5 Interesting Ways an AI-powered ATS Helps You Avoid Bias When Building Winning Teams

As humans, we can all be subject to bias. And most of the time, we’re not even aware of it.

Now, if you’re looking to build a thriving and winning team, you need to make sure you’re not side-stepping into your own beliefs or judgments. There’s no other way to sugarcoat it – but if we only rely on humans to fix bias, we may never get there.

Luckily (and for everyone’s sake), recruiters can leverage an AI-powered ATS to put bias at bay.

So how can an ATS really curb bias in the hiring process?

You got questions, we got answers!

Let’s dig into them together, shall we?

Write fair and inclusive job posts

Your job ad is typically the first thing that candidate lay their eyes on. In fact, it’s normally the first touchpoint with candidates. It’s not uncommon for us to see job descriptions that are ingrained with gender implications. Where the job titles are purely gendered.

“Fireman”, “Chairman”, “Councilman”, and so on.

As a result, this can deter women away from applying to such job positions, since they’re strictly tailored for men.
On the bright side, an AI-powered ATS puts an end to that.

An ATS like EVA-REC can help you write job descriptions that are accurate and bias-free. In essence, the ATS brings more structure to the way job descriptions are created and maintained. All you have to do is simply write the job title for the position, and the ATS will instantly generate the skill sets required for the job – in seconds!

It also autofill’s the skills section based on emerging jobs and up-to-date job requirements in the marketplace. Therefore, allowing you to post accurate job descriptions that are gender-neutral and attract the right candidates for the job.

Review resumes blind

In the past, candidate resumes would fall into the hands of hiring managers. Which all too often would lead to unconscious bias. Especially if the hiring manager was swayed by the candidate’s picture, ethnicity, race, or background.

One way an ATS can combat this issue is through “blind applications.”

What are blind applications?

Blind applications remove details that may lead to biased decisions. These factors could be related to race, class, age, and gender. The candidate’s name, for example, may give the manager a hint about their socio-economic background. Which may sway the manager’s decision to move the candidate forward or not.

Now you may be wondering how it actually works. Well, the process is fairly simple. The ATS removes such information to make it easier for managers and talent acquisition teams to make objective decisions.
For starters, there are many ATSs remove images from resumes to eliminate favoritism. They also redact names to stop recruiters from inferring the candidate’s age, ethnicity, or gender. Plus, they can remove the candidate’s university name to prevent stereotype bias as well.

Source candidates and screen resumes fairly

Screening resumes is an inevitable part of recruitment. While it may be super exhausting and entices recruiters to pull their hairs out – there’s no escaping from it. Since a single vacancy can bring in over 200 resumes, the screening process is no walk-in the park. Especially when you’re not armed with the tools, resources, or ATS you need to get the job done.

Fortunately, an AI-powered ATS allows you to seamlessly source candidates from a variety of job boards, channels, and niche sites in a single click.

For example, our award-winning ATS allows recruiters to post job ads to 2,000+ job boards to reach a diverse pool of talent fast.

After the resumes start flowing in, the ATS also allows recruiters to screen candidates more efficiently. For example, let’s say a recruiter is looking to hire a young, enthusiastic Sales Representative, who’s fluent in English or Spanish. The ATS allows these recruiters to assign weights to the criteria most important to them. After assigning the weights, the recruiters will notice that each candidate will get a certain matching percentage. This percentage signifies how close the candidate’s qualifications match the job requirements. Not only that, but it can also help you, rank candidates, in order of qualification! Therefore, helping you make your first round of screening 80% faster!

Facilitates collaborative hiring

With remote work being the new norm, it’s now super challenging for teams to collaborate and communicate the same way they used to. In the past, they may huddle together at the water cooler, brainstorm ideas in the meeting room, or meet up at lunch to discuss their tasks.

The good news is that an ATS can still put collaboration at the heart of your hiring. It allows you to invite your teammates, specify their permissions on the platform, and assign their tasks with a few clicks. Not only that, but it also allows teammates to discuss candidates in real-time, leave comments, share feedback, and rate applications all in one centralized place.

As a result, with a more collaborative approach, every hiring decision is made collectively together, as a team, to mitigate bias. It also promotes more transparency and objectivity when it comes to recruiting top talent. Simply because the ATS provides one common platform for managers and teams to share their valuable thoughts, opinions, and comments for every candidate.

Plus, with an ATS like EVA-REC recruiters can create and invite their teammates across different departments such as Sales, Marketing, or Customer Success to support them in the hiring process. These teammates can be assigned different tasks and given specific permissions throughout the hiring process. Even if everyone is working remotely. Allowing them all to reach a consensus faster and make the right hiring decision, without inflicting any bias.

Leverage unbiased data and analytics

Want to mitigate bias? We have one word for you: data.

Data doesn’t lie. AI doesn’t lie. Numbers don’t lie.

Jumble all that together and you’ve got an AI-powered ATS that can help you tap into accurate, bias-free, and advanced recruiting analytics.

Through real-time analytics, you can easily measure important recruitment metrics and spot bottlenecks with a single glance. The ATS ultimately gathers various information from the candidate’s sources, applications, and job postings to break down all the information into useful analytics.

For example, with an intuitive ATS, recruiters can get elaborative insights that improve their talent acquisition decisions. They can also get fruitful insights on candidates, team members, jobs, questionnaires, and events with an advanced analytics feature. Plus, recruiters can also track and get an overview of candidate sources, the total number of candidates disqualified and the candidates hired. They can also get deeper insights on the time saved, cost saved, time-to-disqualify, and time-to-hire. With objective, accurate, and unbiased data at hand – recruiters can inevitably reduce hiring bias once and for all.

Takeaway thoughts

Not only does AI expose bias in your hiring – but it also allows you to act on it. Ultimately, an ATS powered by AI reduces and diminishes irrational biases to help you seamlessly hire diverse teams with full confidence.

Looking to recruit winning teams and keep bias out of your hiring process?

EVA-REC is an award-winning and AI-powered ATS that automates and improves the hiring process with AI technology. It arms leading enterprises with world-class features that help them create a rich and immersive hiring experience for recruiters and candidates alike. With EVA-REC, companies can drive merit-based, objective, and fair hiring practices that minimize bias, without dehumanizing the hiring process.

Seeing is believing! Request a free demo of EVA-REC and see how it can help you recruit top talent today, tomorrow, and beyond. 

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