The Screening Room — AI in HR Tech

Practical frameworks, deep analysis, and expert commentary on AI in HR Tech. Weekly insights for HR professionals navigating the AI transformation.

Your ATS just became your AI recruiter

For years, AI in recruiting meant a bolt-on. This week the system of record went agentic. When the ATS becomes the recruiter, build vs. buy stops being a procurement question and becomes an architecture decision.

Your retention strategy is running on lag data

Every significant voluntary departure looks obvious in hindsight. The performance reviews that trailed off, the meeting invitations that went unaccepted, the Slack messages that got shorter. The data was there — it just wasn't being read. AI changes that equation entirely, and the implications are more complex than the vendor brochures suggest.

Enterprise AI recruiting tools weren't built for you

The AI hiring content you're consuming is mostly written with enterprise buyers in mind. Eightfold at $50K a year. HireVue serving a third of the Fortune 100. Paradox contracts that start at $25K. That advice doesn't translate to a 500-person company — and trying to apply it will cost you money and credibility with your leadership team.

Evaluating AI hiring tools on the wrong criteria

Most companies evaluate AI hiring tools the same way they evaluate any SaaS product: demo, feature comparison, price negotiation. That process will get you a vendor with a good sales team. It won't tell you whether their AI is going to create a discrimination lawsuit in 18 months. The evaluation criteria most companies use are precisely backwards.

The lawsuit that every HR leader needs to understand

A single federal case in California has the potential to establish liability standards for AI hiring tools that will govern the entire industry. Most HR leaders have heard the name. Very few understand what's actually being argued — or why the theory being tested could make every AI vendor contract in your filing cabinet a legal exposure.

Your job descriptions are costing you qualified candidates

Most companies spend thousands of dollars optimizing where they post jobs and almost nothing on what those job posts actually say. That's backwards. The words in your job description are filtering candidates before a single resume is reviewed — and for most organizations, they're doing it in ways you'd never consciously endorse.

Your next great hire is already on payroll

The most expensive hire you'll ever make is the one you didn't need to make. Companies have been pouring budget into external recruiting while sitting on untapped talent that already knows the culture, the systems, and the customers. AI is finally making it possible to fix that.

The AI hiring ROI data your CFO actually wants to see

The HR function has been trying to earn a seat at the revenue table for decades. AI is the most compelling business case the function has ever had — but most HR leaders are presenting it wrong, with the wrong metrics, to the wrong audience. Here's how to build a business case that gets funded.