[Podcast] Industry Spotlight | Jim Stroud – HR Influencer & Content Creator – The Pros and Cons of ChatGPT and AI in the Talent Industry

• The Recruiting Radar is a weekly newsletter of business leads for people in the business of recruiting.
• The Recruiting Life  is a whimsical view of the world of work that aspires to educate and entertain.
• The JimStroud Podcast –  This show explores the discoveries and trends forming the future of our lives. Brain to brain communication, robot bosses, microchip implants for workers and immortality as an employee benefit are all happening now! If you want to know what’s next, subscribe to this podcast.
• The Jim Stroud Show – The Jim Stroud Show is a YouTube series about the future of work, life and everything in between.
• JimStroud.com – If you want one place to keep up with all Jim does, this is it. Subscribe now. Subscribe often.

Jim Stroud [00:00:00]:

Because it’s so useful and because it can really improve things and because it’s easy to get to get used to it, there is a possibility of turning off your brain and relying totally on it. And when you turn off your brain and you rely totally on technology instead of your own human common sense, you can get into trouble.

Kortney Harmon [00:00:21]:

Hi, I’m Kortney Harmon, staffing and recruiting industry principal at Crelate. This is the Full Desk Experiences Industry Spotlight series, where we are talking with the top leaders and influencers who are shaping the talent industry. In this series, we’ll be shining a light on popular trends, the latest news and the stories that laid the groundwork for their success. On today’s episode. We have a special guest joining us, Jim Stroud. Jim is a renowned expert in staffing and recruiting professional services with a wealth of experience in our field. He has 26 years of experience. He is here to share his insights on the role of artificial intelligence in talent acquisition, hiring, retention and particularly focused on the fascinating topic of Chat GPT and AI powered chat Bots. Before we dive into the discussion, as we get to know Jim better, he has a diverse background in the staffing industry and Jim has been the forefront of talent acquisition strategies and technology for many years. He was the global head of sourcing and recruiting strategy for Ranstad and has switched his focus now. Content creator, extraordinaire thought leader, Chat GPT enthusiast and you may have seen him on other podcasts in the industry. We heard him and we knew he was a must for our show. So, with all that being said, Jim, thank you so much for joining us today. We’re so excited to continue this conversation about AI Chat GPT because our last episode was a workshop on use cases, how to apply it to your staffing and recruiting desk, and how operation leaders use this tool for scale and to think differently about their foundational processes. So this is obviously the part two for us.

Jim Stroud [00:02:06]:

Well, thanks for having me. I do appreciate it.

Kortney Harmon [00:02:08]:

Absolutely. So, as we dive in, tell us a little bit more about your background, how you got started in this industry, professional service and maybe what has caught your eye about this whole AI world and where it’s going.

Jim Stroud [00:02:22]:

Sure. Like so many of my peers, I stumbled into this industry. It was not a dream initially. Initially my dream was to be a screenplay writer, to write hit movies, write novels, and I certainly have done that. I used to write a newsletter of crime fiction long, long ago. I was making short films. I used to work for a TV studio and I used to make short films and produce local television programming for a cable access channel, think Wayne’s World, something like that. And I really wanted to go for my Hollywood dreams and I was thinking of actually getting married. This was when I was in college. My girlfriend persuaded me, I guess the right way to say it. She said, if you wanted to be with me, you need to get a real job. So I said, now, we did not get married, but I always owe her for that little push. So I went over to the career center over at Georgia State University, and there was an ad posted on the wall that said, get paid to surf the Internet. I had very limited experience with Internet at that point. At that point, the only experience I had was going into a friend of mine’s office who was a system administrator at Georgia State. And he pressed a few buttons, and after he pressed a few buttons, a picture of a woman in bikini popped up. I said, what’s that? He said that’s the Internet It’s the Internet. It’s cool, right? That was my experience at the time. So I went to apply for the job, and it was for a company called MCI, which is a telecommunications company. I asked them, I said, So what exactly would you have me do here? Because I’m sure it’s not what I’m thinking. And they said, well, people are putting their resumes on the Web, and we need people like you to go find them. And I thought, Why would someone put their resume on the Internet that’s full of crazy people. That wasn’t my thinking. This is way back in 1997, the Stone Age. And so I asked her, so, well, how do you go about doing that? And so she switched topic, and I said, oh, you don’t know how to do it? Well, makes sense you want to hire somebody who doesn’t know how to do it. But I didn’t know how to do it. So when the interview was over, I think the first time, then I went home and I went on the Job Career section of MCI. Looked at some of the jobs there. Went over to Yahoo. Actually, I went over to Google, which was owned by Yahoo at the time, or part of Yahoo at the time. Read their instruction manual on how to search on the Internet because that’s how new I was to it and read the instructions. Did a keyword search, found three resumes on an old outdated website called Career Mosaic. I don’t know if you guys probably know in here knows that okay, all right, we’re the only one. And so I found some resumes and sent it to person I interviewed with. Her name was Rachel. Hi, Rachel, if you’re watching this, that was done within 2 hours of our interview. And I said, this is what you want. She said, Hired, and I’ve been doing it ever since. Been fortunate to work for several startup companies. Worked for Google, worked for Microsoft, headed up Source recruiting strategy at Ranstad Source, right, as you mentioned earlier. And my last gig, I was a VP of Marketing for Proactive Talent. Now, I am a content creator doing a lot of content generating demand for HR tech companies with awesome content. That is my sort of roundabout way. I’ve left a few things out, like helping to start SourceCon, which is the premier sourcing conference in the world for sourcing. Left out speaking at various international stages on sourcing and recruiting strategies, and written a few books here and there. You’re just a busy guy, I’m a busy beaver. It’s hard to stand still.

