Artificial Intelligence (AI), Generative AI (ChatGPT) and Automation over the past year have evolved at a rapid pace. Incorporation of AI functionality in candidate sourcing software is one of the key areas of interest as the industry evolves. To gain a deeper understanding and the future evolution of AI’s role in the executive search process, Clockwork surveyed 179 executive search firms across the globe at the end of 2023. The purpose of the survey was to identify key areas of opportunity for AI to support the search process, and gather insights around market demand for future growth for AI.

You can download the full report here. 

And here's a snapshot on A.I.'s impact on sourcing and assessing final candidates. 

47.0% of Search Firms believe AI and automation will likely have an impact on assessing candidates

Search firms anticipate AI can provide richer metrics when assessing candidates.

• 42.2% of search firms are very interested in automatically and continuously updating an overall ‘match to the role’ score for Candidates.
• 40.0% of search firms are very interested in automatically assessing Candidates for leadership and personality traits (Myers-Briggs or similar).

With candidate assessment requiring a much higher level of human logic and reasoning, search firms are incredibly involved in this stage and perform this work very well with little technological intervention. When presented with the idea of AI and automation supporting candidate assessment, search firms are very interested in AI and automation producing deeper and richer metric-based data to strengthen any final recommendations. There is a clear desire among industry leaders to leverage AI functionality within candidate sourcing software. 

This also aligns with a shift in the executive search market as well, where more search firms are highlighting metrics and presenting more analytical data and insights to clients with final assessments. With the ability for AI to automatically generate an overall ‘Match to the role’ score for each candidate, linked to research criteria, core-competencies and more, search firms believe AI can bring new value to the assessment stage with 42.2% of search firms stating they were very interested in this.

Search firms remain divided whether AI can make informed or intelligent final recommendations.

• 30.0% of search firms are not interested in AI generating/writing a final recommendation.
• 27.8% of search firms are not interested in AI automatically recommending the top 1-3 Candidates from the shortlist.

Search firms still remain apprehensive around AI’s ability to make informed decisions, and are unsure if they trust or want AI to support them in making final recommendations on candidates. These mixed findings show the industry isn't yet sold on candidate sourcing software AI playing a role in the strategic decisions on final recommendations. 

Ultimately, it's clear that search professionals are interesting in candidate sourcing software that incorporates AI to help provide deeper and more thorough justification for candidate recommendations. However, the jury is still out about the role AI will play in presenting and sharing final candidate recommendations with clients. Given the nuance and context required for executive search firms to drive projects to success, it's unsurprising that there is a desire to maintain control over the final decisions.

Our AI report contains several insights, statistics and metrics on how the executive search industry is leveraging AI for success-  Download and read the full report here: "A.I and Its Impact On Executive Search".