This Week in Talent (25th May)

Good morning, friends!

My how the time has flown. We’ve reached my final muse-letter in May, and it’s been an absolute pleasure sharing a few of my thoughts with you all each week. I thought I’d focus my last instalment on AI and Open GPT, both dominating the news and the world of Talent.

Did you know, there are 33 time as many LinkedIn posts mentioning topics like generative AI and GPT than there were one year ago and as of March 2023, the share of US job postings on LinkedIn mentioning GPT are up 79% year-on-year?! From screening resumes, scheduling candidates, and generating interview questions, AI can help create a personalised recruitment experience. AI chatbots could help improve your DEI hiring by removing bias, generate careers pathways by matching candidates to jobs that are skills-based not just education-based, and guide employees to upskill in future capabilities.

I was at a lunch last week, arranged by Seek, where they hosted several Heads of Talent from across various industries to talk about challenges in the market. One of the participants spoke about how he’d used ChatGPT to do double the work he’d have been able to do previously. We were all naturally curious about how he’d used it (job ads, report writing, crafting a business case) and as he spoke it was interesting to hear a detailed account of the skills he’s been developing and refining as a result.

What he was really talking about is Prompt Engineering—the process of designing effective prompts for AI systems. It involves crafting the right question or prompt that guides the AI to return meaningful content and I predict this will be a very important skill for Talent Advisors to master. Another way AI can make our lives easier is via AI-assisted messages in LinkedIn Recruiter. At the click of a “draft personalised message” button, a unique message will be crafter to review, edit and send.

From an assessment perspective, there’s emerging pressure to find, hire and develop those skills necessary to maximise AI use across all functional roles. HackerRank found that developing skills assessments to validate and assess this technical talent is also spurring the creation of new assessments with AI-related questions increasing 81% since ChatGPT launched in November 2022. They’ve found that continuing to test more general, conceptional skills (problem solving, machine learning) could lead to a capability shortfall.

With 400 words to use I’ve only scratched the surface here, but I do know that many of the world’s leading companies (Big 4 consulting, Gartner) are throwing a large percentage of their resources at understanding AI better and it feels like something we can’t ignore!

If you’ve enjoyed my musings and would like to stay connected, please reach out to me on LinkedIn.

And that’s a wrap!

IBM to pause hiring for jobs that AI could do

It will be interesting to see whether entire jobs are removed or components of a particular role. In any case, if you’re currently working in job design, get ready to be busy!

ChatGPT and AI are the next worker recruitment and retention game changers

Machine learning will allow hiring mangers to focus on people rather than process- yeow!!!

Bunnings agrees to trial four-day week in landmark union deal 

Slightly off topic but I thought it was an important and relevant inclusion. As AI makes us more productive, will we need to still work a 5-day week?

Helping Recruiters Save Time and Increase Candidate Engagement with AI

With a click of a button mass personalisation of InMail can be done…. coming your way!

Will AI become the New McKinsey?

A deeper dive into the societal pitfalls of AI and implications for Capitalism and a Basic Universal Income.

Will AI fix work?

Microsoft study (9 May 2023) on How AI will create a whole new way of working.

How to construct effective prompts

The 10 best building prompts for crafting powerful AI requests.

Watch: The A.I. Dilemma

This one is if you’re really into the topic and want to go deep with Tristan Harris and Aza Raskin discussing how A.I. capabilities pose catastrophic risks to society, how A.I. companies are deploying without adequate safety measures, and what a post-A.I. world looks like.

AI more likely to hire women than humans are: study

New research has found that women would land more roles in tech if employers used artificial intelligence in the recruitment process.