EP117: TAtech - How AI and Emerging Technologies Will Impact Hiring

All-In Recruitment is a podcast by Manatal focusing on all things related to the recruitment industry’s missions and trends. Join us in our weekly conversations with leaders in the recruitment space and learn their best practices to transform the way you hire.

This transcript has been edited for clarity.

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Lydia: Welcome to another episode of All-In Recruitment by Manatal, where we explore best practices, learnings, and trends with leaders in the recruitment space. If you like our content, please subscribe to our channels on YouTube and Spotify to stay tuned for our weekly episodes.

I'm your host, Lydia, and joining us this week is Stephen O'Donnell of TAtech. Great to have you with us, Stephen. Good afternoon.

Stephen: It's lovely to be here. I'm very honored.

Stephen’s Perspective on Recruitment Tech

Lydia: Yes, it's a pleasure, and an honor to have you. So walk us through some of the pivotal moments in your journey in this space, Stephen. What are some observations you've made in this industry and in your career?

Stephen: I'm one of those old people who have been around for a long time. I've been in recruitment since 1987, initially as a recruiter with recruitment agencies. I owned and ran a couple of recruitment agencies in Glasgow in the 90s. By the time we got to 1999 to 2000, I was being pulled into the technology side of things and launched a website in 2000 called alljobsuk.com. It was essentially a portal for candidates to find recruitment agencies, employers, job boards, or publications that were advertising the vacancies they were looking for. So it was effectively a signpost to everything in recruitment.

So, being pulled into the technology side of things at the same time as running a recruitment agency is a bit like trying to ride two horses with only one backside. It was difficult. The technology side of things interests me because I thought it really complemented what we already did in a much more manual way in recruitment before 2000.

Since 2000, I've been involved in a number of technology companies, either building and selling ones that I built or working with other organizations. These have ranged from aggregators to psychometric assessments and testing, to video interviewing and advertising platforms, and a number of other things, including very early AI search and matching tools.

Connecting and Integrating Recruitment Solutions

Lydia: So how has the talent acquisition, or the TAtech landscape changed since TAtech's inception? Maybe you can walk us through a little bit about how TAtech operates as a community, I believe.

Stephen: TAtech is indeed a community. It's a membership organization and institution for job boards and recruitment technology providers. It was initially job boards, and, of course, on top of that, there would be aggregators, which are job boards that pull in vacancies from multiple sources, and then programmatic advertising companies, who use programmatic algorithms to ensure that jobs are distributed to the places where they’re going to best match with a rich stream of candidates. So that was the initial building of TAtech.

But of course, as we know now in talent acquisition, people don't only use job boards. They use multiple technologies at the same time, and all of those technologies handle data that they have to pass from one platform to another. You might advertise through a programmatic advertising platform on multiple job boards. You're then receiving applications from multiple sources. They’re coming into your ATS; you then need to be able to use AI matching to determine which candidates are the highest priority to speak with first. You might want to put them through an assessment. You might want to organize video interviews with them.

So, all of those technologies—and there are many more—all need to be able to work with each other. The core purpose of TAtech is that these companies, these technology providers, and job boards, are able to meet with each other and work out ways to partner with each other, to collaborate, to integrate, and to put together a more unified tech stack for employers.

Of course, employers all have their own unique collection of technologies that they use according to their preferences, needs, and what the people in TA in that company have used, either in that company or in previous organizations. So, it’s a continually evolving marketplace.

Lydia: I'm sure in the course of these years, TAtech’s efforts would have done some kind of many success stories. So is there any specific story that you'd like to share that could be useful to the audience?

Stephen: Well, there are quite a few. So the place where those stories happen is at TAtech events, specifically TAtech conferences. There are two main conferences: one is TAtech North America, and the other is TAtech Europe. This summer, we were in Washington, D.C. for our North America conference, and in Paris just a few weeks ago for Europe. Over the years, a number of companies have been able to set up partnerships and collaborations.

The largest members we have ranged from Indeed and ZipRecruiter right down to brand-new startups that have come out of their shells. These are companies looking for investment, mentors, and people with experience in the industry who can show them the way. We’ve had quite a few individuals who have built successful companies and are in a position where they’re able to invest in those startups. I can't give you names, but these deals happen all the time, and they happen at our events.