Kortney Harmon [00:06:04]:

Hey, that’s great. And it keeps you out of trouble. So that’s wonderful. You would think that’s fair. A lot of your content lately has really been focused on AI or Chat GPC or the focus of that. So part two to that question is how did you fall into this and what draws you to that? I guess obviously the internet. In the beginning, that was a self expensive story, but what keeps you here now and going?

Jim Stroud [00:06:32]:

When I first saw Chat GPT earlier this year, I had the same feeling I had when I saw the internet for the first time. When I saw the internet for the first time, when I had my first account, it wasn’t CompuServe, it was GNN, which is for Global Navigator Network or something like that, but it was around the CompuServe AOL time frame to really date myself once again. And when I was on the internet for the very first time, I had the feeling of the world just changed. I can sit on the computer and talk to somebody around the world and I can do all these wonderful things. This is amazing. The whole world has changed right before my very eyes. And I remember that feeling. I was such an enthusiast for being on the internet way back then. When I saw Chad GPT for the first time, I felt exactly the same way. And I had heard about it on LinkedIn because people were talking about it was so much buzz, right? It’s like every post was about Chad GPT. And this is only not that long ago, it was only in January, but everybody was all over and I got it, I looked at it, I was like, man, this is awesome. So I just started looking around, reading and finding everything I possibly could on it, experimenting with it, posting my experiments and videos that I posted on my blog and on my YouTube channel. And people would ask me questions, well, how do you do this, how do you do that? So I started experimenting more and I just became an enthusiast that way. Just sort of stumbled into it. I’m sort of like far as gump of recruiting, just sort of stumbled across things at ideal times. So, yeah, that’s how I got into it.

Kortney Harmon [00:07:58]:

That’s very cool. And it’s a hot topic right now. People are just curious, they want more. And I love that you’re out there helping answer questions for our community. That really it’s a very trial and error period. It’s like one of those I saw a cartoon and I think I posted it the other day. It was really the idea of so you don’t know what it does, so you don’t know how it works, you don’t know what the implications are, but you want us to go faster. And that’s kind of how all of us are right now. Don’t know, but let’s go.

Jim Stroud [00:08:24]:

Exactly that. It is exactly that. One of the things too that enamored me with it is how useful the tool is for recruiting. Just to name some of the things that you could do with it. Qualifying candidates is something that a lot of recruiters like. I would demonstrate and I’ve done this in some of my videos. If if I’ll send you the link to put in description if anybody want to check it out. But you can compare resumes with job descriptions and ask chatty BT reasons why they are a good this candidate is a good fit and ask for reasons why they are not, which could help you when you help you pitch a candidate to a hiring manager. It also will help you follow up good follow up questions to ask in an interview. You can ask what other roles this person is a fit for. Ask Chat GPT that you can ask Chatchi PT to write an email to the hiring manager using persuasion tactics. So if you ever been into sales or marketing, there are different persuasion tactics like scarcity and social proof things like that. You could say, hey, Chachi Petit, I really want to convince this hiring manager that this candidate is right for the job. Write me an email promoting this candidate and use persuasion tactic number one, which is scarcity and they’ll bring it or just do it. I like that. I like that you can use it for candidate outreach. One thing that I’ve experimented with, and I did a video on this as well, is that I would ask Chi GPT to write a job description, but I want you to write one or rewrite one based on a certain personality type. The Myers Briggs personality type that are you familiar with? I think a lot of people are. If you look up Myers Briggs and job personality types, you’ll see that people who are bartenders tend to have an iftj personality. I think that’s the right initials. All right, so if someone has that kind of personality, then to appeal to that type of candidate, I can ask Chattypt to write a job description or rewrite a job description that would appeal to somebody with that personality. Type and that will grab that person’s attention and hopefully that will intrigue them to stay on the job more because the job is in line with how their personality basically is. I like Chat GPT because it can give me a lot of interview questions. I can say Chat GPT, here’s a job that I am working on. Give me a bunch of questions that I can ask someone and I can get very specific. I can say give me ten questions that an expert would be able to answer but a novice would not be able to. Now give me five more questions that are tricky. Questions that seem easy to answer but are really deceptively tricky. So things like that, I like it for so many different reasons. I was showing some recruiters the other day a tactic where you can put the URL of your career site inside of the Chat GPT and say, hey, Chat GPT, look at this URL. I forgot exactly how I worded it, but I would say analyze this career site and ask me questions about it. And so I would suggest recruiters do that so that they could quiz themselves on how well they know the company culture, how well they know the company they are recruiting for, because the candidate may ask them something and they would ask based on what they’ve seen on the website. So when the candidate asks you, your company, how does your company feel about A, B and C and you say XYZ, then you made yourself look kind of foolish that you don’t really know the company that you’re representing. So quizzing yourself on the company that you work for is another cool way to use it.

Kortney Harmon [00:11:57]:

I love that. These are all good. I didn’t even think about that one. We used to do something similar when I was doing franchise training. It was like you had to defend your impact player or the person that you were taking to market, to skill market. And I would hold it and I would ask it questions, but that’s essentially what you’re asking it to do. That went back to what we were doing with new franchise owners. I love that.

Jim Stroud [00:12:17]:

Cool.

Kortney Harmon [00:12:17]:

Keep going. I don’t want to stop you.

Jim Stroud [00:12:21]:

One more idea is using Chatchi BT to gauge a candidate’s work style. So I could say Chatter t. I want to figure out someone’s approach to work. So I’ll say give me three inspirational quotes and then give me three possible answers that would suggest somebody’s mindset. So this is what I mean. One inspirational quote from Steve Jobs might be something like remember the crazy people. I forget it’s a famous speech, but remember the crazy people. The people who stretch themselves and do weird things. Something like that, right? So I would say this is the quote. I say, give me three possible responses to this quote which would denote how someone approaches work. And if someone says yes, I think this is a great quote, you really should embrace the crazy, then that suggests that this person may be an innovator, maybe a risk taker, someone who looks at the different sees different possibilities of things. But if somebody says yes, the crazies are good, but you still need to have a solid foundation, you still need to have a basic foundation to work on before you can innovate. Then you know that person is more of a maybe a worker be or more of a workhorse, someone who will keep the course. And you need both people. You can’t go half talked on new ideas all the time because then you might ruin your foundation. So asking chat GPT questions like that give you inspirational quotes and to give you suggestions on how a candidate might respond could give you some sort of insight into how they work.

