Voice and Video Screening of Candidates: Chatbots Help Hire Faster and More Accurately

Social media has become a new recruitment channel. On one hand, employers can "dig up" background on job seekers; on the other, applicants can cast a wide net to increase their chances of getting interviews. A local start-up has developed an artificial intelligence chat programme (Chatbot) that lets companies find talent through the virtual world. Job seekers can talk to the interview bot anytime, anywhere, record their voice and video, and pass the recordings to employers for screening, significantly saving time for both recruiters and applicants.

Chatbots are already widely used on messaging apps such as WeChat, and Google and Facebook (fb) have also joined the race, moving into "Conversational Commerce". According to the latest statistics from research bodies Mindbowser and Chatbots Journal, among 300 companies surveyed, 30% believe Chatbots will replace human conversation. More than 60% agree that the functions of Chatbots will surpass mobile apps within the next five years.

Frenchman Max Armbruster founded Talkpush in Hong Kong three years ago, embedding a Chatbot in fb Messenger and turning it into a recruitment tool. Talkpush now works with many companies, such as The St. Regis Macao and Sheraton hotels in Macau, providing Chatbot recruitment services and earning technology fees from them.

After seeing a recruitment advertisement on fb, job seekers can click the ad to chat with the bot. The bot asks questions such as "Please tell me a little bit about yourself", and also asks applicants to upload their résumé and voice recordings, or to answer questions by video. The information is then passed to the company for review. If the company wants a "Second In" (second-round interview), the bot notifies the applicant of the time and place.

Max advises job seekers to make good use of voice recordings or video to show their communication and presentation skills. They can keep their tone relaxed and dress Smart Casual, because companies that choose Chatbot recruitment are usually more open-minded. About 1,000 job seekers use Talkpush each week, of whom about 50 are hired. Max points out that, in the past, human resources departments interviewed many candidates and asked each of them the same questions, which was time-consuming and inefficient. With Talkpush, a company can select just two or three suitable candidates from a large pool to interview.

When Talkpush started, it successfully raised seed funding from 500 Startups and Seedcamp, launching with US$120,000 (about HK$936,000) and sharing an office in Sheung Wan with other start-ups. Besides Hong Kong, Talkpush also has an office in the Philippines to expand into the Southeast Asian market. The company currently has just over ten employees, most of them software researchers. Max admits that Talkpush is not suited to the professional job market, so it focuses on the service industry: "Accountants and lawyers, for example, are better screened using traditional methods." Industry observers believe that recruiting through social media allows employers to vet candidates' backgrounds, for example by learning about their interests, habits and social circles, greatly improving the hit rate.

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