As with any conference, we have people on stage, and we always have a great array of fantastic speakers. Most of the attendees at our events are CEOs, founders, and C-suite level executives from those companies, so they’re able to speak on behalf of their organizations. That also means while yes, they’re on stage, they’re also in the Deal Center. The Deal Center at TAtech is where, at our conferences, you’re able to make appointments to speak with CEOs and senior executives from companies you want to do business with. Usually, there are hundreds of meetings organized at our conferences, and all manner of deals come out of those. Sometimes, it’s just competitors having a sit-down, being able to look each other in the eye, and be on talking terms. They’ll go home and compete with each other again as they did before, but at the event, they’re able to speak with each other.

Lydia: That is the platform that TAtech provides to come together and really talk about how they can collaborate and work together, and maybe even build a network of their own in terms of deals and partnerships.

In terms of collecting these insights, does TAtech have some kind of publication, or do they have some kind of way to give back to their community from these events?

Stephen: We absolutely do. So obviously, the physical events are great for people to get together, but every week, multiple times a week, we're putting out newsletters, blogs, podcasts, and webcasts where we're digging into new technologies and what they do and how the landscape is changing in different countries and sectors, in different areas of technologies, and how that affects everyone else. So we're continually taking the temperature of the marketplace.

Balancing Recruiter Efficiency with Candidate Experience

Lydia: So from these events, lots of conversations would happen about technologies and what might be the forecast in terms of the tech that's coming our way. So what emerging technologies do you see that are about to shape the future of recruitment? Let's say maybe in the next two or three years.

Stephen: So it won’t be a surprise to anyone if I mention the letters A and I. But what we—most people on the street, a candidate, a job seeker—wouldn't be aware of is that work on AI has been going on for the past seven or eight years, and longer than that. But, intensely for the past seven or eight years, organizations have been building large language models, training them, and filling them with data from which those platforms can learn about the behaviors of whoever is interacting with that technology.

So going back to 2018, I was working with a company called Pocket Recruiter, and they did exactly that. When I saw that technology initially, I thought, "Hold on a second. This is going to change everything." But it didn’t. It didn’t move as quickly as I thought it would then because there’s an inevitable amount of inertia. But in the years in between, it’s been a bit of fits and starts, and now, in the past two years, it’s full-on, where companies are not only adopting AI but implementing it in novel ways that you wouldn’t have expected. So we’re still very much in the foothills of this.

One thing in particular that I am really keen on is that we always look at technologies that make things easier, more effective, and efficient for those who are recruiting—for employers and people in TA—and all of those tools are fantastic. What we’ve seen since the pandemic is real growth in candidate-centric technologies, with AI being brought to bear, where candidates can use tools to identify not only the employer they should be considering working for now but who they might potentially work for in 10 years.

So candidates might not say, "I don’t want to do this," but they’ll accept fewer invites to take on those kinds of interviews and vote with their feet, or their mouths; they just won’t go through with it. So I’d like to see candidates push back, or companies identify which parts of the hiring process are working well in terms of identifying good candidates, but are also seen as acceptable by job seekers.

Which is why you’ll see this little logo in front of me here. With my online recruitment awards, we are continually looking at the hiring process from the other end of the telescope—from the job seeker’s point of view—and trying to understand what works for them, because what candidates accept now is very different from what they would have accepted 20 years ago.

Lydia: So what is top of mind when it comes to concerns about using technology from a candidate's perspective, coming from the feedback that you may have gotten from the awards?

Stephen: Candidates are much more aware that they are putting their data into someone else’s platform. Most candidates, let’s face it, are relatively relaxed about that. They all have social media accounts, mostly have accounts on LinkedIn, and are sharing lots of information all the time. But increasingly, they understand that some information shouldn’t be shared; it’s not in their interest to share. Some information might be used for the wrong reasons when it’s put into a database.

So candidates would like more clarity on what happens to their details. If they register with a job board, a recruitment firm, or apply for a job with an employer, how is their data being managed in that system? If I were registered with a job board, for example, I’d want to be notified if anyone looked at my CV or my resume online. I’d really like to get a notification saying that a particular company looked at my CV today, so I could be in a position to either follow up myself or dismiss that information. These are little things, but I’d like to know that.