Kortney Harmon [00:13:55]:

I love that. Again, didn’t think of that one, but just to be able to help dig a little bit deeper. I know when we were talking in our workshop, we talked about using it not only to help rookies or mid level producers scale up to be better, but I think it also can make your senior, top level recruiters and top level producers think differently.

Jim Stroud [00:14:17]:

Definitely, I’ll give you an example of thinking differently. I was showing someone this other day, I asked chat GPT, I was using it for sourcing, right? So I was saying, Chat GPT, how can I find software engineers online? And then it gave me LinkedIn, indeed, job boards, the usual suspects, right? So then I’ll say, okay, give me ten more ideas of how to find software engineers online. Then it said things like GitHub or stack overflow and online forums meetups, things like that. I said okay. Then I’ll say, okay, Chad GPT, give me ten more ideas and then it’ll start giving me derivatives of what it already said. So if it said LinkedIn before, if I say give me ten more ideas, it’ll say LinkedIn jobs and I say great, give me ten more. Then it may include LinkedIn groups. I say, okay, technically you’re still saying LinkedIn, but you’re sort of giving me derivatives of it. So I would say, okay, Chat GPT, give me ten more ideas, but don’t mention anything that you said previous in the conversation and it would give me more ideas that it had not done before. And so when I see these type of responses, I think, man, okay, it’s cool. Some of this I would know, some of this I didn’t know. That is really good. And so it’ll give me a lot of ideas to think about. And then another thing that you can do too, which I sort of stumbled across this. I said, okay, after getting about 30 or 40 different sourcing ideas on how to find someone, I think to myself, okay, I need to think about efficiency and not wasting my time because it’s a lot of ideas. So I asked chitbt rank these different strategies on the likelihood of success and rank them from one to ten, one being the highest. And they’ll say, okay, number one, job boards. You’ll be sure to find candidates on job boards. Number two LinkedIn. You’ll find plenty of people on LinkedIn and then down towards the bottom, you will see things like a hackathon to find somebody or some other stuff. So when I look at that list and I ask it to qualify it based on the likelihood of success, saves me so much times. And I think that’s something else that people are overlooking. With Chbt, if you ask it from an efficiency standpoint, if you say things like think like an efficiency expert and give me ideas on how to do this, that and the other, it can help you save time, it’s going to help you change your processes. So, just starting out there, I love that.

Kortney Harmon [00:16:36]:

I was going to ask you about key benefits, but hey, you just listed all kinds of them in this industry. I love that. So let’s talk about, I’m sure we’ll come back to this, let’s talk about what other AI tools that you’ve seen because there’s a bunch coming out. Oh yeah, it’s almost like a copy paste at this point in time. But what have you seen that’s maybe comparable to Chat GPT that works well? Or maybe you’ve seen some that don’t work as well.

Jim Stroud [00:16:57]:

Well, as far as being comparable to Chat GPT, I almost swear by Perplexity AI. Perplexity AI. Love that tool. I use it more than Google, I really, really do. Perplexity AI is sort of like a different souped up version of Chat GPT, if you can imagine it. Some engineers who worked for OpenAI, the company that built Chat GPT, they broke off and started their own thing, which is probably why Perplexity is so good, because they actually worked on the Chat GPT. Everybody’s worked on it’s in everywhere. So they started their own tool. And it works just as well in my opinion, as Chat GPT in some ways does things that I like better. Like for example, with Chat GPT, you ask it a question, gives you an answer, doesn’t always give you a source. You can ask Chat GBT, where did you get the information from? It’s an extra step. Sometimes you don’t think about it, but more often than not, you ask Chat GPD something and you just accept it as gospel. With Perplexity it’ll say, hey, this is the answer, this is where we got it from. These are the five sources we got it from. You say, okay, wow, that’s interesting. I like that answer, the same question, but give me five different sources. Okay, good. So now I got a different viewpoint from five more sources. It does stuff like that. Now it’s built on top of Chat GPT, so in addition to their own secret sauce, they still use the GPT you know and love. So they are integrating Chat GPT four into it now. So you gave us very soon adding pictures and stuff and other things. They have an iPhone app that I use all the time as well. I really should be working for them. They really should be reaching out to me. Because I love that tool so much. Absolutely. So that’s apples to apples perplexity I like better as much or better than Chat GPT. Other tools that I’ve used that are in that sort of AI space. One tool that I’ve played around with is called Perfect, which is a sourcing tool. Now, I did full disclosure, they were a sponsor of my content, so that’s how I came across them, and I did a demo video of it. But essentially what it does is you type in what you want and it finds what you need. It finds it slow, supposed to quick. If you go to LinkedIn, you type a few buttons and then boom, you got a list of candidates there. This tool takes its time a little bit slower, but it gives you some really good responses to your queries. It learns how you search and how you think and what you want. So the more you use it, the more it learns you. And so I could be looking for a python developer and you could be looking for a python developer, but because of the questions I ask it, or because the information I put in are different than yours, I’m going to get different candidates. Although we’re both looking for the same thing, I think that’s really cool.

Kortney Harmon [00:19:43]:

That is very cool.

