AI-enabled candidate screening is designed to address the single most time-consuming and inefficient aspect of the recruitment process. Despite technological advancements, effective candidate screening remains one of the biggest challenges for recruiters today. 

AI-enabled screening in recruitment increases the likelihood that the most qualified candidates will not be overlooked by pinpointing which applicants are most compatible with the job description. According to resources, 35% of talent experts say AI is the leading trend influencing hiring. With recruiters no longer having to scan through resumes one by one manually, they can spend more time focusing on recruiting and engaging qualified candidates.

What Is Candidate Screening?

Candidate screening in recruitment is the process of reviewing job applications, resumes, and applicant profiles. Through this process, recruiters can identify which candidates have the right qualifications, experience, and skill set to match the job requirements and organization. 

The goal of screening candidates in recruitment is to shortlist candidates to ensure only the best are moved on to the following stages of the hiring process. 

Effective Methods Used to Streamline Candidate Screening

Whether you are reviewing a small number of applications or sifting through a sea of resumes, the screening process for candidates must adhere to specific methods to streamline the process.

The need to evaluate qualifications, which may include work experience, academic background, abilities, knowledge base, personality, behavior-indicative features, and competencies, are the main thing that is checked (whether by a human eye or artificial intelligence). Listed below are six popular methods used for effective candidate screening.

1. Background Checks

Background checks ensure accuracy and compliance with legal and organizational regulations. Employers should select the most reliable background providers to safeguard their applicants’ information. Comparing different background check providers can help identify the best one for the company’s needs. Knowing the correct background check time ensures accuracy and privacy.

 2. Assessment

Comprehensive assessments must be completed to make accurate decisions about a job applicant. Assessment tools help to determine whether a candidate has the necessary skills and qualities to perform the job effectively. Advanced technology allows employers to gain more insight into their applicants and quickly decide whether they have met the required criteria. Evaluating job candidates in a shorter time will reduce the time to complete the recruitment process while ensuring they can do the job.

3. Job Interviews

Job interviews are a great way to gauge an applicant’s personality, interest, and understanding of the job. It is also a chance to ask questions and gain an understanding of a candidate’s past experiences and motivations. Knowing how to conduct job interviews properly is essential for the interviewing process and the successful onboarding of new employees. Setting aside the necessary time and resources to plan and prepare for job interviews can help make the process smoother and result in more accurate decisions.

4. Resume Screening/Review 

Resumes provide a great starting point for individuals to present their skills and qualifications. By improving the means of screening and reviewing resumes, employers can spend less time deciding if an applicant is suitable for the position. Automation solutions can shortlist applicants quickly, allowing managers to focus on the most impressive resumes. It is also essential to focus on keywords and phrases to identify the best candidate and the applicant’s educational background and relevant experience.

5. Reference Checks

Reference checks provide insight into a job applicant’s abilities and can help confirm or deny specific skills. They are essential to the recruitment process and should be completed before making an official job offer. Leveraging this process requires asking the right questions and establishing trust while gathering information. Through reference checks, employers can gain an insider view of job applicants, enabling them to make more straightforward decisions. 

6. Predictive Analytics

Predictive analytics offers a more effective way of predicting an applicant’s success and determining a company’s best recruitment and prediction strategies. By leveraging predictive analytics technology, employers can use data-based insights to assess performance under certain conditions, leading to more accurate decisions about job applicants. Furthermore, leveraging predictive analytics enables employers to weed out potentially harmful or fraudulent job applications.

Challenges Recruiters Face During the Candidate Screening Process

The candidate screening process can be challenging for recruiters; the most common 3 challenges are -:

1. Slow Time To Hire Rate

The ever-growing demand for recruiters to do more with fewer resources and the extensive time needed for candidate screening is detrimental to productivity. And inevitably slows down the time to hire. 

Having a longer screening process and time to hire creates a greater risk of losing high-quality candidates to competitors. This is especially true when competitors provide quicker recruitment and hiring experience. An efficient applicant tracking system (ATS) could be helpful in this situation, as it can automate a significant chunk of the procedure and let you review and manage staggering numbers of applications.

2. Quality of Hire

Hiring the wrong people is expensive. Traditional ATS systems alone cannot measure the success or quality of hires. This leaves recruiters manually collecting and analyzing data to observe recruiting and hiring patterns. 

This results in more frequent bad hires being discovered later, creating wasted time and resources for your business.

3. Volumes of Resumes

Many applications that submit for open roles are considered unqualified or irrelevant. The countless hours spent while recruiters weed these out are better used to tend to qualified candidates, active recruitment, and strategic work. 

With such high levels of applicant volume to work through, it is almost inevitable that some good ones will slip through the cracks while recruiters are using their time speaking with less desirable candidates. 

How To Improve Your Candidate Screening Process With AI-Enabled Recruitment

AI-enabled screening reduces the time to hire and improves recruitment effectiveness by streamlining and automating the candidate screening process. It enables recruiters to set priorities in their applicant list without relying on manually screening candidates.

Here are three additional ways that AI can improve candidate screening:

1. AI-enabled recruitment helps remove human bias and promotes diversity, equality, and inclusion regarding candidate selection. It also helps ensure each applicant has similar experiences to promote fairness.
2. AI-powered talent intelligence platforms provide vast amounts of valuable data insights to recruiters. Features like predictive talent analytics provide data showing which steps in the recruiting and hiring process need to be more efficient and highlight where recruiting funds should be allocated or reduced based on which sources bring in the top candidates. 
3. AI-enabled talent acquisition solutions can quickly provide customized recommendations based on enormous data sets your recruiters cannot manually analyze. 

When Leveraging AI-Enabled Recruitment, Recruiters Can:

• Rank candidates based on skills, experience, and location and assess them using AI-enabled pre-screening chatbots to accurately match relevant profiles based on the job criteria through context-driven talent selection.
• Automate the evaluation and selection of qualified candidates suitable to interview.
• Create a solid pipeline, ensuring your organization always has access to the best talent. 
• Source strong passive candidates from multiple channels and make recommendations from profiles closely matching the job description.
• Improve the quality of hires by tracking applicants and activities with advanced analytics.  

Today’s job marketing is more competitive than ever. And recruiters must dedicate more time and effort to actively sourcing and engaging the most qualified candidates. 

Frequently Asked Questions

What do pre-employment background checks look for?

Pre-employment background checks typically look for information such as a potential employee’s criminal history, credit history, education, references, and prior employment.

Are there any restrictions on pre-employment screening?

Many states have laws that regulate what employers can and cannot do during pre-employment screening. In general, employers cannot access certain types of information, such as Social Security numbers or financial records. Additionally, employers must obtain the candidate’s consent to conduct employment screening.

 What is involved in an automated screening process?

Automated screening processes can include:

1. Checking references.
2. Validating education.
3. Verifying criminal records and credit histories.
4. Using bots to search for keywords in resumes.

Automated screening can also send automated emails to a candidate’s previous employers for verification. Automated screening processes are often more efficient than manual methods, saving a business time and money.