Over the past few years, the adoption of AI in recruitment has accellerated. However, there has been a noticeable resistance from HR managers to invest in AI tools for their deparment. With the aim of understanding the causes prompting this resistance, this thesis investigates the factors that impact the pace of adoption of AI in HR, with a focus on recruitment solutions. While designing an analytical framework inspired by the contingency perspective, the factors have been searched through a literature review and their effects have been tested in terms of magnitude and direction through a qualitative study. To do this, the authors performed a case study involving an external partner, an AI solution provider start-up company. A total of 16 semi-structured interviews have been conducted with different levels of stakeholders, including external partner`s employees, investors, competitors, and end- users. Finally, a strategic analysis of the AI recruitment market has been deployed. Our ambition is that the combination of the information over the factors together with the strategic analysis will empower the companies within the industry in taking better informed strategic decisions.

With the constant technological changes globally, organizations are now at the forefront of changing their business processes to be more competitive. These technological developments have brought in several shifts within business processes. Human resource management (HRM) has been dramatically affected by such changes more than ever, especially the recruitment process. As such, there is rising concern to shift from a traditional to an AI recruitment process. The adoption of AI in the recruitment process has remained relatively unexplored, especially within Swedish organizations. Despite its great discussion within academia and organizations, the limited amount of literature on the subject makes it interesting and current. Therefore, the main aims of this research are: (1) to analyze in which stages till date organizations are using AI in recruitment practices in Sweden and (2) to ascertain the attitudes of recruiters and recruitees towards the use of AI in the recruitment process in Sweden organizational context. This research adopted a qualitative approach with semi-structured approach interviews conducted with three recruiters and five recruitees in Sweden. The empirical findings of the study reveal that organizations have not fully implemented AI in the recruitment process. Factors such as timeframe, recruitment cost, work efficiency, and human biases were considered the top challenges of the traditional recruitment process. AI in the recruitment process can help reduce the lengthy time while increasing work efficiency with faster-recruiting methods. Organizations can share recruitment costs. Human biases can significantly be reduced with the use of AI at the pre-screening and selection stages. It was also discovered that the attitudes of recruiters and recruiters were seemingly positive towards the acceptance of AI in the recruitment process. Furthermore, AI was not seen as a threat to human jobs instead as a complementary role. This leads to the conclusion that AI can complement the recruitment process and AI cannot take human jobs since humans will still be needed for software development. This research provides contributions towards theoretical, practical, and social. This research offers an extent of the existing knowledge on the subject matter. It will help recruiters understand the importance of AI in the recruitment process. Furthermore, recruitees will be more accustomed to the idea of AI. In addition, the findings of this research can assist in the curriculum adjustment of educational institutions to best serve the needs of the changing business climate. At the government level, the findings can be used to encourage continuous innovation and learning. Furthermore, this research can be a starting point for other future research.

Artificial intelligence has recently gained an increased amount of attention, both in general and in recruitment. The recruitment process has for a long time been dependent on the human touch, but lately AI has been argued as the “future of hiring”. This thesis investigates how candidates’ and recruiters’ attitudes influence the transition towards using artificial intelligence within the recruitment process. The purpose is to gain a wider understanding, and by providing that knowledge, prepare for the future that lays ahead. The thesis takes on a global approach, and the investigation is conducted in a qualitative manner using an exploratory approach. Attitudes are investigated based on the different elements; AI readiness, bias, personal characteristics, adoption stage of technology, field of study, gender, age, country of origin, level of control, and language barriers. The key findings state how candidates in general have a more negative attitude towards artificial intelligence as a part of the recruitment process, compared to the recruiters, where the main elements influencing attitudes were personal characteristics, level of control and AI readiness. Concluding that attitudes influence the transition towards AI based recruitment tools by slowing down the process due to existing resistance. Regarding the future, recruiters believe that AI will play a great role, indicating that our findings are of great importance.

