- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
- cross-posted to:
- technology@lemmy.world
an AI resume screener had been trained on CVs of employees already at the firm, giving people extra marks if they listed “baseball” or “basketball” – hobbies that were linked to more successful staff, often men. Those who mentioned “softball” – typically women – were downgraded.
Marginalised groups often “fall through the cracks, because they have different hobbies, they went to different schools”
Yep. I literally told a company there was no legitimate legal reason they could possibly want this, and good luck with their search. What better way to practice racism, sexism, and ageism in the hiring process?
There’s also that.
But purely on the premise of “you should take the time to record a video merely for the pleasure of maybe having us look at your application”, their expectations are way out of whack.
This isn’t like when Google put scavenger hunts or puzzles or whatever in ads and gave job offers to people who solved them. The people who got hired by those ads were following through out of curiosity/the fun of solving the problems, and that wasn’t the main/only way to get a job. It’s just a new absurd demand trying to push the threshold of what’s a legitimate ask.
Legal?
I get that some people would decline, sure. But what do you think is illegal about it?
I dunno what country you’re in, but in my country you are required by law to have a valid reason to reject a job candidate. That reason can be pretty simple, such as “your application was not as strong as other candidates” but you need to be able to back that claim up if you’re challenged (and you can be challenged on it).
The recommended approach is to have a list of selection criteria, and carefully consider each one then write it down and keep a record of the decision for a while, incase you end up on the wrong end of a discrimination lawsuit. Candidates have the right to ask why they were unsuccessful (and they should ask - to find out what they can do better to improve their chances next time. As a hiring manager I would note down anyone who asks and consider offering them a job in the future, bypassing the normal recruitment process).
I rank each criteria from one to ten, then disregard the worst scoring candidates until I have a short list that I can compare directly (at that point, I wouldn’t worry too much about numbers. You are allowed to say “you were a great candidate, but we had multiple great candidates and had to pick one. Sorry”.
If your selection criteria includes “they need to wear nice clothes” then you’re treading on very dangerous territory and could be breaking the law. The damages here are commonly six months pay at the salary of the position they applied for, and can also include a court order for you not to be involved in the hiring process going forward.
It’s perfectly reasonable to require someone to dress well if they have a customer facing role… but that requirement should be implemented at work and not during the job interview. I’m well aware that a lot of hiring managers rely heavily on these things to make their decision but they should not be doing that. It’s not as bad as picking someone because they’re a straight white male candidate (which is also very common), but it’s still a bad policy.
You consider applicants who show up to a bank/office type job interview in sweatpants and a T-shirt with a skeleton making a rude gesture?
Please tell me the country where declining to offer that candidate a job would be illegal.
There is also the question/prep element. Something like, “tell me about a time you used x tool” or “what would you do if faced with y challenge”. No longer than 30s needed to respond, but very obvious when someone has been generous on their resume.
Once again, this video recording tool is an option that I think makes sense for jobs where it relates to the required skills. Don’t videoconference? Work from home? Never have to interact with customers or other external parties? Probably not the tool I would use in hiring.
Australia. It’s not clearly illegal but it’s dangerous territory. Candidates have a general right to be treated as equals and you need to reject someone for reasons that are relevant to the job position.
Something that can easily be changed, like a shirt, might not be OK. ANZ bank (a massive bank with several hundred billion dollars in assets they manage), for example, requires customer facing staff to wear a branded uniform but back at the office? You can wear whatever you want. When they changed their dress code years ago to no-longer require a suit/tie the CEO deliberately wore ugly clothes for a while to set an example.
Obviously no candidates are expected to turn up to an interview in their uniform - they don’t have a uniform yet. And if someone can wear a Marilyn Manson shirt in the office, then why not also at the interview?
The bank I’m with is even more relaxed - even customer facing staff can wear anything they want. Sure, if it’s offensive they’ll be told to wear something else, but that’s a conversation I’d be having with the candidate rather than a reason to reject their application. I might reject them if I don’t like their response.
You’re focusing on the dress part. There’s still the actual questions and overall sense of calm and comfort a person has in communicating on video, a skill that directly maps to this specific job.
I can’t imagine a front-of-house bank teller would need to have these skills. Maybe a question like, “tell me about a time a customer was unhappy and how you handled the situation?”. In which case, I imagine some people would like the chance to think about it at their leisure and record once or twice, and rewatch it before submitting to make sure they’re happy with it.
Being recorded and interacting with someone in person are hugely different. Even
First of all, a person would give nonverbal feedback.
Secondly, there is all manner of body language that could be used for emphasis that doesn’t make sense doing to a camera.
In the case of a single bank teller position with a dozen applicants, you’re right, a prerecorded video probably isn’t the most effective tool.
Imagine a company like Ally in the US, or idk, Commonwealth is the first one that comes to mind in Australia, hiring for a new video chat support function. 50 positions to fill with 1,000 applicants. Wouldn’t this tool maybe, possibly make a bit of sense? It directly maps to skills relevant to the position, and helps both candidates and hiring panels more efficiently work through the process without scheduling 1,000 x 30-minute interviews. Anyone who is uncomfortable being on video should consider one of the many non-video positions instead, like a traditional in-house bank teller position or a chat/phone support function with no video element.
I’ll give you another scenario. I have colleagues who recruit at university career fairs and professional org conferences and there has been a dramatic speedup in the process since I went through college grad and looking for a job 10-15 years ago. Candidates now expect interviews and answers same day or next. Any one company is limited in the number of people they can physically send to the fair. So in order to process the number of interested candidates in the timeframe they expect, we’ve relied on videoconf interviews with more hiring managers not physically present; candidates at the career fair booth jump on a tablet provided by the company and they go through a rapid 10 minute interview. As you can imagine, this can be a bit chaotic and high stress, so we’ve started giving the option for students to submit resumes a week or more in advance and the option for students to prerecord video of themselves answering set interview questions. The day of, they’re already in the system with an evaluation started, we can efficiently route them to the right person in the booth to talk about the types of jobs they’re interested in, and get them moving towards a potential offer that much quicker. I don’t have hard numbers, but anecdotally, there has been no shortage of students choosing to use the optional prerecorded video tool and almost all are using the optional resume presubmission instead of carrying paper copies around like I did.
See elsewhere in the thread for another scenario where this tool might be used effectively, high volume of international students applying for post grad positions when in-person interviews are not an option and scheduling live phone or video conference calls are difficult across time zones.
I’ll say it one more time so the folks in the back can hear. This is one tool to be used optionally for certain types of jobs and I think makes the most sense when there is a high volume of applicants and/or complex scheduling logistics. People also need to recognize that just like AI processing resumes, it’s already out there in use and it’s unlikely to go away anytime soon.
What legal reason(s) do you have for needing to see their appearance when making a decision on whether to hire them? You may have some, such as requiring a professional appearance. These need to be spelled out in the job requirements. It also opens the doors to claims of illegal discrimination, since this will be on full display. In the US, that includes race, age, and gender. Having a required video can also reveal protected classes like familial status and religion, depending on what’s in the background.
Whether an action is “Legal” is almost always dependent on context, and the lawyers/courts involved. A common tactic by racist nightclubs is to set a dress code, particularly on shoes. The argument is they aren’t refusing entry based on race, but on clothing. But the unauthorized shoes are the ones commonly worn by people of the race they’re discriminating against. Different courts have made different rulings on whether this (and similar actions) constitute racial discrimination.
By that logic, in-person interviews should also be illegal.
I go back to my comment somewhere in this thread about some symphony orchestras doing double blind auditions. If that is your position, then your issue is with general hiring practices, not with this video submissions in particular.