Jim Stroud [00:19:44]:

And another tool that I am experimenting with that I like so far is a tool called Rasa, and it’s a newsletter marketing tool. So what I like about it, if anyone’s producing a newsletter, definitely check out Rasa. R-A-S-A IO. Basically what it does is I put in my newsletter information. I also add in different sources of information, say, Twitter or certain newsletters, whatever, and it’ll take different links from the different sources and put it into my newsletter. And then when people receive my newsletter, they receive information that I submitted. They also see information from other sources, and then the readers will click on the different sources. And as they do, Rasa is learning what each individual reader prefers, right? So the next newsletter that comes about, they’re going to get more information specifically to them that they have an interest in. And so now my newsletter becomes even more valuable to the reader, presumably because they’re getting my information, but also because they’re getting a curated list of information around the web that fits their specific taste. So that’s another one that I’m using.

Kortney Harmon [00:20:56]:

Very cool. And where we’re at today is only just like the tip of the iceberg, where we’re going to be a year from now or two years. It’s going to be crazy.

Jim Stroud [00:21:04]:

It makes me wonder. I mean, I know that this past year, probably it’s a conservative number, probably 500 companies based on top of Chat GBT have emerged. I think it’s going to be a bit of a Wild West for the next few years, and I think that it won’t be unheard of for a company to have less than ten employees and worth a billion dollars or something because it’s building top of Jackie Pete. That would not be unheard of. I think the competition for large enterprise companies has gone up exponentially. I think a lot of companies are probably going to continue to practice of looking at these smaller companies that are doing some interesting things and just buying them outright or copying them. I know Facebook and Instagram and all the other big, they all copy, they see what’s working and then they start doing it. So I think it’s going to turn a lot of companies into incubators, whether they realize it or not, because they’ll be acquired or they’ll be copied. I think it’s really good. I think having so many different companies and so many viewpoints and so many ways to do something is good. I welcome it.

Kortney Harmon [00:22:08]:

I love it. All right, I’m going to switch gears on you. Okay. We talked about some benefits, we talked about some tools. What challenges or limitations maybe have you seen or encountered when implementing Chat GPT into sourcing recruiting and maybe how have you addressed them?

Jim Stroud [00:22:22]:

Yeah, well, one I mentioned before about you ask it give you some answers, and I’ll give you ten more responses and start doing a derivative of it. So that’s one another one, which is tricky because you don’t always know. Sometimes Chat GPT can just outright lie or it can hallucinate and you don’t always know that it’s hallucinating. Yeah. For those who don’t know, you can ask Chachi PT something and because it wants to please you and ask your question, sometimes it might just make something up. Doesn’t do that a lot, but it does do it on occasion. And that’s one reason why I always suggest to people that when you’re using it in your processes in any kind of way, you got to have a human being in the loop. You got to have someone there who can look at this and say, okay, it doesn’t sound right. My spider sense is tingling on that one. Let me verify that a bit more. I think the biggest challenge with Chatterbt as far as that’s concerned is because it’s so useful and because it can really improve things and because it’s easy to get to get used to it. There is a possibility of turning off your brain and relying totally on it. And when you turn off your brain and you rely totally on technology instead of your own human common sense, you can get into trouble. I’ve seen articles, it’s not hard to find. There’s probably these four or five different articles I’ve read where people have driven their car into a lake because they were listening to the GPS so much that even though there was clearly a lake in front of them, they drove anyway because their mind was so in tune to what Siri was saying or whatever the GPS was saying. That’s the danger you got to have being in the loop, because you can’t be over reliant. But all that being said, I think Jet GT is really good for brainstorming. I think it’s really good for refining your sourcing strategies. I mentioned before about asking it to evaluate different things from one to ten based on likelihood of success. So things like that is good. Oh, something else that you can do with Chat GPT along the lines of challenges and limitations is this. What you may not be aware of is you can ask Chat GPT, give you some ideas based on what other people have already asked it right. So one thing I was in an experiment I was doing, I said, hey, chatty BT, tell me how other recruiters are using you, tell me how other people are using you that are presumably recruiters, and then show me the prompts they use and the ones that they receive favorably. And the ones that Chat GT could see that were being received favorably were those prompts that got a thumbs up. Because when you’re in GBT, you can put the little thumbs up, you can click the thumbs up icon. So you can ask the things like that and say, I think it was, yeah, give me a list of prompts used by presumably recruiters that resulted in you receiving positive feedback. It gave me a list of prompts and I can use those prompts that other people have tried, that they like, that they gave it a thumbs up. And I figured it could work for me. Likewise, I can say, give me a list of prompts that presumably recruiters have used that did not work well. So I can learn from what worked well, I can learn from what did not work well. And so there’s that very cool.

Kortney Harmon [00:25:38]:

I’ve not tried that. It’s on my list now.

Jim Stroud [00:25:40]:

Yay.

Kortney Harmon [00:25:44]:

Well, when it comes to this, in your opinion, and how does Chat GPT compare to the traditional methods of candidate engagement communications? When we start to think about emails and phone calls, I think it’s a.

Jim Stroud [00:25:56]:

Good tool that adds value, but it’s not a replacement for human interaction. Nothing replaces human interaction. Now, for example, chat bots are useful for screening candidates or for few basic questions, but not an entire interview, especially if you’re not especially if you’re recruiting executive talent, for sure. However, I see recruiters using interview tools like full disclosure, this is another sponsor of mine, Metaview. So metaview is AIpowered interview transcribing tool. So I can just talk to you, have a conversation, it’s transcribing the conversation, it’s taking notes from the conversations. It’s going to help me analyze the interview based on the notes that it took. That’s a really cool tool because it allows me to just focus on the person that’s in front of me, don’t have to worry about stopping. I can catch not only their answers when I’m talking to them, but I can also catch. Their nonverbal cues. I can say. I can think to myself. When I asked about A, B and C, they were all excited and Jubilant really into it. But when I asked about X, Y and Z, they seem a little quiet, a little shy, a little pensive. Maybe they’re not as experienced in X, Y and Z as they say they are on their resume. So let me go ahead and ask them a few more probing questions to see if they really are an expert or they’re just faking it till you make it. So in that way, these AI tools are good because they help me to focus on the person, allow me to do my job better. But I don’t see it as potential replacement for recruiters because like I said, the bottom line human beings crave human interaction. If that wasn’t the case, we wouldn’t have the loneliness epidemic which is going on. Human beings are very complex people with their own personalities, with sarcasm, and with different things. I don’t know how many times I asked my daughter, what’s wrong? She says nothing. I say, okay, you said nothing was wrong, but I don’t know if you really meant nothing.

