AI In Hiring: Where Automation Should Stop, and Humans Begin

Hiring has always involved a tension between efficiency and humanity, but artificial intelligence is pushing that tension into new territory. AI can now help screen resumes, identify candidates, generate job descriptions and automate communication. According to LinkedIn’s 2025 Future of Recruiting report, 37% of recruiting organizations are actively integrating or experimenting with generative AI, while 73% of talent-acquisition professionals say AI will change the way organizations hire.

That makes the question less about whether companies should use AI and more about where responsibility belongs when technology affects someone’s opportunity. Members of the Senior Executive HR Think Tank bring perspectives spanning talent acquisition, organizational leadership, career coaching, workplace culture and HR technology.

Across their responses, one principle emerges: AI can take on more of the process, but companies cannot automate accountability.

“If the machine screens out every candidate with a career gap, no one gets to call that a system error.”

– Christopher Bylone, Principal Strategist and Founder of Innovation Unbiased

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Make the Human Handoff Explicit

Christopher Bylone, Principal Strategist and Founder of Innovation Unbiased, sees the human handoff as something companies should make explicit rather than leave to chance.

“Publish the handoff,” Bylone says. “Candidates deserve to know exactly where the machine stops and a person starts, and once a person owns the decision, that person owns the message.”

The problem, he says, is not necessarily automation itself. It is what happens when companies allow technology to replace the human interaction at the point when candidates have invested the most time and effort.

“The ugliest version of this is common,” Bylone says. “A hiring manager spends four hours with a finalist, three interviews, a panel presentation, then lets an automated template send the no at 6:47 on a Friday.” The screening, he says, “was never the insult. The disappearing act was.”

That final interaction deserves more attention because it may be the only part of the hiring process most candidates ever experience.

“Rejection is the only part of your process the majority of candidates will ever experience,” Bylone says. “It is the product. Design it that way.”

For Bylone, responsibility also remains with the people who choose and deploy the technology. “A human wrote the criteria, approved the model, and chose to let it decide,” he says. “If the machine screens out every candidate with a career gap, no one gets to call that a system error.” It reflects choices made in designing and approving the process.

His standard for the human role is straightforward: “AI can tell someone they were not selected. Only a human can tell someone why.”

Put Human Judgment Before the Decision

Britton Bloch, Vice President, Global Talent Acquisition Strategy and Head of Recruiting at Navy Federal Credit Union, puts the threshold earlier in the process, saying human involvement should come into play before an AI-influenced decision significantly affects a candidate’s opportunity.

“Screening tools may inform judgment, but rejection should remain subject to substantive human review,” she says.

That review requires more than simply having a person approve an AI-generated recommendation. The reviewer must understand both the role and the technology’s limitations, examine the relevant evidence and have authority to “change, defer or escalate the decision.” Bloch’s approach is consistent with the NIST AI Risk Management Framework, which emphasizes managing AI risks throughout design, development, deployment, use and evaluation.

Bloch also emphasizes giving candidates ways to correct inaccurate information, request accommodations and provide evidence of transferable skills.

“A human rubber stamp is not human judgment,” she adds.

“Once we ask someone to invest that time and engage with us personally, we owe them a human response.”

– Tracy Jackson, President and CEO of My HR Confidant

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Treat AI As Delegation, Not Accountability

Tracy Jackson, President and CEO of My HR Confidant, approaches the issue through responsibility.

“Tasks can be delegated, but responsibility cannot. That applies whether we delegate to another person, a vendor or AI,” Jackson says.

Her threshold for human interaction is straightforward.

“If a candidate has interviewed with people from your company, they deserve to hear from a person when the process ends,” she says. “Once we ask someone to invest that time and engage with us personally, we owe them a human response.”

Jackson also emphasizes that accountability includes evaluating the technology itself. Employers should examine whether names, schools, addresses, affiliations, disabilities, religion or other information could influence screening. They should also consider whether employment gaps connected to caregiving, childbirth, disability or other life circumstances are being unfairly penalized. 

“AI can improve efficiency, but it cannot replace accountability. We can delegate some tasks to technology; we cannot delegate responsibility for the outcome,” Jackson says.

Match Human Involvement to the Stakes

Dr. Curtis Odom, Managing Partner at Prescient Strategists and Executive Professor at Northeastern University’s D’Amore-McKim School of Business, also sees consequence as the deciding factor.

“Companies owe candidates a human response when an automated decision materially affects their opportunity,” Odom says, particularly when AI recommends rejection based on assessments, interviews or inferred characteristics.

AI can identify patterns and organize information, he says, but employers remain responsible for ensuring decisions are “fair, explainable and job relevant.”

Candidates should also have a meaningful way to question an automated outcome, correct inaccurate information and request human review when appropriate.

“The greater the consequence of the decision, the greater the obligation for human judgment and transparency,” Odom says.

Let Respect Increase With Candidate Investment

Dr. Jonathan H. Westover, Educator and Futurist, Founder and CEO of Human Capital Innovations, draws the line according to how much a candidate has invested. Utah Valley University’s current faculty profile confirms Westover’s academic and consulting roles.

“After initial resume screening, automation is reasonable,” Westover says. “But once a candidate completes multiple interview rounds, submits work samples or reaches final stages, they deserve human feedback.”

That investment includes more than hours on a calendar. Candidates have also invested “emotional energy,” he says, making an impersonal automated rejection increasingly difficult to justify later in the process.

Westover offers a practical test for employers:

“If you’d feel uncomfortable telling someone face-to-face ‘a machine decided you weren’t worth our time,’ that’s your answer.”

A brief call or personalized email from a hiring manager may cost little, he says, while acknowledging the candidate’s effort and dignity.

