Insights into the recruitment of AI specialists
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Finding and recruiting suitable talent in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) is a major challenge for many companies. Recently, Lucas Senzel, Director HXM-Transformation, and Alina Hodkin, Consultant HXM-Transformation, discussed this topic with companies at the Innovation Park Artificial Intelligence (IPAI) in Heilbronn and presented exciting and promising approaches. They present the most important insights in their follow-up report.
The fact that we are now talking about an employee: inside market is nothing new. The staff shortage affects almost all sectors and occupational groups. In the AI environment, the fact that this area is still being developed and there are hardly any fully trained talents makes things even more difficult. In the period from January to April 2023 alone, German employers were looking for around 44,000 AI specialists(Welt, 2023).
A precarious situation, especially for those who want to participate in the predicted benefits such as annual productivity boosts of 0.2 to 3.3 percent through (generative) AI by 2040(McKinsey, 2023). The 26 or so companies and partners of the IPAI are also aware of this. According to Handelsblatt, the Innovation Park in Heilbronn could soon become the largest AI center in Europe. .
During our discussions with the participants, we identified challenges and developed valuable solutions. You can read some of them here:
Challenges in the recruitment of AI specialists
- Suboptimal recruiting processes: The process is often not adapted to the target group. The duration is also unsatisfactory – by the time specialists receive an answer, they have usually already decided on another company.
- Lack of an internal community: Target groups with a technical focus in particular want to talk about current developments in their field and share the latest solutions. To this end, companies should create opportunities for exchange.
- Difficult evaluation of practical skills: It is difficult to assess skills on the basis of CVs and traditional job interviews.
Solution approaches for optimized recruitment of AI specialists
- Specialized HR managers per target group: We know from past projects that this critical target group wants to talk to experts in their field right from the start. HR managers therefore need in-depth knowledge in order to be able to answer technical questions. It is recommended to conduct the initial meeting directly with representatives of the target group. An interviewer CV can also arouse additional curiosity about the interview and projects and allay fears.
- Building an IT/AI-friendly community: A first step towards building a community can be a so-called “anchor hire”. This means hiring a high-caliber AI expert who acts as a kind of magnet to attract a broad network of AI specialists and develop a strong launch strategy. The possibility of an overarching exchange with experts should also be communicated right at the start of onboarding. Both internal (e.g. regular exchange formats such as TECH Talks) and external networking opportunities should be established here.
- Evaluation of skills: Concrete case studies that are similar to the tasks in the company in order to check the candidate’s procedures or the question about past projects and previous experience make the evaluation of skills easier.
Would you like to find out more? We look forward to an exchange on this topic.