Kortney Harmon [00:27:57]:

Absolutely.

Jim Stroud [00:27:58]:

And if human beings go through that, I can only imagine machines trying to interpret all the different nuances of a human personality. So all that to say, I don’t see machines removing recruiters out of the equation entirely. There’s just too much going on in terms of personality, in terms of the need for a high emotional intelligence, the need to manage relationships well. It’s just too many things to program. I don’t see it happening. But I do see humans working alongside AI, working with AI to get jobs done.

Kortney Harmon [00:28:31]:

One of the common things that we’re hearing and seeing whenever people think AI can just be automation too, like the idea. So what role does Chat GPT play in automating those repetitive tasks and talent acquisition? And what benefits does this automation bring to staffing and recruiting professionals?

Jim Stroud [00:28:49]:

I think it brings a lot of good. I mentioned before about the efficiencies that these tools could do, but I probably would want to. But I want to bring up a concern I have because everybody talk about how wonderful these tools are, especially if you are an HR tech vendor, which I do love. They do sponsor my content. But there is one concern. I have a lot of these different AI tools that I think a conversation will be had about this one day very soon, if not already. So let’s say that you’re using HR tool number five and it’s wonderful. It does all these wonderful things and it just makes your recruiting life so much easier. Well, someone from Benefits and Compensation will look at this and say, this AI tool is doing 10% of your work. Maybe we should pay you 10% less because you’re not working as hard as you have before, because you got this cool tool. Either that could happen, or a hiring manager, probably one of those mean micromanagers will say, wow, I see that. With these tools you’re using Chat GPT, you’re connecting it to Zapier, you’re connecting it to ATS, and it’s doing all these things automatically. Wow, you’re doing the work of ten people. Maybe I should give you the work of 30 people to keep you busy because you’re doing these tools doing so much work. So I think there’s going to be a conversation pretty soon because these tools are just so good that either it’s going to be a conversation of maybe I should pay you less because these tools are so great, or maybe I should give you more work because these tools are so great. If it’s a situation of I should give you more work because these tools are doing such a good job, how does that affect work life balance? If it’s a situation of these tools are doing a great job, so I need to pay you less, how does that make your company as attractive to someone else, to another company that’s going to still pay whatever the going rate was pretool? And I think that’s the conversation that people should be having or will be having one day in the future, well, that’s a concern.

Kortney Harmon [00:30:48]:

Are there any other ethical concerns or considerations that an organization should be mindful of when using Chat GPT in their processes?

Jim Stroud [00:30:58]:

Yeah, this comes up a lot. One thing I would say is bias and discrimination. That always comes up. Chat GPT can perpetuate different people, so you don’t have as diverse organization as you may want. For example? For example, okay, so Amazon, back in, way back in 2018, I think it was maybe 2019, they had this magic algorithm that helped them find software engineers and they put in the resumes of their top people and they said, hey, magic algorithm, figure out when someone comes in who applies to Amazon. If their resume fits the resumes of these people we put in who are really our best people, then send them our way, give them high priority. We’ll look them over and we’ll probably hire them because these resumes are based on the best people that we have. Well, apparently those best people, none of them were women. So the AI would not promote people to the attention of the hiring managers that happened to be women because they did not match the data that the machine received to grade the candidates on. So that’s what I mean by bias and discrimination. Make sure you have data that represents a wide girth of different talent from different backgrounds. Also, you can look, I mentioned earlier about how Chat GPT can hallucinate or lie. There was a recent study by NewsGuard that found that Chat GPT four, which is the latest Chat GPT version, said that it was more likely to spread misinformation than the earlier version. So one ethical concern is that misinformation and disinformation being introduced into the system and not really knowing if it’s there or not, which is why you have the debate of different laws. So like in New York, they just passed a law that said if you’re using AI for hiring in your process, you have to get it audited at least once a year. So someone’s got to come in and look under your AI hood and make sure that the information is there, correct, that you’re not discriminating against people, that kind of stuff. And then another concern, major concern is transparency. So I wrote about this in my newsletter. I have a newsletter called The Recruiting Life. Get to it by going to Jimstral.com, by the way, just subscribe. Well, one of the things that I talked about in there was there was research done by Pew. Pew. Pew Research.

Kortney Harmon [00:33:19]:

Pew, pew.

Jim Stroud [00:33:21]:

All right. There’s a Pew research. They did a study and in that study they found that they asked people their opinion about artificial intelligence in the recruitment process. And they found that it was 66% of people they surveyed, I think it was like 2000 or so many people, I forget many people they surveyed, but they said 66% of the people they surveyed said they did not want to apply to a workplace that used artificial intelligence in the hiring decision. And a lot of that is because a lot of people are still sort of skittish around it. They’re thinking like, okay, how do I know my resume is going to even be looked at? Is it a machine going to be looking at it and the machine is going to exclude me from the process or from a certain level of consideration, then why would I even waste my time applying for the company? Now, as recruiters, you know, we already use a lot of this stuff already, but with all of the news stories and attention on Chat CBT and artificial intelligence and all this fancy stuff coming out, a lot of job seekers are just nervous or concerned they’re not going to get a fair shake. So I would say one thing that companies should do, which is really in their best interest, is to have full transparency. Let Candace know, hey, we do use some tools. They’re super cool. But when it comes down to who gets hired, a human being is going to do that. Just be transparent about that because that’s the biggest concern. A lot of the jobs you can have, according to Pew study, that a machine is going to decide who gets hired or not. Some kind of way in your verbiage on your career site or when you’re talking to people, talking to candidates, say, hey, yes, we use a lot of cool tools, but we are human beings. Human beings are the ones making decisions. And that’ll ingratiate you more to the candidates that you interview, presumably.