I’d like, wherever my data is sent, to get pushback and advice from those organizations saying, "Actually, we don’t need your driver’s license number, your National Insurance number, or your passport details and in fact, you shouldn’t attach a photograph with this application for DE&I reasons, because we want to avoid bias." I’d like candidates to understand more. They have a rough understanding, but it’s very mixed in terms of comprehension level.

I’d like candidates to understand more about the employment laws where they work—what’s acceptable, what isn’t acceptable, what good DE&I looks like, and ways to avoid bias that might preclude them from being successful in a job application. I’d really like employers to tell them: If I apply for this job today, when will I hear back? What’s the time period within which you expect to fill this job? How many other candidates have applied for this job? Where am I in the process?

Candidates are informed by the other things they do online. When I buy anything on Amazon, I can track the package. It’ll tell me that if I order something today, it’ll come tomorrow or the next day. And if it gets lost, I know which stage in the process it got lost. From experiences with those kinds of interactions online, candidates now expect more transparency in the hiring process when they reach the end of an application.

Embrace Curiosity and Tech to Find Hidden Talent

Lydia: In terms of the role of a recruiter, given all these technologies, all these different expectations that are coming in from candidates, the awareness of usage of data, etc, how do you foresee the role of recruiters evolving? Or rather, what sort of traits should they even have today that would prepare them for the newer technologies that are about to come in?

Stephen: If I were thinking about ideal recruiters, they are someone who is interested in the people they’re dealing with—the hiring managers, the company they work for, and, of course, the job seekers applying for jobs. People who are genuinely interested in the details about each participant in the hiring process. So being curious is absolutely essential, and that extends to the technology they’re using.

Being curious about, "Well, are there ways in which I can find candidates we weren’t finding before?" Because there are lots of terrific candidates out there who could potentially be hired for a role but are just not being found. They’re lost in a database, and miscategorized. They might have a qualification from an unusual source, maybe a different university than is expected, or maybe they have an unusual name that some people might set aside because of bias in that direction.

So candidates would like to understand more about the hiring process there.

Revitalize, Don’t Replace Your Existing Recruitment Tech

Lydia: You spoke about inertia earlier, reluctance to accept that technology. I mean, what is the sense of that since 2018 and reluctance, or rather an apprehension towards technology? Is there a sense that it's moving away? Is there a sense that there's an increased apprehension toward the emerging technology? So what's the sense there?

Stephen: So it’s certainly the case that individual people in TA will feel overwhelmed with technology. They may have a manager who, every week, brings them a new technology to trial. The first time you see a new technology, it’s a new toy, and you think, "This is going to be great. This is fantastic. It’ll make my job so much easier." And maybe it works a little; maybe there are problems with it. Maybe it’s fantastic, but the company decides it’s a bit too expensive. So you had a trial of something, and it’s then taken away. Then you have another trial of something else, and it’s taken away or not implemented. People in TA get tech fatigue, where they feel like they’ve thrown themselves into a new piece of technology, and it either doesn’t work or they don’t get to use it long term.

Each time a new piece of technology comes in, their enthusiasm level drops a little. So it’s unfortunately the case that whenever a new technology company brings a new solution, one of the things they have to overcome is that sense of, sometimes, dread: "Oh, another piece of technology." And there are various technologies out there that were actually designed to overcome problems created by previous technologies, which is very meta, but it certainly happens.

I always think companies should regularly review all the technology they have—conduct an audit, find out what’s working, what’s not working, what they’re paying for that they’re not using—and simplify. If you can pare away technologies that aren’t serving their purpose anymore, that helps to refresh your use of the tech you already have and gives you a bit more space to consider new technologies. That can include job boards as well.

I did a project a while ago with an employer who wanted to switch to a whole new ATS. They wanted to consider all the ATSs out there—the spread of features, benefits, and costs they should consider if they were going to change. Long story short, I spoke with many, got an understanding of them, and presented all that to the company. But what we also did was an audit of how the ATS they already had was being used. Actually, what they were able to do was stay with the technology they had but re-implement it as if it were new. The company behind it came in, trained all the staff as if it was a brand-new installation, and reintegrated it with the other technologies they had. It reset the purpose.

