Recruitment, the hard yards

What could we automate?

Recruitment is often described as “people business”, and it is. But anyone who has actually done the job knows the truth: a large part of the working week is not spent talking to candidates or advising hiring managers. It is spent doing the hard yards — the repeatable, interruption-heavy, slightly thankless work that sits around the human moments.

This isn’t a complaint. It’s an observation. And it matters because if we can remove the grind without removing judgment, we can make recruitment both more humane and more effective.

So let’s take an honest look at what tends to feel “boring” in UK recruitment, why it persists, and what we could sensibly automate.

The work nobody puts on the LinkedIn post

When recruiters talk candidly (usually in comments, not posts), the same themes repeat. Not because recruiters are cynical — because the workflow is.

1) Admin is the silent tax on every vacancy

Even in well-run teams, every role accumulates admin: tidying job briefs, cleaning up job descriptions, chasing approvals, logging activity, building shortlists, writing submission notes, updating the ATS, sending updates, documenting decisions.

None of this is glamorous. Much of it is necessary. But a lot of it is copy-and-paste with consequences.

2) Scheduling is “diary tennis” disguised as a process

Interviews should be simple. In practice, they are a chain of constraints:

• Three diaries (sometimes six)
• Availability windows that evaporate
• Last-minute changes
• Candidate commutes and childcare
• Hiring managers are going quiet at the exact wrong moment

It’s not difficult work. It’s constant work. And it breaks concentration.

3) CRM/ATS hygiene: the work that doesn’t feel like recruiting

Most recruiters have had the experience of finishing a strong candidate call… and then spending another block of time turning it into “system truth”.

If the system isn’t updated, it doesn’t exist. If it’s updated badly, it becomes misleading. Either way, it is time that doesn’t feel like progress.

4) Compliance and checks are essential — and relentlessly procedural

Right to Work, references, role-specific vetting, temp compliance, audit trails, and client-specific paperwork. This is the part of recruitment where mistakes are expensive, reputationally damaging, and sometimes have legal implications.

It is also the part where the process is least forgiving and least “human”.

5) Reporting and client updates aren’t hard — they’re frequent

Weekly updates, pipeline summaries, stage reports, “what’s changed since last week”, “why is this role stuck”, “where are we with X”. It is good practice, but it repeats. It’s often derived from the same data you’ve already captured elsewhere.

Why it still happens (even in good teams)

If this is so obviously grindy, why hasn’t it been solved already?

Because recruitment has a few structural realities:

• High volume and high variation: every role is “unique”, but the steps rhyme.
• Many stakeholders: hiring managers, HR, finance, candidates, agencies, internal TA, compliance.
• Low tolerance for errors: small mistakes can have big outcomes.
• Tools don’t talk cleanly: email, calendars, ATS/CRM, assessment platforms, spreadsheets, and messaging apps.

In other words, it’s not that recruitment teams are inefficient. It’s that the work is built around coordination, documentation and risk mitigation.

That is exactly the kind of environment where automation can help — if applied carefully.

What should we automate?

A helpful principle is this:

Automate the movement and preparation of information. Keep humans responsible for decisions and relationships.

Automation should reduce friction, not remove accountability.

Here are the sensible candidates.

1) Role intake: turn messy briefings into structured clarity

Most role briefs start as notes, a half-formed conversation, or an email thread.

AI can help by:

• Converting intake notes into a structured role brief
• Drafting a clean job description and advert
• Pulling out competencies, non-negotiables, and “nice to haves”
• Drafting an interview scorecard and shortlist template

Crucially: a human still signs it off. The automation does the tidying and structuring, not the deciding.

2) Sourcing: reduce the time spent “finding the same people again”

AI can support sourcing by:

• Searching internal databases semantically (not just by keywords)
• Building initial longlists from multiple sources
• Creating “research packs” for candidates and companies
• Suggesting outreach angles based on role motivators (not gimmicks)

A recruiter still chooses who to approach. The tooling removes the drudgery of list-building and context gathering.

3) Screening: capture the substance without doubling the work

Done properly, screening is judgment-heavy. But the admin around it is not.

AI can help with:

• Call transcription and structured notes
• Summaries mapped to a scorecard
• Draft shortlist rationales
• Identifying gaps to probe in a follow-up call

The recruiter remains the editor, the recommender, and the owner of the assessment. The system becomes a disciplined note-taker.

4) Scheduling: automate the coordination, not the relationship

This is an obvious win area:

• Self-serve scheduling within defined constraints
• Automated reminders and reschedule workflows
• Clear comms that reduce candidate drop-off
• Visibility of stage status for hiring managers

You don’t need a human to send the fifth “what times work for you?” email. You need a human to manage expectations and keep the process moving when it gets sensitive.

5) Compliance: build workflows that are audit-ready by default

Recruitment compliance is not a place for “clever” automation. It is a place for reliable workflows:

• Checklists and document collection
• Exception routing (when something doesn’t meet policy)
• Clear audit trails
• Timely nudges that prevent last-minute panic

Automation here isn’t about speed; it’s about consistency and risk reduction.

6) Reporting and updates: stop rewriting the same information

Most updates are a structured summary of what the ATS/CRM already contains — when it contains it.

AI can generate:

• Weekly pipeline summaries
• Stage ageing alerts (“this is stuck”)
• Next-action prompts (“waiting on feedback”, “offer approval outstanding”)
• Candidate update drafts that the recruiter can personalise

This is where “light” automation makes the human work better: recruiters spend less time compiling and more time advising.

What should stay human-led (and why)

If we’re serious about not compromising the human element, we need to be equally clear about what not to automate.

These should remain human-owned:

• Final shortlist recommendations and hiring advice
• Culture and team fit judgement (context matters)
• Negotiation strategy and counteroffer management
• Sensitive candidate conversations (rejections, rescinds, difficult feedback)
• Exception decisions in compliance and fairness

In short: automation should support judgment, not replace it.

The real prize: better recruitment feels more human, not more automated

The irony is that the best use of AI in recruitment is not “AI recruiting”.

It is removing the paperwork that stops recruiters from being recruiters.

If you can reduce admin drag, you create space for:

• deeper candidate conversations
• more honest hiring manager advisory
• better preparation
• more consistent process
• less ghosting (on both sides)
• better decision quality

That is the point.

Recruitment will always be the hard yards. But it doesn’t have to be hard yards spent on the wrong work.