Singapore, 4 August 2023 – A recent study, jointly conducted by National University of Singapore (NUS) Business School, International Institute for Management Development (IIMD) and The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, has revealed that job applicants opine the use of AI in selection and recruitment process as untrustworthy. They perceive the algorithmic decision-making in the recruitment process as less fair compared to human-assisted methods. This is amid the rapid adoption of AI technology by Human Resource (HR) departments to identify and hire suitable job applicants.

Professor Jayanth Narayanan from the Department of Management Organisation at NUS Business School, said “There are many benefits that AI can bring to organisations. While it can automate any tasks traditionally done by HR, it cannot replace the human touch and interactions that are core to the HR function including recruitment exercises. The distrust of AI in providing a fair hiring assessment is prevalent. Hence, we hope our study can guide organisations to exercise caution when adopting AI in their HR recruitment processes as it may potentially lead to brand and reputational risks.”

The study was conceived to examine the potential challenges of AI-enabled decision making in the HR hiring process. Over 1,000 participants of different nationalities were involved in the research, comprising candidates who had experienced both successful and unsuccessful outcomes in an AI-enabled hiring process. They were involved in four scenario-based experiments, where the first two experiments studied how the use of algorithm affects perception of fairness amongst job applicants in the hiring process, while the remaining two sought to understand the reasons behind the lower fairness score.

Algorithms fail to recognise uniqueness of candidates

According to the findings, job applicants perceived a higher degree of fairness when a human is involved in the resume screening and hiring decision process as compared to a fully algorithmic system. This observation remains consistent even amongst the candidates in the study who had received a positive application outcome in an algorithm-drive recruitment process.

The disparity in perceived fairness is largely attributed to AI’s inability in identifying the candidates’ unique characteristics, as compared to human recruiters who are better equipped to evaluate qualitative information that makes each candidate distinctive. AI-enabled processes can overlook important qualities and potentially screen out good candidates. This challenges the popular notion that algorithms can provide fairer evaluations of candidates and eliminate human biases.

A participant in the study shared, “I feel that a computer programme could not choose an employment candidate as well as a human could. I feel that the emotions I put into applying for the position were wasted since computers can not relate to emotions in the same way humans can”.

In addition, there are potential legal and ethical risks involved in the use of algorithms to optimise HR recruitment.  These may include privacy loss, lack of transparency, obfuscation of accountability and potential loss of human oversight. Hence, organisations should consider prioritising the involvement of human recruiters in the hiring process, whenever possible, despite the advantages of algorithms in improving efficiency and productivity in HR management.

The study has been published in the Journal of Business Ethics.

For media enquiries, please contact:

 

Yvonne Chan
Head, Corporate Communications
NUS Business School
National University of Singapore
Tel: +65 91117627
Email: Yvonnechan@nus.edu.sg

Natalie Law
Assistant Manager, Corporate Communications
NUS Business School
National University of Singapore
Tel: +65 6601 1206
Email: natalielaw@nus.edu.sg

About National University of Singapore (NUS)

The National University of Singapore (NUS) is Singapore’s flagship university, which offers a global approach to education, research and entrepreneurship, with a focus on Asian perspectives and expertise. We have 16 colleges, faculties and schools across three campuses in Singapore, with more than 40,000 students from 100 countries enriching our vibrant and diverse campus community. We have also established our NUS Overseas Colleges programme in more than 15 cities around the world.

Our multidisciplinary and real-world approach to education, research and entrepreneurship enables us to work closely with industry, governments and academia to address crucial and complex issues relevant to Asia and the world. Researchers in our faculties, research centres of excellence, corporate labs and more than 30 university-level research institutes focus on themes that include energy; environmental and urban sustainability; treatment and prevention of diseases; active ageing; advanced materials; risk management and resilience of financial systems; Asian studies; and Smart Nation capabilities such as artificial intelligence, data science, operations research and cybersecurity.

For more information on NUS, please visit www.nus.edu.sg.

About NUS Business School

The National University of Singapore (NUS) Business School is known for providing management thought leadership from an Asian perspective, enabling its students and corporate partners to leverage global knowledge and Asian insights.

The school has consistently received top rankings in the Asia-Pacific region by independent publications and agencies, such as The Financial Times, Economist Intelligence Unit, and QS Top MBA, in recognition of the quality of its programmes, faculty research and graduates.

The school is accredited by AACSB International (Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business) and EQUIS (European Quality Improvement System), signifies that the school has met the highest standards for business education. The school is also a member of the Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC), Executive MBA Council, Partnership in Management (PIM) and CEMS (Community of European Management Schools).

For more information, please visit bschool.nus.edu.sg, or go to the BIZBeat portal, which showcases the School’s thought leadership.