So it’s often the case that the technology you already have has the ability to do what you want, but you’ve gotten involved in old ways of using it, or it can do things you weren’t aware of. The amount of choice out there is phenomenal. And when looking at new tech, one of the most important things is to consider what you already have. It’s a bit like looking at an old camera you have and thinking, "Well, I’d like to buy a new camera," but the old camera can do everything you want. And if you just put a new lens on it or get a new tripod, suddenly the quality of outcome is far better.

Curiosity and Tech-Savviness Can Set You Apart From Other Recruiters

Lydia: Now you've obviously been in recruitment, and you've seen the landscape change drastically over all these years. What advice would you give someone who's starting on recruitment, Stephen?

Stephen: For someone in TA, I would say, hone your sense of curiosity. If you’re interested in something or someone—people, companies, and so on—then get used to digging in to find more information about them using the internet. Now, if I see a car on the street, I can get an app that will tell me exactly the model of the car, when it was built, and whether it’s MOT’d, taxed, and licensed. I can find all these things out. If I see a company, I can look up Companies House or search the internet for who registered their domain. All of these things are easily findable, as it were, and it’s the same with jobs, employers, and companies.

There’s so much to find out, and you should hone your sense of curiosity. When you find out more information, it should make you want to dig even deeper, managing that information and using technology to do so. Get used to using multiple technologies and exploring novel ways to apply them. One of the best ways technology evolves is through feedback from users on how they’re using it in ways that weren’t originally planned. Companies often discover that their technology is being used in unexpected ways, which helps them develop the product in a more intuitive direction.

Whether it’s searching and matching technologies, job boards, video interviewing platforms, or any number of other tools, the ways in which they can be used are vital. And that’s because, for the most part, people in TA are lateral thinkers, always looking for ways to solve problems. The problem could be: "How do we find a replacement for this vacancy that just appeared today?" or "How do we find someone for a role that’s going to be effective?" or "The company is planning to hire for a new location—how do we identify an entire team of people to work for the organization?"

Thinking about how to solve these problems in a novel, effective way is key. TA is not a job where you just show up, turn on your PC or laptop (even if you’re working from home), and plow through tasks. It’s a job where you need to think on your feet daily and be agile in how you approach your work. At the end of each day or week, you should be asking yourself, "How could I have done that better? How could I have saved time?"

One thing that often happens with technology is that you get bogged down in regular ways of doing things. You should continually question how technology works for you.

Lydia: In terms of technology, it yields data, and the metrics that you look at as well are going to indicate the ways in which you work. So, what is the goal that you're going for, or rather, which metric should you be tracking for you to do your work better, how to use it to do it better, and also even storytelling the data?

Stephen: Metrics absolutely matter. If you can't count it, it doesn’t count—and vice versa. When a company is selling a new technology, they might often say, "When used correctly, this technology will save recruiters 10 hours a week or 20% of their time." That 20% of their time ideally means they have more time to spend speaking directly with job seekers and hiring managers, focusing on more human tasks because the things that can be automated are automated.

In truth, though, that 20% time saving is usually invested in allowing that one recruiter to handle 20% more vacancies. So they don’t get free time to spend on the more human aspects—the expected capacity of each recruiter just goes up. And that’s a shame because that wasn’t the intention in the first place. But in a team of 10, 20, or 50 recruiters in a large organization, when someone leaves, the position often isn’t refilled; the technology simply expands to fill the gap, so fewer people remain in TA.

Within TA, you need to ensure that you’re putting in the crucial human element that makes you valuable, and understanding the data and learning every day is essential to that.

Encourage Candidates to Evaluate Employers

Lydia: And finally, Stephen, this is the last question and I'm looking forward to hearing what you have to say. What is your favorite or most memorable recruitment story? I'm sure you have many, but what stands out?

Stephen: I've had a long career in recruitment, and one story goes back to my very first job interview. Picture this: I'm in an interview room with a group of interviewers, and I’m standing there in a dressing gown. They asked me to take it off and hang it up, so I was left standing there wearing nothing. After a moment, I put the dressing gown back on and left the room. Today, such a request in an interview would be shocking.

