An integrated e‐recruitment system for automated personality mining and applicant ranking

TLDR

This paper introduces a novel e‑recruitment system that automates applicant pre‑screening by extracting personality traits from social media through linguistic analysis and ranking candidates with an analytical hierarchy process. The system automatically gathers objective criteria from LinkedIn profiles and personality indicators from social presence, then applies AHP—weighted by recruiters—to produce a ranked list of candidates. In a real‑world deployment, the system’s pre‑screening matched human recruiters’ decisions (except for senior roles) and allowed firms to limit interviews to the top candidates, thereby increasing recruitment efficiency.

Abstract

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to present a novel approach for recruiting and ranking job applicants in online recruitment systems, with the objective to automate applicant pre‐screening. An integrated, company‐oriented, e‐recruitment system was implemented based on the proposed scheme and its functionality was showcased and evaluated in a real‐world recruitment scenario. Design/methodology/approach The proposed system implements automated candidate ranking, based on objective criteria that can be extracted from the applicant's LinkedIn profile. What is more, candidate personality traits are automatically extracted from his/her social presence using linguistic analysis. The applicant's rank is derived from individual selection criteria using analytical hierarchy process (AHP), while their relative significance (weight) is controlled by the recruiter. Findings The proposed e‐recruitment system was deployed in a real‐world recruitment scenario, and its output was validated by expert recruiters. It was found that with the exception of senior positions that required domain experience and specific qualifications, automated pre‐screening performed consistently compared to human recruiters. Research limitations/implications It was found that companies can increase the efficiency of the recruitment process if they integrate an e‐recruitment system in their human resources management infrastructure that automates the candidate pre‐screening process. Interviewing and background investigation of applicants can then be limited to the top candidates identified from the system. Originality/value To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first e‐recruitment system that supports automated extraction of candidate personality traits using linguistic analysis and ranks candidates with the AHP.