As early adopters of technology, our firm spends a lot of money on advanced tech tools. We were among the first recruiting firms to invest in semantic search and resume parsing before the terms entered common parlance. But technology has limits, particularly during a talent war….
It was Neil Postman, channeling Marshall McLuhan, who first said, "in a noisy world, silence is golden." In the world of AI, human contact is extraordinary. AI-driven candidate matching based on sophisticated algorithms is ineffective when more employees resign from jobs than apply for them. Companies like NurseFly, rebranded as Vivian Health, experienced rapid growth based on the pandemic staffing surge response to their AI-based technology. Their rapid growth recently landed them $60m in venture capital, but they may find themselves languishing like Peloton post-pandemic. In the purely virtual recruiting universe, the best jobs with the highest salaries and maximum flexibility will be the winners. Small to mid-size companies will not be able to compete in that world. High touch will always trump high tech in a candidate-scarce environment.
"In the world of AI, human contact is extraordinary."
Job postings and technology cannot persuade someone to work for your company. Video is the closest thing to automated selling, but video can't answer questions or tailor the message to individual candidate motivations.
Some time ago, we received a job order for an Anesthesiologist for Anchorage. The client asked me what motivated a particular Anesthesiologist candidate to want to work in Alaska.
We explained: "He didn't want to work in Alaska. He was happy living in Little Rock. If he ever moved, he would like to move to Arizona."
"So why is he open to Alaska," our client asked.
"Because we sold him on the opportunity to serve the troops, the adventure for his young family, the baseball recruiting opportunities for his son, pharmacy opportunities for his wife, the Air Force support for his niche pain therapy treatment, etc.…"
In other words, we did our job. We sold him on the job, the location, and the salary.
Put that in your algorithm!
"The tools never made the carpenter, nor did they make the mechanic. The typewriter never made the author, the camera never made the photographer, and the canvas never made the painter." — Sales Guru, Anthony Iannarino
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