I takt med den teknologi som har expanderat i samhället har organisationer, b.la rekryterings- och bemanningsföretag, med glädje valt att implementera artificiell intelligens (AI) för att underlätta sina arbetsuppgifter på ett kostnadseffektivt sätt. I samband med detta har fördomar och diskriminering varit en stor fråga i relation till AI-drivna rekryteringsprocesser. Arbetet syftar till att undersöka vilka åtgärder organisationer kan ta för att hantera fördomar i AI-drivna rekryteringsprocesser utifrån svenska aktörers föreställningar. Arbetet syftar även till att förstå hur svenska aktörer ställer sig i relation till de etiska överväganden och den etiska processen som bör tas hos organisationer som använder sig av AI-verktyg i rekryteringsprocessen. Vi vill forska vidare kring hur fördomar ska åtgärdas i en AI-driven rekryteringsprocess och utgå ifrån Sverige. Studien har genomförts genom en kvalitativ metod för att få en djupgående insyn och dessutom forma en god relation med respondenterna. Resultatet visar att fokuset ligger på aktörerna i organisationerna i relation till AI-verktygen. Detta är för att övervaka individernas egna fördomar. Det är främst den etiska processen och etiska överväganden som presenteras i arbetet är det som krävs för att organisationer ska kunna hantera eventuella fördomar som kan dyka upp i AI-driva rekryteringsprocesser. / As technology has expanded in society, organizations, such as recruitment and staffing companies, have been happy to implement artificial intelligence (AI) to facilitate their tasks in a cost-effective way. In this context, prejudice and discrimination has been a major issue in relation to AI-driven recruitment processes. The work aims to investigate what measures organizations can take to manage prejudice in AI-driven recruitment processes based on Swedish actors' perceptions. The work also aims to understand how Swedish actors positionthemselves in relation to the ethical considerations and the ethical process that should be taken by organizations that use AI tools in the recruitment process. We want to further research how prejudices should be addressed in an AI-driven recruitment process and start from Sweden. The study has been conducted through a qualitative method to gain an in-depth insight and also form a good relationship with the respondents. The results show that the focus is on the actors in the organizations in relation to the AI tools. This is to monitor the individuals' own biases. It is mainly the ethical process and ethical considerations presented in the work that are what is required for organizations to be able to manage any biases that may emerge in AI-driven recruitment processes.

Studien undersöker vilka metoder som är mest lämpliga för rekryteringsprocesser genom att inkludera tre befintliga Artificiell intelligens (AI) verktyg samt en egenutvecklad prototyp. Tidigare studier har visat att AI kan förbättra rekryteringsprocessen genom att öka effektiviteten och minska fördomar, men också att det finns begränsningar i hur väl AI kan bedöma kandidaternas kompetenser. Målet är att bestämma de mest effektiva AI-lösningar för att matcha kvalificerade kandidater till ledande positioner. Identifierade möjligheter till förbättringar i hastighet, noggrannhet och kvalitet av rekryteringsprocessen. Fokuset för detta arbete ligger på analys av befintliga AI-lösningar parallellt med utvecklingen och testningen av en prototyp. Prototypen har designats för att hantera de brister som identifierats i de befintliga metoderna, såsom matchning av nyckelord mellan Curriculum Vitae (CV) och jobbannonsen. Denna metod har begränsningar i hur väl den kan identifiera kandidaters verkliga kompetenser och relevans för jobbet, vilket utforskas i denna studie. Resultatet från denna studie visar att AI för närvarande har en begränsad, men växande betydelse i rekryteringsprocesser. Detta pekar på en betydande potential för AI att erbjuda nya lösningar som kan leda till mer rättvisa och effektiva rekryteringsprocesser i framtiden. / The study examines which methods are most suitable for recruitment processes by including three existing artificial intelligence AI-tools as well as a custom-developed prototype. Previous studies have shown that AI can improve recruitment processes by increasing efficiency and reducing biases, but also that there are limitations in how well AI can assess candidate’s competencies. The goal is to determine the most effective AI solutions for matching qualified candidates to leading positions. Opportunities for improvement in speed, accuracy, and quality of the recruitment process have been identified. The focus of this work is on analyzing existing AI-solutions in parallel with the development and testing of a prototype. The prototype has been designed to address the deficiencies identified in existing methods, such as matching keywords between Curriculum Vitae (CV) and job advertisements. This method has limitations in how well it can identify candidate’s real competencies and relevance for the job, which is explored in this study. The results from this study show that AI currently has a limited, but growing significance in recruitment processes. This points to significant potential for AI to provide new solutions that can lead to fairer and more efficient recruitment processes in the future.