British companies are rapidly increasing the use of artificial intelligence (AI) interviews in recruitment, but job seekers are increasingly resentful of the lack of advance notice and explanation of evaluation criteria.
Technology news outlet TechRadar reported on May 1 that 47% of UK job seekers have undergone an AI interview as part of the recruitment process.
The survey was carried out by Greenhouse among around 3,000 job seekers in the UK. According to the study, 82% of respondents said they were not clearly informed in advance of what the AI would evaluate. A further 24% said they only found out about AI being involved after the interview began.
A lack of transparency is causing more people to abandon the hiring process. About 30% of respondents said they had dropped out of a hiring process in the past because it involved an AI interview, and 19% said they would be willing to drop out if the same situation arose in the future.
Job seekers specifically pointed out that AI is scoring pre-recorded videos with no human presence. This was counted as the biggest factor causing dropout. Companies’ failure to disclose how they use AI and how AI monitors applicants throughout the hiring process are cited as similar rejection factors.
Concerns about bias were also identified. About 27% of respondents said they felt age discrimination in AI ratings, and 17% cited bias related to race or ethnicity. The findings reflect the view that AI employment is exacerbating existing employment problems rather than improving efficiency.
Still, job seekers have not called for AI to be completely excluded from employment. The survey found that only 19% of respondents do not want AI to be used in recruitment. Instead, there has been a growing demand for companies to provide clear safeguards and options.
Specifically, 40% said companies should disclose from the beginning that AI is being used, and 36% said companies should clearly explain their AI measures. Additionally, 45% said they want the option to interview with a human rather than an AI interviewer. Only about one in 10 respondents said their employer currently has a clear AI policy. About 59% said such notifications should be a legal requirement.
Daniel Chait, co-founder and CEO of Greenhouse, said AI in employment is exacerbating an already troubled system. Although the number of applications has increased, meaningful signals and transparency have declined, he said.
Chait also pointed to structural problems with the recruitment process itself. “The hiring process, including AI, was broken from the beginning,” he said, adding that applicants had been accumulating complaints about resume writing and complicated application procedures. He said a 15-minute AI conversation that lets you promote yourself to applicants could be a better starting point than a resume full of keywords, but added that this change should come from building better hiring processes, not layering AI on top of broken hiring processes.
The study shows that the debate around AI adoption is shifting from whether or not to deploy AI to transparency, explainability, and the option to replace human interviews. It also reaffirmed that for companies to continue expanding AI as a recruitment tool, they must first secure the trust of applicants.