Kortney Harmon [00:35:02]:

That’s such good advice. And honestly, just upfront to say, yes, we’d still talk to every person, or however your process is. So you’re not getting how many times do you get on the phone and you’re like, no, I just want to push zero, I just want to talk to somebody for customer service. Right. So then you don’t have to fight with that. So that’s interesting. That’s a potential risk for people. Are there any other potential risks or challenges maybe for organizations that are heavily relying on chat GPT for sourcing and recruiting besides the few that you had already mentioned?

Jim Stroud [00:35:34]:

I don’t think beyond anything I’ve already mentioned, although I would stress keeping a human being in the loop. Don’t become so used to these different tech tools that you just sort of take your brain and put in the corner for a minute. I think one thing that will happen because of all the potential risks using chatcheep, team recruiting and all these other AI tools, is that like the law in New York? I think something like that will become standard one day, probably become standard in Europe before it comes over here on a federal level, but having a third party come in and check the biasness or the secret sauce rather of the different tools to make sure that they’re compliant. Sort of like GDPR, which recruiters love. So I think the same thing. It’s going to be like a GDPR type of policy or law. It’s going to sweep the land one day soon. Not really quickly, because in the States we move at the speed of sloth when it comes to technology, but because this is getting so much press and so many people are talking about it, there’ll probably be some sort of sweeping legislation maybe in a couple of years, three years, five years. It’ll happen eventually. I don’t think it’ll happen quick. I think when social media became popular, we didn’t have legislation on that until like ten or twelve years later. After Facebook they started become popular. So it takes a long time. People on the Hill are behind in understanding technology, really behind in how it affects normal people. So they move really slow. But I think it will happen. I just think it’ll be a while.

Kortney Harmon [00:37:11]:

Are you seeing more and more companies adopt AI policies within their own companies? I know that’s on a legislative that we were just talking about. But are you seeing more and more companies try to figure out that whole company AI policy, if they haven’t already?

Jim Stroud [00:37:23]:

I have not seen a lot of companies do it, but I can make a safe prediction because I’ve seen at least one example, which I talked about in my newsletter as well, because of this new technology of AI, different jobs coming, some jobs are going to fade away, some jobs are going to be replaced instead. And I think that we’re going to see a rise in what’s called a chief AI officer, someone who’s going to be in charge of all things AI as it relates to the company. Same way maybe a decade ago there wasn’t a Chief Diversity Officer. Now a lot of companies have them. There’s going to be a Chief AI officer pretty soon as well. This person may have a technical background. Maybe they are a CTO in a previous life or maybe they were a VP of Technology somewhere. They’re going to come in, they’re going to do things like set the policy, put in guidelines that say you can’t put proprietary code into Chat TPT looking at you Samsung as a no, no, you can’t do that. We’re going to look at these different tools or use these type of tools or we’re not going to allow people to use it on our system. They’re going to come up with all those kind of policies, stuff like that. So the name of the company that has a Chief AI officer escapes me right now. If somebody really wants to know, they can look me up or distribute research themselves. It’s called Chief AI Officer and see what the job title, see what the job description is around that. So yeah, we’re going to see more of those in the near future. Just like I think we’re going to see an onslaught of third party software audit companies who will be auditing AI to make sure there’s no bias or discrimination in it. So those are two big growth industries, I think, coming very soon.

Kortney Harmon [00:39:02]:

That’s great insight. And we’ll put your newsletter in the show notes for everybody listening so everybody can link to your newsletter. So love that. As we look at this and people that maybe are on the fence because honestly, in the last workshop there was a lot of people on the fence about Chat GPT, they hadn’t used it. What are some key factors organizations should consider when deciding whether to adopt something like Chat GPT or other similar tools for their staffing and recruiting efforts? Is there anything that they should think of before they make the move?

Jim Stroud [00:39:34]:

Don’t buy it just because it’s the hot new thing. Make sure that assess what your needs are and if Chat GPT can deliver the solution or whatever, fill in the blank tool, can deliver on the solution. Figure out if the tool makes you more efficient or if the tool just has a really good salesperson. I’ve been in organizations where I look back and think, wow, they must have had a really good salesperson because nobody here is using this tool. Beware of those really good salespeople. Don’t waste your money. Do a really good assessment on if people are using it, if it really improves the candidate experience. Because if candidates don’t like it, then they’re not going to use it. It’s going to reflect badly on your employer brand. For example. There are certain ATS tools. I will not mention them because maybe they’ll sponsor my content one day, but there are certain ATS systems out there that will say, upload your resume to apply for this job. Great. Now once you’ve done that, now fill in the blank on each of these slots to apply for this job. And I’m thinking like, okay, you have my resume. Why should I have to fill out all this information? Why shouldn’t your tool be able to parse information from my resume into the different slots? That being the case, I as a candidate might say, you know what, I really don’t want this job because I just turned off by that. And I know a lot of people happen to be turned off by that. So just throwing it out there. I will look and see if they have a really good customer success department, do some research online and see if people are raving about how easy they are to work with. Because once you’ve bought it and the sole person goes goodbye, it’s you. And tech support, and then you might have a different opinion of the tool at that point. So I would make sure they have a really good customer success. Also, and this is very important, I would see if the tool is compatible with the stuff I already have. And if it isn’t, then does that tell me, okay, do I buy a whole bunch of new stuff to go with this new cool stuff? And if I had to buy a bunch of new stuff to go with this new cool stuff, that’s a lot of money. That’s a lot of time and training that’s going to impact the productivity of my team. So although this new thing has all the fancy bells and whistles, is it really worth it in the long term? When I think about productivity, cost and training time, and then I also will look at how secure is the tool, how committed are they to data security and privacy. And I also would ask them because it’s the cool thing to ask these days, do you have a third party auditing your system? How do I know your tool isn’t promoting bias? And if you are doing that, which you probably aren’t, that’s something you would say if you like, okay, I don’t want to say I don’t want to buy your tool. Let me throw you something to give us filtering your way to give us more time to think about it. I would say, okay, if you do have a third party auditing your tool, do you make reports available to your customers? So those are things I would throw out there.