Don’t Automate Away the First Impression of Culture

Nicole Cable, Chief People and Experience Officer and founder of C3 Health, expands the issue from candidate courtesy to organizational culture.

“The question I would ask is not simply when a candidate deserves a human response, but when technology begins replacing a human responsibility,” Cable says.

She welcomes AI’s ability to manage volume, identify qualifications, schedule interviews and reduce administrative burden. But there is a boundary.

“When a person has invested meaningful time, shared their story, completed assessments, or sat across from someone in an interview, we should not outsource the final act of respect to an algorithm,” she says.

Hiring is also often a candidate’s first real experience of an organization’s culture.

“Candidates are learning who you are long before they become employees,” Cable says.

Her recommendation is to use technology to create more room for human interaction, not less.

“Use AI to make recruiting better and give recruiters more capacity to connect with people,” she says. “Do not use it as permission to disconnect from them.”

Give Candidates a Better Ending

Amy Douglas, Chief of Culture and Connection at LEVATA Human Performance, agrees that the interview stage marks a meaningful boundary.

“Once a candidate has progressed into the interview process,” Douglas says, “they deserve more than an automated rejection. They deserve a human response.”

At LEVATA, that response can include “a brief feedback conversation.” Douglas views caring, candid feedback as “a gift” because it can help someone grow even when it does not change the hiring decision.

Her larger question is one HR leaders can apply to every automated process:

“What experience do we want someone to have when they walk away from our organization?”

She says the answer reveals something about the organization’s culture and values.

Keep Candidates Informed Even When the Answer Is No

Dr. Kyle Elliott, Tech Career Coach and Executive Coach at CaffeinatedKyle.com, offers a candidate-side perspective informed by his work with senior managers and executives.

“The more time a company asks of a candidate, the more human its response needs to be,” Elliott says. “For example, an application merits a timely update, while multiple rounds of interviews deserve a human response.”

Elliott also makes an important distinction around so-called ghosting. Candidates may describe a lack of response as ghosting, but he pushes back on that characterization when no live human has engaged with them.

Once human interaction has occurred, however, expectations change.

That does not mean every rejected candidate needs extensive feedback. Elliott notes that candidates who receive feedback often want the decision reversed, even when another applicant was genuinely the stronger fit.

Companies can still improve the experience by providing automated status updates.

“AI can send those automatically, so candidates are never waiting on a recruiter to click a button in the ATS,” Elliott says.

Remember That Candidate Experience Is Culture

Gigi Garcia, Founder and CEO of HR Couch, connects the hiring experience directly to the employee experience.

“Once a candidate has invested meaningful time in interviews, assessments or conversations with an organization, I believe they have earned a human response,” Garcia says.

She warns against allowing technology to become “a shield between companies and people.”

The candidate experience, she says, is also the employee experience before employment begins. How an organization treats someone when it no longer needs something reveals as much about its culture as how it treats the person it ultimately hires.

“AI can automate the process,” Garcia says. “Accountability, empathy and respect still belong to people.”

“The real test isn’t whether AI can automate a step. It’s whether automating that step creates a candidate experience the organization would be comfortable attaching its employer brand to.”

– Tyler Crebar, Founder and CEO of Crebar Career Consulting

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Use Automation To Create More Human Capacity

Tyler Crebar, Founder and CEO of Crebar Career Consulting, closes the discussion with a practical test for HR leaders.

A human response is warranted, he says, once companies invest “meaningful human effort” in the hiring process.

Using AI to screen applications or automate routine communication can make recruiting more efficient, particularly when organizations receive thousands of applications. But Crebar says that efficiency should create more capacity for recruiters to engage with candidates rather than eliminate those interactions.

“The real test isn’t whether AI can automate a step,” he says. “It’s whether automating that step creates a candidate experience the organization would be comfortable attaching its employer brand to.”

What Leaders Can Do With This Right Now

• Define the human handoff before deploying AI. Candidates should know when technology is supporting the process and when a person assumes responsibility for the outcome.
• Match human involvement to the stakes. The greater the consequence for a candidate, the stronger the need for meaningful human judgment and transparency.
• Do not confuse human approval with human judgment. A recruiter who accepts an automated recommendation is not necessarily providing meaningful oversight.
• Validate the technology, not just the outcome. Organizations should understand how their AI tools work, what limitations they have and what risks they may introduce.
• Increase communication as candidates invest more time. Automated updates can keep candidates informed, while interviews, assessments and work samples create a stronger expectation of human interaction.
• Give candidates a path to challenge errors. Correction rights, accommodation processes and meaningful human review become particularly important when automated decisions materially affect opportunity.
• Use automation to create recruiter capacity. Technology can reduce administrative work while giving recruiters more time for judgment, communication and relationship-building.
• Treat the candidate experience as an extension of culture. The way an organization handles rejection can shape its employer brand the same way it welcomes a new hire can.
• Ask whether the experience reflects the employer brand. If an organization would not want its name attached to the automated interaction, the process may need more human involvement.
• Keep accountability with people. Technology can support a hiring decision, but organizations remain responsible for how their systems are designed, evaluated and used.

The Human Standard Still Matters

The most important hiring decisions are not necessarily the ones that require the most technology. They are the moments when an organization has to decide how much judgment, explanation and care a person should receive.

That makes the human role less about preserving every traditional recruiting task and more about deliberately designing the points where people add value. Leaders can automate administrative work and use AI to manage scale, but they also need to establish clear expectations for when recruiters and hiring managers step in, what they review and how they communicate with candidates.

In the end, an AI-enabled hiring process says something about the organization behind it. The technology may shape the process, but the standards leaders set for judgment, transparency and respect determine the experience people take away from it.