiring the same sort of person again and again. And that would be a danger. For me, what I missed most from my HireVue experience was the human element.
I couldn't crack jokes, make eye contact, or gauge how my responses were resonating. But the software was also really easy to use, convenient, and less stressful than an in-person interview. One thing's certain. AI will continue to transform the hiring experience.
I'm convinced that you're going to walk into someone's office 10 years from now and see a pile of resumes on the corner and think, oh my gosh, I haven't seen those in years. You still do it that way. Good for you for hanging on because there's a much better way and we think we're on the verge of making that transition.
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