September 2019
Can AI Boost Diversity in Engineering?
As artificial intelligence (AI) becomes more commonly used in recruitment, will we see an increase in workplace diversity?
Diversity, or lack of it, is a major challenge for organisations of all sizes. Too often, qualified candidates are filtered out from the process because of their gender or ethnicity.
Bias is a prominent issue in today’s workplace, especially during the recruitment process. Most people believe that they are fair and impartial, evaluating others based on objective facts alone. However, every person, no matter how egalitarian, holds implicit biases - otherwise known as unconscious biases. Enter AI to level the playing field.
The words that make up a job posting really matter because they can discourage potential new recruits from applying for a job.
AI can be utilised to flag language and phrases that could be considered off-putting to minority groups, along with recommending the best tone and wording to use to increase diversity in applications.
When attempting to minimise bias, one of the top recommendations is to stick to a script in interviews. However, this doesn't always open up the ‘inclusive’ part of a diverse hiring strategy, but furthers a ‘tickboxing’ exercise and the success of homogenous candidates.
Instead, new ways of interviewing incorporate neuroscience games and AI to predict the right person for the right job, by assessing performance in a more sophisticated and complex manner.
Individuals can’t help allowing their lived experiences and preferences determine how they feel when they come to work every day, especially if those feelings exist in the subconscious.
This will make these biases extremely hard to acknowledge and change. By contrast, the smartest of machines can learn when biases are creeping in and modify their processes to compensate.
If harnessed correctly AI can be an extremely powerful tool in improving diversity.
NBC Universal is one of the highest profile organisations utilising AI tools in a push to be more diverse during the recruitment process. They have implemented an algorithm powered diversity tool that runs blind screening on applicants in order to predict suitability for interview.
Where AI really earns its stripes is recruitment at scale - nowhere is this more evident than in the case of large multi-national Unilever. The company has been a leader in recruitment innovation, putting 250,000 candidates globally through a process involving gamified psychometric testing, followed by a second-round analysed video interview and an algorithm driven selection process.
Attracting and hiring a diverse workforce depends on building a more inclusive candidate pipeline. There are three critical actions organisations are implementing that is ensuring the success of AI in democratising the workplace:
- Adopt a framework for fairness
- Bring in the right expertise
- Constantly monitor and improve.