Se I held premy resume
The social robot Tengai can do a great job. Discrimination and arbitrariness often apply in personnel selection. The selection of the fittest, which exists in nature, is suspended here. A certain distinction can be repulsive and unacceptable. It is that of skin colour, gender, origin and religious or political faith. There may also be a lighter but equally odious distinction. The clothing, the fan base, some details of the appearance. The distinction overwhelms the qualities, the skills. When it comes into effect, a candidate's resume is waste paper. The variations of the distinction are endless.
It is also true that hiring personnel is a very delicate moment in the activity of an organization which must weigh many factors, including those of an emotional and personal nature. Factors that are difficult to predict based on a half-hour conversation.
Who better than an artificial intelligence system can work on predictability and make a correct selection. Can it be programmed to effectively evaluate the candidate's profile and her inclinations, regardless of any other consideration of a discriminatory nature?
Another question. Can the current level of development of artificial intelligence — which certainly can analyze data and build predictions with them, better than any biological team — express an evaluation capacity?
According to two Swedish companies, one specializing in robotics and the other in personnel research and selection, the answer is yes. For this they built and put to work Tengai unbiased, a sort of Amazon Echo with a nice little face, which is able to conduct an impartial personnel selection activity.
Looking for impartiality
As of August 2018 Furhat has partnered with TNG, one of Sweden's largest employment agencies. The goal of this "global partnership", as stated on the TNG Blog, is to "...jointly develop the world's first unbiased recruiting robot".
To this end, the two companies seem to complement each other. Furhat has the technical expertise and robotic platform needed. TNG brings experience in recruitment, as well as the know-how and training ground suitable.
“Part of the process of bringing this vision to life is working with world-leading companies like TNG. We were very inspired by their vision to eradicate bias from the recruiting process. We can give people a better chance to have a suitable career. Employers have a better opportunity to find suitable candidates' — stresses Samer Al Moubayed, CEO of Furhat Robotics.
For the occasion, therefore, the Furhat robot acquired a further connotation: “Tengai unbiased”. “Unbiased” stands for objective, impartial, free from prejudices. The personnel selection sector is not new to a search for greater objectivity, although above all it is incessantly striving to pursue spasmodic efficiency.
It has seen the introduction of automation for some time now, both for the preventive screening of applications and for the management and optimization of personnel. Until now, however, this automation had not gone much beyond the preliminary phase of the selection process or a comparison and analysis of workers, according to countless parameters and metrics.
To a higher level
Edman Källströmer, CEO of TNG, rightly speaks of “higher level”. Formally it refers to requests aimed at meeting and satisfying various needs felt in the field of recruitment. The main ones are impartiality and the reduction (if not the elimination) of discrimination, diversity in the workplace.
Here's how Källströmer explains what he means by taking his agency's work to the next level.
«Collaboration with Furhat Robotics will take impartial recruiting to the next level. We have been working on impartial recruiting for years and have reviewed various AI platforms and robotic solutions. We have ascertained that the product of Furhat it is the best on the market. With Furhat, we can create a process of impartial selection based on skills and a new and more unique candidate experience. It will be an experience that will involve and excite job seekers. The combination will help us improve our ability to find the best candidates for our clients. It will also help us increase diversity in the workplace. It is an essential stage in our journey and our vision aimed at creating a more sustainable labor market".
Indeed, it seems to me that the "upper level" referred to by Källströmer could be found on another plane. Specifically, it pertains to Tengai's ability (still to be verified) to interact with one's interlocutor. Even more, if you like, to interact and at the same time evaluate the candidate, without, however, I add, causing the latter annoyance or, worse, a refusal.
The uniqueness of I held
It is here, as they know well even at TNG, that the singularity of Tengai lies. As Charlotte Ulvros, Chief Experience Officer at TNG remarks:
“This is a totally unique offering, as current AI-related recruiting solutions that the HR world calls robots are actually products of automation. I held is a tangible and advanced social robot with a human interface — which is considered the next step in the world tech». This makes the automaton of Furhat a very peculiar experiment as no one has ever done it before.'
Tengai and the latest generation of robots, social robots, challenge our perception of automatons. They also challenge the stereotyped image of the latter as mere devices enslaved to man. The progress of artificial intelligence continually blurs the line between what is (exclusively) human and what is not (any longer) human.
