Recruitment entering a new age as AI shifts business needs

The rise of artificial intelligence is re-shaping the job market in Scotland and around the world in more ways than one, with the technology creating an effective period of ‘reindustrialisation’.

Change Recruitment

The latest technology is being adopted at pace across almost every industry, as companies look to streamline workloads which increasingly sophisticated AI agents can handle.

This has already led to job losses at a number of firms where low-level roles can be effectively replaced by machines, while the biggest areas of growth have come in more blue collar manufacturing and engineering roles, as well as industries where manual skills are a greater necessity.

And it has created a monumental shift in the process of recruitment, with jobs now routinely getting hundreds of applicants and a growing concern about how to validate the skills and experience of candidates, as well as greater emphasis from employers on AI literacy.

The Scotland 500 data shows that there has been a net increase in jobs created with 267 companies (58.8%) growing their headcount over the last 12 months, while 161 (35.5%) cut their headcount. Just 26 companies (5.7%) included in the figures kept a flat headcount.

The biggest job creator was Scottish Power UK, which added 2926 jobs, an increase of 45% on the previous year. GXO Logistics was in second spot for year-on-year employment growth, adding a totla of 1,794 employees to its books.

Scott Taylor, Director of Accountancy and Financial Services with Change Recruitment, started in the industry more than 20 years ago and said he was seeing perhaps the biggest upheaval in the recruitment market in his lifetime.

“This technology feels like a recruitment reindustrialisation,” he said. “There are still vacancies – AI is replacing certain roles within professional services, and there is a big drive towards automation, so the roles and the required skills are shifting to that idea of reviewing and challenging information, being that second pair of eyes.

“So the number of vacancies is still large but the type of roles have changed slightly.

“A good example is Barclays, who have cut 5000 jobs by investing heavily in AI, with these bots coming in to do traditional call centre roles. That means they now need maybe one person instead of five, with the value of that person there to review the work of the machines.

“That is the challenge that people are going to have – are they skilled and equipped for a market that reinvents itself every six months? AI feels exactly like Excel did 20 years ago – everyone uses it, everyone thinks they are an expert but what skills do they really have?

“So AI literacy is probably the most valuable skill any candidate could add to their armoury.”

While not directly linked to AI, the biggest job cuts recorded in the Scotland 500 data were seen at the Bank of Scotland, which lost 3,991 roles, a 19.3% reduction on the previous year.

The biggest percentage loss came at meat supplier Scotbeef, which lost 458 roles, a decrease of 45.8%, a result linked to its loss of a major supermarket supply contract. Difficulties in the Scottish beef industry also led to a large percentage drop in roles at J.W. Galloway, which reduced its headcount by 521, a drop of 42.3%.

Over five years, the biggest growth seen was actually in recruitment, with Venesky-Brown Recruitment growing its workforce by 502% in that period, taking its headcount from 189 to 1138. Edinburgh Airport saw seeing its workforce grow from 500 to 958, a 92% increase.

“The areas that we still see in demand are renewables and energy transition, as well as engineering,” he said. “Whatever your political views, the opening up of the Jackdaw gas field and the push for more oil and gas sites will mean a greater need for engineers.

“Within life sciences there is a need for people that can come in and use new technologies and, more broadly, there are growing opportunities around cyber security and technology, and the need for firms to be one step ahead of the technology.

“So it’s a pretty robust market. There are still opportunities out there but the types of roles that are being hired are slightly different.”

As to what the future holds for the job market, Scott admitted the rapid change of advanced technology.

H e said the wider global economic uncertainty, made it hard to say what the next 12 months would look like.

“It’s quite intangible because it’s dependent on too many factors at the moment – not just the economy but the adoption of technology,” he said.

“Some companies will shed jobs after investing heavily in technology, but there are other employers that find they cannot do that, they maybe don’t have the budget to embrace that in the same way.

“And then there will be the newer types of roles that exist in oversight.

“Whatever happens, there does needto be a big piece of work around reskilling people towards that AI literacy, to give people the confidence in using the technology.”

Candidates lost because of AI bots

Verifying the skills and suitability of candidates in the age of AI is the biggest challenge facing recruiters.

Typically job adverts are now receiving upwards of 100 to 200 applicants, and many will have CV and cover letters that make the candidates sound like a perfect match for the job.

Unfortunately, many of them will come from people who have no interest in, or perhaps even knowledge of, the job they have applied for, with AI agents often set up to apply for any role..

“It is a real problem,” admits Scott. “It is scary sometimes, the volume we are seeing, and it clogs up the process. It also reinforces that idea of AI literacy being vital, as candidates need to know how to use the tools so they can ensure their CV gets past the AI filters being used to tackle this volume problem.”

He also agreed that there was a concern good candidates were being overlooked as a result of the sheer volume of applications.

“People are being left behind because they don’t know how to navigate this new landscape, and so their intangible qualities – the things they would bring to a role that could be really desirable for an employer – are getting lost because that’s where AI bots fail

Five key points

1 No ignoring AI

The rise of artificial intelligence is changing how Scotland, and the world works, and it has meant that AI literacy is now the number one skill any job candidate should look to add to their CV.

​2 The Human touch

While automated processes are increasingly being used in recruitment, Scott believes that will shift in the next 18 months with a greater focus on human input to pick up on the ‘intangible’ skills of candidates that can be missed by AI.

3 Manual labour

Manual skills in everything from engineering and construction to the food services industry will continue to be in high demand, with an onus on the education establishment to ensure people have the chance to learn these skills for a rapidly shifting job market.

​4 Oversight essential

As AI use grows across industries, so too will the need for human oversight to ensure the technology is being correctly used.

​5 Who can you trust?

The single biggest challenge for recruiters in the coming 12 months will be an increased need to check and verify claims made in applications which will routinely have been created using AI agents.