Students and job applicants appear to be early adopters of AI. Many are leveraging AI to write papers, create resumes, answer test questions, and much more. AI support – or AI cheating, depending on how it is used – is a recent trend and it is creating a significant challenge for HR management.

In practical terms, how do recruiters know if resumes or test responses are the applicant’s own work or AI-generated? How can they be sure the candidate they select is the person they appear to be on paper? It is quickly becoming expensive to acquire the expertise and countermeasures to discern between what is real and what is AI.

Is it Real?

Sourcing, recruiting, and hiring qualified job applicants has always been hard. Applicants want to make the best possible impression, leaving HR pros to filter through candidate information in an effort to decipher fact from fiction.

• Are the applicant’s qualifications and credentials true?
• How much of the information provided is authentic or exaggerated?
• Did the candidate actually produce the results listed – or merely participate in them?
• How well do they work with others?
• Can they really perform the job?

Interestingly, these are the same questions HR wants to answer, regardless of AI. Yet, AI intensifies the filtering efforts required.

• Is it real or is it AI?

Answering the Challenge

Authenticity is at the core of effective hiring. HR professionals need the assurance that applicant information is accurate and authentic. There is a growing demand for technology to automate the process of identifying and filtering out fake and AI-generated content. These innovations will continue to shift the advantage of faking back and forth between those who want to evade detection and those who want to catch fakers. This creates a continuous “arms race” of faking.

Whether faking is facilitated by AI or simply the art of human exaggeration or socially desirable responses, filtering-technology is not the only or even best way to discern applicants’ authenticity. Already there are methods in place to minimize the opportunity for faking and cheating. Those methods center around the concept of Make it Real, a practical approach that helps eliminate faking from the hiring process and makes it AI-proof simultaneously.

Make it Real

Rather than looking for new and better ways to detect fakers, why not turn to technology that makes it difficult to fake and cheat in the first place?

To AI-proof your hiring process, Make it Real! Here’s how.

Ensure Job Relevance

Basing hiring decisions on job-relevant data is a high priority for several reasons. A closer alignment between the hiring process and the requirements of the job improves outcomes. A well-designed hiring process should provide an authentic ‘pre-experience’ for both the organization and the applicant. Relevant job data helps applicants and organizations make better-informed decisions. For example, simulation-based tests and work samples replicate real workplace scenarios and require candidates to demonstrate their real problem-solving, decision-making, and interpersonal skills – just like on the job. The complexity and relevance of tools like job simulations make it difficult for applicants to memorize stock answers or use pre-determined strategies to cheat. 

Take a Holistic View

A hundred years ago, factory work was segmented, partitioned, and repetitive. Isolating each step in the production line was a way to create efficiency and consistency. In the hiring process, this would be analogous to concentrating on one skill at a time, such as giving a typing test or math test. However, today’s jobs are much more complex, requiring higher-order thinking. Successfully performing in a job requires a wide variety of actions, skills, and behaviors. Unlike traditional tests that often focus on individual skills or rote memorization, immersive assessments evaluate a range of skills and behaviors – all within the context of the job. A holistic approach guards against cheating and offers the best way for candidates to prove they can actually do the job – combining the entire set of skills and behaviors necessary for job success.

Focus on Performance

Swimming provides a good analogy. Knowing about swimming and actually knowing how to swim are two very different things. While it’s relatively easy to fake knowledge of swimming techniques and safety rules with a quick online search, it’s practically impossible to fake swimming performance if you can’t actually swim. Performance is the best deterrent to AI faking and cheating. Immersive assessment tools like job simulations ensure authenticity by requiring candidates to perform actual job tasks and solve real workplace problems. Just as lifeguards need to prove they can swim and save lives, job candidates must show they can perform key aspects of the job without sinking. Performance always trumps promises in an interview, or AI-generated credentials on a resume. Making it real by eliciting performance ensures the authenticity of applicant responses, mitigating faking and cheating.

Engage Candidates with Realism

Just as candidate authenticity is critical to HR professionals, job applicants are also looking for authenticity and transparency from potential employers. Fortunately, more organizations are recognizing the importance of the candidate experience and are creating candidate-centric hiring practices that engage talent and build realistic expectations about the work. To be an employer of choice, the first impression applicants have of an organization starts with the hiring process. If it is vague, mysterious, or invasive, it will create a negative experience and discourage applicants. An engaging, job-relevant, and realistic hiring process is viewed much more positively by applicants, helping organizations attract and retain the best talent. Making it Real is just as important for applicants as it is for HR professionals.

Ready to AI-Proof Your hiring process?

Hire With Simulation-Based Assessments

While authenticity is critical to informed hiring, it is often illusive. What candidates say, whether in person or on paper, may not always reflect their true experience or abilities. And with the rise of AI, job seekers can now embellish or cheat more effectively than ever. Remember, however, that genuine competence is best demonstrated through real performance. By incorporating job simulations or work samples into you hiring process, you’ll gain a cost-effective and efficient way to evaluate candidates quickly, accurately, fairly, and objectively.

You can’t fake a simulation – the situations are real and the performance is real.

To learn how to mitigate the risk of AI cheating and design a better hiring process, contact  us here or call 888.332.0648.