Kortney Harmon [00:42:39]:

Don’t be distracted by shiny new tests.

Jim Stroud [00:42:41]:

Yes.

Kortney Harmon [00:42:41]:

I love that.

Jim Stroud [00:42:42]:

There’ll be something new tomorrow.

Kortney Harmon [00:42:44]:

Bingo.

Jim Stroud [00:42:44]:

Sure it works.

Kortney Harmon [00:42:45]:

I love that. You mentioned the candidate experience. You talked about your internal teams as well. We really focus on foundational processes on our show, like internal operations within your firms and organizations and making sure things are embedded in your everyday workflows. You mentioned the wild, wild west, right? We don’t necessarily want everyone using this tool to just go wild. And it’s really about metrics, understanding what’s working, what’s not working. Have you seen any organizations adopt this concept successfully using chat GPT as their foundational process? Or right now everybody’s just kind of feeling it out or what are your thoughts about embedding it in your foundational processes?

Jim Stroud [00:43:24]:

Okay, so I think it’s pretty common to use chat box to screen candidates, answer questions and provide feedback and everybody’s doing it. I think that only improve with chat GPT, but I think it’s challenging, I’ll say this correctly here, this is a safe space, so I’ll just say it?

Kortney Harmon [00:43:41]:

Yes, absolutely.

Jim Stroud [00:43:42]:

I think it’s challenging to find examples of chat GPT being integrated into the workplace because I’ve heard rumors, I’ve seen a couple of articles. I’ve seen a couple of forum mentions that workers are using chat GPT a lot. But they’re not telling their superiors because of fear of being replaced or fear of more work being added since they can do what’s expected in less time. I can go over here and create this report, analyze the data in like 5 seconds, and I can go off and pick my kid up from school and no one knows I’m gone. I don’t want to tell my boss that I can help it, or if I say, hey, this tool allows me to do three things at once, all automated, so I’m not spending so much time. Well, I’m not sure I want to tell management that because then they may say, you know what, I can get by by letting you go and hiring somebody cheaper and just let this tool do this aspect of the job. So I think chat GPT is working really well in a lot of offices, but I think a lot of people are not going to tell, they’re just not going to say it.

Kortney Harmon [00:44:50]:

Okay, so flip side to that coin. We have a lot of operations people that listen to this show. Is that something that you think those people should the operation leaders should take the time to train their organizations how to use this correctly, to have a tool in their arsenal versus everybody just using it like the wild, wild west behind the screen.

Jim Stroud [00:45:09]:

I think operational leaders should go ahead and train the people on how to do different things. Sure. I think that some people will still experiment and they may do things on their personal phone, they may do things sort of on the side off of the network. And I say that because I know that mentality exists prior to these AI tools. You probably can do a search now and find articles on people that are working like two or three jobs because chat GPT helps them do that and they can stay on the radar. Before chat GPT became popular, I know recruiters were doing two or three jobs on the side anyway with the tools at the time. So I know that mentality exists. I’m not necessarily mad at people that can do that because that takes a certain level of proficiency to work three different jobs, keep everybody happy and no one knows what you’re doing. So all that to say, yes, train your workers on how to use these tools. Sure. But also keep in mind that some of your more industrious ones, they may find ways to do of other tools and not tell you about it. I think the only way you would catch them is if they would use it on your system. But chances are, if they are smart enough to do it, they would not do it on your system. So just throwing that out there, that’s fair.

Kortney Harmon [00:46:31]:

And props to those people. I am a serial multitasker, but that takes it to a whole new level.

Jim Stroud [00:46:37]:

Okay. I’m not going to see anybody’s name. Okay, so Chat GPT has a lot of plugins now that you can plug into the system. Sort of like chrome extensions. Right? So a lot of cool tools that way. There are other things that are possible. If you connect Chat GBT to Zapier, that might be a whole nother conversation.

Kortney Harmon [00:46:59]:

I’m sure we can get down the rabbit holes here. Yes.

Jim Stroud [00:47:04]:

And so I guess from that standpoint, it comes from the mentality of the operations person or the benefits and compensation person. Are you mad at people who can be more efficient? Are you willing to penalize them? Are you going to pile up on them because they can do so much? Or are you going to just leave them alone to do what they do because they’re doing it so well? I think a lot of that will come down to how the worker feels about the manager. Do they feel comfortable enough on the manager to divulge their secret sauce that might endanger them from taking a longer lunch than normal? I think one way around that for all concern is to promote a row, which stands for Results Oriented Work Environment, which I love those type of environments. So how a row works is I don’t care if you do it at two in the afternoon or two in the morning, as long as it’s done by this deadline, I don’t care what you do. So if I call you at 03:00 and you had the ball game but by 06:00, my report is in my email like you promised, I don’t care what you do. And when you have an environment like that, I think that frees up workers from feeling like they have to hide what they’re doing. And if managers are on board with, I just care about the results. I don’t care when you do it or how you do it, as long as it’s done ethically and on time. If you had that kind of environment, then I think it’s win win for all concerned.

Kortney Harmon [00:48:29]:

I love that I only have one more question for you. Okay, we’ve had a great conversation. I could continue this, probably especially down these other rabbits. But looking ahead, what developments or advancements do you maybe anticipate in the field of AI? Like chatbots. Chat GPT. And how do you think it’ll shape the future of talent acquisition?

Jim Stroud [00:48:52]:

This is a weird answer if you’re ready for a weird answer.

