AI + HR & SxSW

No, that’s not a bunch of random letters in the title of this post. South by SouthWest (SxSW), kicks off this week in Austin. The interactive track of this event explores the intersection of technology and humanity, and has gotten nearly as famous as the music portion of the conference. This year there are a number of talks on how artificial intelligence will improve fashion, sports, even therapy. There are also plenty of human resources focused talks on the talent pipeline, diversity, workforce change, and more. And yet, in the thousands of talks at the event, the topics of HR and AI never meet up. It’s too bad, because AI has a lot of practical potential to change the outcome of big discussions happening in the HR space at SxSW.

Two years ago SXSW was the target of a prank marketing campaign that involved a group of people protesting against being replaced by robots. It worked because it tapped into a common sentiment that people have about HR and AI. Many AI stories seem to be focused around whether AI will replace people in jobs. But there is another type of AI which actually does the opposite of replacing you: it makes you better at what you do best, and lets you focus more on what matters.

There is another type of AI which actually does the opposite of replacing you

In recruiting, for example, you and an AI platform work together to bring in the best candidates. Take a look at the pipeline and diversity issues at many companies. Unfortunately, humans have unconscious bias, which hinders diversity recruiting. That’s where a machine intelligence platform can come in, instead of having biases an AI platform only relies on the data that is continually being analyzed and adapting recommendations based on the most recent data.

How does artificial intelligence work in this context? The Textio predictive engine learns from each new data point that’s added to it, adapting its' guidance to show you the language patterns that work right now, not two years ago, not even two months ago. With analysis of outcomes of the language patterns used in job posts Textio can unearth data showing that the use of gendered phrases in your job post strongly predicts the gender of the person you eventually hire. And then give you suggestions to change this outcome. This has a huge impact on your pipeline: If you reach more women with your job post, and more women apply, you’re that much more likely to hire a woman at the end of the process.

By following the AI guidance, you don’t lose your “voice,” or what is unique about your brand. But rather AI amplifies what you are trying to say, and helps you find the words that will help you attract more qualified candidates.

Another element of AI is the ability to build a powerful “learning loop.” Basically, Textio’s predictive engine applies artificial intelligence not only to your companies data, but to aggregated data sets, to surface guidance that will improve the results of your writing. Companies inside the learning loop have a huge advantage over companies that are outside of it. They now have access to not only their own data, but anonymized data on what works across millions of job posts. By contributing to the learning loop, your writing gets better over time, and so does the product’s feedback.

We’ve already seen that regardless of their size, companies inside the Textio learning loop fill roles 17% faster, with more diverse candidates, than companies outside the loop.

Now is the time to give AI for HR a try.