It is easy to cross over into the discussion relating to the fears aroused by automation and the consequent marginalization of man. However, Tengai is a good example of how far AI has gone in its quest to appropriate portions of humanity. A run-up, after all, that doesn't seem to want to stop. In fact, it combines two aspects, two areas that are completely natural for man, while up to now apparently irreconcilable for machines. That of doing and that of thought, action and emotion.
Beyond data collection
In data collection and analysis, artificial intelligence software has completely supplanted the work of people. However, we are always within the specific competences of a calculation tool.
In an article that appeared some time ago, The Simple Economics of Machine Intelligence, three economists from the University of Toronto have looked at human activities through the “lens of the economy”.
They have thus identified five fundamental elements that represent them. "All human activities - according to the authors — can be described by five high-level components: data, prediction, judgment, action, and outcome.'
Well, the three economists start from the previous wave of innovation, the one that had opened the NewEconomy. This had already made itself responsible for removing the first of the five aforementioned components from the power of man: the collection of data. Data is now largely subject to automation.
Applying the economic categories, they they go on, «The economics of the “New Economy” could be [thus] described at a high level. Digital technology would have resulted in a reduction in the cost of research and communication. This would lead to more research, more communication and more activities that go hand in hand with research and communication. That's essentially what happened."
Now, the new wave of innovation determined by the progress of Artificial Intelligence (machine intelligence) is fundamentally driven by the predictive capabilities of these technologies. These seem to attack the second of the five aforementioned components: forecasting.
Prediction
The analysis of big data will lead to the identification of trends. This ability to mine trends will lead to a new stage in the development of artificial intelligence: the automation of predictions.
The revolution dictated by AI is in fact causing similar effects to the previous transformation brought about by the New Economy. this time, however, it takes place on the side of forecasting.
Therefore, «… economic change will center on a decrease in the cost of forecasting». And that is exactly what is happening. The costs of forecast-based goods and services are rapidly collapsing. The results, well known to economists, are easily "predictable".
“First, we'll start using forecasting to accomplish tasks where we previously didn't. Second, it will increase the value of other things that complement the forecast."
In fact, the predictive capabilities of new technologies have been exported and used in various fields. Many of whom had not previously felt such a need. In essence, the negligible cost of forecasting has transformed the approach to these areas and changed the perspective according to which we observe them and now conceive them.
Consequently, automation is rapidly taking possession of the second of the aforementioned components, precisely forecasting. It is removed from the exclusive prerogative of man.
After all, the rapid and seemingly unstoppable progress of automation is there for all to see. Nonetheless, this process does not seem to cause excessive concern in the eyes of our authors. According to the "lens of the economy", although the value of human prediction is now outclassed by AI, in cost and (increasingly) quality.
These economists believe, therefore, that this could indeed represent aopportunity.
“When the cost of a key input falls, it often affects the value of other inputs. The value goes up for the complementary ones and goes down for the surrogates».
The automation of forecasting, as has already happened in research and communication, could generate an increase in forecasting. Therefore, lead to a major evaluation request.
«… Because the value of human judgment will increase. Using the language of economics, valuation is a complement of forecasting. When the cost of forecasting plummets, the demand for valuation increases."
The evaluation
Will artificial intelligence also become autonomous in evaluation? The little robot Tengai seems to predict it.
Therefore, to distinguish us humans from machines is still our ability to evaluate. Almost a sort of extreme bastion which nevertheless, if it were conquered, would leave very little to separate the human being from the redundancy. Yet we are really sure that technological innovation is not already preparing to attack this last frontier. After all, its limits appear increasingly vague and precarious?
With the progress of AI, the margins of its autonomy widen. An autonomy that from mere operation is increasingly approaching decision-making autonomy. According to some techno-enthusiasts, there is no absolute limit to what AI can and can't do. There is only one limitation dictated by what it is not (yet) able to do. According to others, digital innovation has intrinsic limitations.
However, there is no doubt that the boundary between man and machine, between what belongs to one and what belongs to the other, appears increasingly fluid and uncertain. I am also aware of this our authors:
"The dividing line between evaluation [Judgment] and prediction is not clear: some evaluation tasks will even be reformulated in the form of a series of predictions.
Tengai, with his relational skills, his skills that ultimately also involve evaluation, participates in such a moment of indeterminacy and fluidity. Today it presents itself as a border experiment. Time will tell whether it will remain a mere liminal episode, or whether it will represent an event intended to push forward, once more, the demarcation line that separates human from machine.
