COVID-19 lockdown has not only instigated job losses but also stopped fresh job offers. “However, the epidemic is not without its opportunities for recruiters and organizations. Those who will adapt and evolve with the latest technologies can gain critical talent advantage during these times,” says Bipul Vaibhav, Co-founder and CEO, Skillate, which is an AI recruitment platform, making recruitment easy, fast and transparent. In an email interaction with CXO Outlook, Bipul talks about the ongoing recruitment challenges and explains the importance of embracing HR Tech in the coming days. Here are the excerpts.
In this time of social distancing, what are the major challenges recruiters are facing?
Some of the major challenges they are facing include:
- A pause in hiring from many sectors, especially aviation, tourism, and hospitality.
- Cynicism from candidates in changing jobs, who want security and stability in this time of uncertainty.
- No face-to-face interviews make it challenging for hiring managers to take the final call.
However, the epidemic is not without its opportunities for recruiters and organizations. Those who will adapt and evolve with the latest technologies can gain critical talent advantage during these times.
How has the talent acquisition landscape changed in the last ten years? What are the latest trends in this sector?
The adaptability of technology has increased many folds, even with traditional enterprises. A few years back things like online assessments and video interviews would have seemed like a dream. With the current situation, every company is forced to do it, and most are reaping the rewards as well.
Enterprises now understand the value of AI and tech in their recruitment processes. The important factor for them now is the scalability of these technologies.
Do you think, many Indian companies might not be ready to adapt the AI-based recruitment process? What are some common fears people have about AI when it comes to identifying qualified candidates?
The most common fear that people have is AI will replace humans. That’s the biggest myth of all time. AI is supposed to automate mundane, repetitive tasks that need no human intelligence. Any process that requires the human brain would not only stay but will get empowered with AI.
AI in recruitment not only has the capabilities of reducing hiring costs and time, but it will also increase transparency and accountability in the recruitment process, something we at Skillate continue to strive towards.
Do you feel AI will replace Talent Acquisition and HR functions in the next ten years? Please explain.
As mentioned earlier, AI empowers people and doesn’t replace them. Decision-makers in the field of recruitment will only be more enabled with the data-driven capabilities of AI.
In India, the HR Technology landscape is a fast-growing market now, exploding with innovation solutions. What are the opportunities and challenges for Skillate?
In Human Resources, most Indian companies are still using the SAP, Oracle, or Workday Products for their HR operations. But they have their challenges of speed, UI, transparency and are extremely difficult to be replaced. So, the biggest opportunity is to integrate with those global products and provide the latest technologies on top of it. We Skillate have seamlessly integrated with these applications (SAP SuccessFactors, Taleo, etc.) and help the companies in optimizing the entire value chain of recruitment with the power of Artificial Intelligence. But the biggest challenge is Indian enterprises are still in the beginning phase of adopting the SaaS product as compared to the developed world. But it is getting better, and especially after COVID-19, there will be a surge in the HR Tech product adoption for automating the process like digital remote hiring.
What are some of the HR Tech features that Indian companies have overlooked and are finally realizing are important?
Two fundamental features:
Writing the Job Description: We have observed many Indian companies have never focused on writing a better job description. In fact, according to our analysis, more than 50% of the JDs in any large enterprise contains less than ten words. Because of this overlook, it doesn’t provide clarity and doesn’t appeal to the relevant candidates to apply for the jobs. This error sometimes consequences in receiving irrelevant applications and eventually led to the high possibility of hiring the wrong candidates.
Candidate Experience: Transparency in the recruitment process that is also overlooked by many companies. Almost all the candidates who go through the interview process and get rejected never hear back from the companies. This gives a lot of confusion and frustration to the candidates who have applied for the jobs and also reflects negatively in the employer branding. It is now a big concern for the CHRO or HR Head, and now they want to solve this problem on priority.
What is the future HR Tech looks like? Please tell us some of the major developments in this sector that everyone needs to look forward to.
Technologies in the field of candidate screening, talent matching, JD optimization, and automating interview scheduling are already making in-roads. Going forward, inclusiveness and diversity are some of the topics organizations and HR tech companies should focus more on.
More about Bipul Vaibhav
At Skillate, Bipul is responsible for AI, Investment, and overall business growth of Skillate. Prior to founding Skillate, Bipul worked as a Data Scientist at DataWeave Software Pvt Ltd, where he developed a machine learning model to classify the product categories of e-commerce products. He also worked as an advanced software engineer with Burning Glass Technologies for a little less than a year. Bipul holds a B. Tech degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from IIT Guwahati. He has co-authored a paper on an autonomous river cleaning robot and a model for video classification using semantic keywords. He holds research publications in the field of Artificial Intelligence at International Forums like SPIE and IEEE. Bipul is passionate about cricket, reading books, and building software products.