AI as a new job search method?

Anyone looking for a new job usually gets information from company websites on the Internet or via job portals. With the help of artificial intelligence, it should only be a matter of time before job seekers and personnel seekers will find each other more quickly thanks to new matching tools.

Many options when looking for a job

When looking for a job, it is common to ask around, read job advertisements, ask your own circle of acquaintances, search on Google or job portals. The first matching tools are now using artificial intelligence to quickly find the right employees or jobs for recruiters and potential applicants.

If recruiters want to recruit new employees, they primarily ask their own company channels or job portals on the Internet.

However, experience has shown that it takes some time before a position is actually filled. According to investigations by the recruiting company Workwise, the search for the right employee in 2020 took a total of 78 days. Since then, however, the shortage of skilled workers has worsened to such an extent that it will probably take even longer today to find the right people.

First successes

This staffing gap is increasingly being dominated by more and more tech companies, which use apps and other AI-based tools so that potential employers and job seekers can find each other.

A good example is the tech company Empion, which designed a self-learning algorithm so that employers and job seekers match. According to the company, it takes only 27 days to be hired under this system. According to its own information, Empion presented the first candidates within 48 hours.

Individual questions

Launched in 2021, the company uses a robo-advisor that works through artificial intelligence. Potential applicants can use this advisor with filters and individual settings.

Comparable to a personal headhunter, the robo advisor quantifies the most important values, skills and CV of the applicants.

To fulfill this purpose, the system generates individual questions through chats and also takes into account the person’s attention span. The robo-advisor notices how quickly and how eagerly prospects answer questions. For this reason, the system only asks as many questions as are required to create an individual profile.

Constant need for improvement

The algorithm assigns the companies to a so-called culture pattern in order to then bring together the right candidates. According to current information, Empion’s hit rate is three times higher than that of classic online job portals. Nevertheless, work will continue in the future to significantly improve the generation of questions.

Probably the greatest challenge for artificial intelligence is to achieve a high degree of individuality, as is common, for example, through personal job placement by headhunters. After all, applicants and companies have a wide range of individual ideas and requirements that must be taken into account when looking for a virtual job. In this case, the AI-based tools are required to process the corresponding information appropriately.

Neutral Mediations

These requirements are very complex, as many job seekers are interested in different sectors. To make matters worse, some of the algorithms adopt human thought patterns.

For example, if a job in the past was mainly filled by men, the new job search will focus on men again.

As a result, women often end up in a form of discrimination, including in so-called MINT professions or in male-dominated fields of study such as engineering. The matching platforms should therefore be geared even more towards acting neutrally in the future.

New methods of large job search portals

Larger job search portals such as Indeed or Stepstone still have significantly more data than much smaller matching tools. More than 500 companies are now registered with Empion. However, Stepstone lists 150,000 companies. In addition, traditional job boards are well aware of the potential of artificial intelligence when looking for a job.

That’s why Stepstone has already announced a cooperation with a US startup in order to use AI-supported chats in the future. Indeed already uses artificial intelligence in the background to find the right job ads for users. The AI-based matching portals are still in their infancy. Nevertheless, a clear efficiency advantage is already emerging.