De Villers warns that starting the candidate journey with an AI-centric process is a wasted opportunity to present your organization at its best. “When thinking about the candidate journey, organizations need to pay close attention to where AI can bring value and where the human touch should always remain, because that’s important to the organization and its employer brand.”
Bottineau said some employers are responding by taking a step back and adjusting how processes are designed, including rethinking where humans should be involved. “That’s causing some frustration, and sometimes having to go back and revise the job description and think, ‘Do we need to insert a human touchpoint earlier in the process?'” She added that such redesigns can create more work in the short term if HR teams need to update job descriptions, adjust screening questions, or recalibrate what recruiters treat as non-negotiable requirements.
Shift your workload instead of reducing it
Natalie Simjanov, vice president of organizational effectiveness and talent acquisition at FGF Brands, agrees that reallocation of effort is more important than an overall slowdown at this point. In her view, AI is moving the pinch point to the evaluation stage. “On the talent acquisition side, we’re trying to reach candidates faster, and candidates are adapting to what we’re looking for more quickly. So it’s ultimately about where the human interaction is, and ultimately the focus is on human talent evaluation and consideration,” says Simzhanov. “Eventually, regardless of how you play this game, candidates will start using AI in their processes, recruiters will start using AI in their processes. But at the end of the day, you still need human conversation and human connection. That’s why we’re seeing a lot more different types of validation.”
Simyanov said this change could impact recruiters’ workloads, with more emphasis placed on tasks that require judgment, such as assessing skills, assessing communication, and making sure candidates understand the role that cannot be expressed in a generated resume.
Transparency about how AI is being used is important at both ends of the process to ensure time-to-adoption is appropriate, Simjanov says. “Even though using AI to manage processes can improve efficiency, humans are still needed to make critical decisions whenever possible,” she says. “This helps maintain compliance because it reduces bias as much as possible in that regard.”