Kortney Harmon [00:48:55]:

Right, I’m ready. Hit me.

Jim Stroud [00:48:56]:

Okay, so I think everyone will have their own personal AI, a talking assistant that knows everything about them. Have you ever seen a movie her, where this guy falls in love with Siri? Yes or not Siri, but basically Siri, right? Yeah. I think everyone’s going to have their own little digital minime that will follow them around, that will know all their preferences. So they could imagine walking into a restaurant and the minime orders for you based on your typical eating habits, based on your current health at that time, based on your mood that it perceives at certain times. So it just does things automatically. I think that this personal assistant would be walking around with you, so to speak. Maybe it’ll be attached to your iPhone in some way. Maybe it’ll be a brain implant. Elon Musk has this neural link thing that he’s been pushing where I’ve hurt. Yeah. Which helps you communicate the machines with your brain waves. Sci-fi is coming. Sci-fi. So I think that will happen. Once we get to that level of technology, I think we’re going to have a whole new set of issues. I think we’re going to have really good recruiters who can spend more time talking to people and making decisions in their head. So imagine I’m talking to you and I tell my AI assistant through my brain implant, a shortlisted candidate. And so the candidate knows before they even leave the building that they’ve gotten the job because it’s already been the brainwaves are going all over the place. But I think it’s that as amazing and as weird and as efficient as that kind of stuff could be, I think it’s going to also raise a couple of issues, too. So there are always going to be people who can afford this new technology kind of thing, and then they’re going to be people who can’t there’ll be people who know how to work this AI assistant on a daily basis, and there’ll be some who can work it better, right? So then I think it’s going to be a time when, say, a hiring manager has two candidates, right? And one candidate has, like, the brain, Elon Musk neuralink brain implant in their head, and they’re able to code three video games at once. Amazing, right? But then you have, say, a regular coder who does great work, but they can only do one game at a time. So should you hire the Cyborg Bionic Man to code for you? And if so, what about all the other coders who don’t have all the super bionic stuff in their brains. So you have a new level of discrimination, these super augmented humans, or the people who are not augmented with all the technology, that kind of thing. So it’s going to be a double edged sword. Double edged sword. I see little bits of it starting to creep into the workplace already. Like, there’s this company in Wisconsin called Three Square Market that would microchip its employees. So you imagine a little piece, a grain of rice right here inside your hand in this part of your skin. And instead of using a T cart, you wave it over a pad and you’re able to walk into secure areas. Or you’re able to wave your hand and get a pack of Twix out the vending machine or make copies or send a fax. So it’s that kind of thing. That’s a really small example, but it’s like and then you look at this is not a rabbit hole, but let me make it quick. I think another thing that people are going to be looking at, too, same way they’re looking at chachbt, is this neural technology. Have you heard of neurotech? That’s more of the brainwave technology. So they already have examples of neurotech in the workplace already. So like in Japan, if you are working on the bullet train and you’re the conductor, you want to make sure that you’re awake at all times, because if you go to sleep, that can really ruin a lot of people’s day. So they give you a hat with these transmitters and stuff in the hat, and if the transmitter picks up from your brain waves and you’re starting to get sleep, a little alarm will go off. Hey, wake up or start talking to you, that kind of thing. So that’s kind of cool. But there are also ways that companies can use that to where let’s say that you are working on your computer and maybe you’re not as focused. Maybe you got the TV on in the background, you’re watching TV, little alarm can come up in your browser. Hey, you don’t seem like you’re all that focused on your work. Here’s some suggestions on how you can focus on your work better, which from a management standpoint sounds great, but from a worker standpoint, oh my God, that’s too creepy. So neural technology the next thing to be concerned about next to Chat GPT. So there you go.

Kortney Harmon [00:53:39]:

Crazy. Then we’re going to go to the next movie, which is but I robot. Isn’t that where they take over the world then?

Jim Stroud [00:53:45]:

Yeah.

Kortney Harmon [00:53:46]:

Our issues now are not going to be the same issues in a year and three years, and it is just going to get more diverse and more technical and more things for sure. Well, I love that. Thank you. That brings us to the end of this engaging conversation. Like I said, we probably could go down many other rabbit holes. Thank you, Jim. For being with us today and sharing your invaluable insights into the world of AIpowered Chat Bots and the impact and Chat GPT on the talent industry in general. So, thank you so much for joining us today.

Jim Stroud [00:54:20]:

Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.

Kortney Harmon [00:54:22]:

Absolutely. So for our audience, throughout this discussion, we explored the benefits of Chat GPT in comparison to traditional candidate engagement methods, the challenge and ethical considerations for organizations should be mindful of, and the future developments that lie ahead. It’s evident that AI technology, like Chat GPT has the potential to revolutionize the way we attract, we hire and re retain. So, as operation leaders in the staffing industry, it’s important to keep in mind the importance of your strong foundation and see if these tools fit into your well defined processes before implementing shiny new technology for efficiencies and scale. Jim really talked us through some great ideas and food for thought for our industry and how it’ll evolve more into our world. So don’t let your teams lose sight of that human element to continue to create and nurture those relationships both on your candidate and your client side. Listeners, I hope you found this episode enlightening, as I did. If you want to learn more about Jim and his work, be sure to connect with him on LinkedIn. We’ll put his website and his newsletter in our show. Notes. Thank you for tuning into the Full Desk Experience industry spotlight. I’m Kortney Harmon with Crelate. If you enjoyed this episode, don’t forget to subscribe, leave us a review and share it with your colleagues and friends. So stay tuned for more captivating, conversations and insights from industry experts. Until next time, I’m Kortney Harmon with Crelate. Thanks for joining us for this episode of Industry Spotlight, a new series from The Full Desk Experience. New episodes will be dropping monthly. Be sure you’re subscribed to our podcast so you can catch the next Industry Spotlight episode and all episodes of the Full Desk Experience here or wherever you listen.