Michael Scott, the protagonist from the US version of The Office, is using an AI recruiter to hire a receptionist. The text-based system asks applicants five questions that delve into how they responded to past work situations, including dealing with difficult colleagues and juggling competing work demands. Potential employees type their answers into a chat-style program that resembles a responsive help desk. The real – and unnerving – power of AI then kicks in, sending a score and traits profile to the employer, and a personality report to the applicant. This demonstration, by Melbourne-based startup Sapia.ai,

Philipp Schmitt & AT&T Laboratories Cambridge / Better Images of AI / Data flock (faces) / Licenced by CC-BY 4.0 Recent years have seen the emergence of AI tools marketed as an answer to lack of diversity in the workforce, from use of chatbots and CV scrapers to line up prospective candidates, through to analysis software for video interviews. Those behind the technology claim it cancels out human biases against gender and ethnicity during recruitment, instead using algorithms that read vocabulary, speech patterns and even facial micro-expressions to assess huge pools of job applicants for the right personality type and'culture fit'. However, in a new report published in Philosophy and Technology, researchers from Cambridge's Centre for Gender Studies argue these claims make some uses of AI in hiring little better than an'automated pseudoscience' reminiscent of physiognomy or phrenology: the discredited beliefs that personality can be deduced from facial features or skull shape. They say it is a dangerous example of'technosolutionism': turning to technology to provide quick fixes for deep-rooted discrimination issues that require investment and changes to company culture. In fact, the researchers have worked with a team of Cambridge computer science undergraduates to debunk these new hiring techniques by building an AI tool modelled on the technology, available online.

It's safe to say that AI recruitment tools are a major topic in the HR space right now. While they're praised for their ability to reduce the time and expense involved in the recruiting and hiring process, currently available AI is also notably imperfect. As smart as current AI can seem, it's also easy to manipulate. There are countless websites and forums devoted to helping candidates game the system and zoom right past the AI's algorithms. Their known propensity to pick up and then deploy ethnic and racial biases is troubling, to say the least.

As the experience economy gathers pace, diversity of thought and authenticity are now playing a crucial role in improving a business's bottom line. Ensuring that your workforce reflects the audience it serves is a huge step forward in the name of progress. But can tech help us shake our bad habits? Despite our best attempts to create a more productive work environment where innovative ideas will flourish, it appears some human traits have been holding us back. For example, the financial cost of a bad hire is estimated at more than US$18,700.

A recruiter contacted me recently via email and encouraged me to apply for several entry-level roles in communications. Why communications, when my background clearly reflects a long career in HR? And why were those positions located in Georgia, when I live in New York City? Curious, I replied to the email explaining that I was not looking for employment, and subsequently learned that the email had been sent by an algorithm that determined I was an entry-level millennial living in Savannah. This inaccurate profiling was formed by scans of my recent Twitter and Facebook posts, which described my new (pro-bono) role handling communications for a first-time senate candidate in Georgia.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is disrupting every industry, and the recruitment market is no exception. By lowering the cost of prediction, AI offers cheaper, faster, more efficient ways to connect people to jobs, as well as the promise of unlocking human potential. This is a big opportunity. In a world where most people are unhappy with their careers and many organizations complain about their talent gaps - for example, a recent ManpowerGroup report noted that 40% of global companies are experiencing critical talent shortages, the highest figure in a decade - technology can help us bridge the gap between supply and demand and make the job market less inefficient, just like dating apps have managed in the market of love. However, as with any technological innovation it is important to understand the ethical implications of using AI for attracting and selecting employees.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is disrupting every industry, and the recruitment market is no exception. By lowering the cost of prediction, AI offers cheaper, faster, more efficient ways to connect people to jobs, as well as the promise of unlocking human potential. This is a big opportunity. In a world where most people are unhappy with their careers and many organizations complain about their talent gaps - for example, a recent ManpowerGroup report noted that 40% of global companies are experiencing critical talent shortages, the highest figure in a decade - technology can help us bridge the gap between supply and demand and make the job market less inefficient, just like dating apps have managed in the market of love. However, as with any technological innovation it is important to understand the ethical implications of using AI for attracting and selecting employees.

Turkish lacks gendered pronouns: The single word "o" does the work that in English is done by "he," "she," or "it." That linguistic quirk poses a challenge for machine-translation tools: to render a Turkish sentence into English, a tool like Google Translate must guess its subject's gender -- and in the process, often betrays its own built-in biases. For example, Google translates the Turkish sentence "o bir doktor" as "he is a doctor" and the grammatically identical "o bir hem?ire" as "she is a nurse." Google's algorithms similarly assume that a president or entrepreneur is male, but that a nanny, teacher or prostitute is female. Even character traits come with assumed genders: A hardworking person is judged to be male, while a lazy one is assumed to be female.