This was part of the application process to join the Metropolitan Police in London in the mid-80s. The process included physical exercises, face-to-face interviews, IQ tests, and this surprising moment. By 1996, someone within the Met questioned, “Why do we do this?” The only answer was, “We’ve always done it.” With no clear reason, the practice was dropped. Back then, rules existed around visible tattoos too; a person who interviewed with me, coming out of the army with tattoos, didn’t get the job because of them. Nowadays, stipulations like that wouldn't hold up.

The point is that doing something just because “it’s always been done that way” is not a good enough reason. Every step in the recruitment process should have a specific purpose, and you should be prepared to defend it when questioned. If challenged on something that doesn’t contribute meaningfully to the process, you need to consider changing it. For example, candidates are often asked odd questions just to see how they think on their feet. I often tell candidates that if they’re asked something irrelevant, they should feel empowered to push back and say, “I don’t think that’s relevant to this role.” This shouldn’t count against them; sometimes, the company might be in the wrong.

All that said, I still believe employers should have the right to hire the person they like best, even if they aren’t the most qualified. Work is about people, and the workplace should be one where people feel comfortable and can collaborate. You want a diverse workforce that includes people who might not typically socialize outside of work, as this can create a more well-rounded workplace.

Lydia: Going back to your story. How did you handle that dressing gown interview? I'm really curious to find out. What was the point of that interview, and what were they expecting to see there?

Stephen: When hiring for the police force back in the day, they were not just looking at what candidates had in their heads but also at them as physical beings. Police officers often face challenging physical situations, so they sought individuals who were fit and strong, without any limitations that could hinder their performance. Someone must have decided that it was necessary to see the whole person, which, while shocking to many HR professionals today, was genuinely part of the process. At the time, I simply accepted it; I was 17 or 18 and thought this was standard practice to get the job. I didn’t have the understanding or the ability to push back.

Even less so now, but up until about ten years ago, candidates were often asked to jump through various hoops just to apply for a job. For instance, if a candidate was already employed and doing well, they might be asked to complete a project—be it in marketing, engineering, or programming—to showcase their skills. This means asking them to do unpaid work while managing their current job, which is unreasonable and unnecessary. In such cases, I believe the candidate should be compensated for their time.

There are still situations where candidates are asked to do things they may not feel comfortable with, yet they go along with it. I would like to see a more equitable playing field during interviews. Candidates should feel empowered to interview the company just as much as they are being evaluated. They should ask questions like: “Why is this position available? What happened to the person who held this job before? What are the growth prospects in this role? Is there any risk of redundancy in the near future?”

Asking the hiring manager about their own career path within the company or their ambitions should be seen as legitimate inquiries, not impertinent ones. This is increasingly recognized today; the hiring process is a two-way street. Candidates should have the opportunity to choose the company that is right for them, just as much as companies want to find the best fit for their needs.

Lydia: So recruiters and hiring managers sitting in on these interviews should be prepared to answer these questions as well, and just be prepared for the informed candidate, so to speak.

Stephen: Absolutely. A good progressive hiring manager will welcome these questions and will look well on someone who asks those kinds of questions because that's telling this person's genuinely interested, and they're considering this role seriously.

Lydia: Thank you so much, Stephen, for your insights. You’ve been generous and it's been great listening to all these stories. For those who are listening in, I'm sure someone will want to connect with you. Or whoever is interested in finding out more about TAtech would definitely want to connect with you. So what's the best platform to connect with you?

Stephen: The best way to find me is on LinkedIn. Search for TAtech, search for the NORAs. But on LinkedIn, Stephen O'Donnell, you'll find me there. Anything to do with the NORAs, then you would you'd find information online, the National Online Recruitment Awards in the UK.

Lydia: And when are the Awards?

Stephen: The awards event is on the sixth of November, so three weeks from now, and we have 14 awards to give out. There are just over 80 finalists altogether, and we're really looking forward to the preparation is well underway, and we always have a big party in London.

Lydia: Excellent. Thank you again, Stephen, and we have been in conversation with Stephen O'Donnell of TAtech. Thank you for joining us, and remember to subscribe. Stay tuned for more weekly episodes of All-In Recruitment.