Resumes Are Messing up Hiring

By Terence Tse, Mark Esposito and Olaf Groth

W hile we are surrounded by a wave of new disruptive technologies1. disruptive technology： 破坏性技术，又称“破坏性创新”，是指将产品或服务进行科技性的创新、使企业更具竞争性的技术。and apps, HR still hasn’t improved how it evaluates the prospective workforce. Traditional hiring processes that revolve around CVs2. CV： [拉丁语] =Curriculum Vitae，简历。are no longer sufficient—they don’t pinpoint the right qualities demanded of leaders today, and their dated criteria obscures many talented individuals from even hitting the radar.

There is nothing inherently wrong with resumes—they highlight applicants’ past achievements and experience. But while CVs are good at showcasing formal skills, they’re not very useful for identifying values and behavior. Resumes generally don’t distinguish between skills (knowing how to do something) and competencies (doing it really well and with great reliability and ease).

尽管我们正被大量新兴的破坏性技术和应用所包围，人力资源却仍未改进他们评估未来劳动力的手段。传统的以个人简历为中心的招聘模式已远远不够，因为它们无法准确描述出如今领导者所要求的合适的素质才能，而那些过时的标准也使许多有才华的人甚至连一个机会都无法得到。

简历本身并不存在什么缺陷，它强调了应聘者过去的业绩和经历。但是，简历更加注重展示技能，对价值和行为方面的鉴定则帮助不大。一般来说，简历是无法区分技能和能力的，前者主要指知道如何去做某事，而后者则指能够出色、可靠并轻松地完成这件事。

毕业在即，制作简历成为学生党的当务之急。个人背景、技能、教育/实习经历……经过一遍遍加工润色的简历仿佛成了学生们的救命稻草，而各大企业也铆足了劲，希望在成千上万份简历中寻找到他们想要的人才。然而，传统的简历是不是人才定位最有效的途径呢？“它通常无法区分技能和能力，只能证明一个人是合格的，而并非合适的。”如今，Coca-Cola、IBM、Saberr等公司都开始尝试通过智能数据、社会媒体、心理行为分析等对应聘者进行评估，一场未来招聘手段的变革即将上演……

Sam Mead, co-founder of London-based start-up, Saberr,which specializes in workforce science, reiterates3. reiterate： 反复讲。this problem with CVs—and by extension, the now ubiquitous application systems. They only show the eligibility but not the suitability of a candidate.4. eligibility： 适任，合格；suitability：适合。And while resumes can match an applicant’s skills to the role, they are poor at predicting how well the applicants will interact with the company’s culture and future colleagues.

CVs have led recruiters to focus too much on grades,university reputations, and prior work experience. The problem with these hiring criteria is that they’re biased toward applicants from more wealthy backgrounds. These families usually have better connections and networks, can provide better education opportunities, and can afford to pay reputable universities’ tuition fees. In addition, children who have grown up in the upper echelons5. echelon： 阶层。of society are also much more used to the social norms that guide successful “acceptable” behavior.

山姆·米德是伦敦一家新企业——Saberr公司的联合创始人之一，专门从事劳动力科学的研究。他反复探讨了关于简历的问题，并引申到了如今普遍存在的应聘机制。这种机制只能显示某一个应聘者是“合格的”，而并非是“合适的”。尽管简历可以将应聘者的技能与职位相匹配，但它们却无法预测应聘者能否很好地融入企业文化，并和未来的同事打好交道。

个人简历使得招聘者过分关注成绩、就读大学的名气以及之前的工作经验。这些招聘标准的问题在于他们会倾向于那些来自更富裕家庭的应聘者。这些家庭通常有更多的人脉和关系网，能够（为孩子）提供更好的教育机会，而且能负担得起名校的高额学费。另外，上层社会家庭培养出的孩子也更习惯于那些社会规范，从而使自己的举止更合人心意。

This process is no longer reliable; it has turned income inequality into career opportunity inequality. As much as they claim to be interested in taking in talent from a broad spectrum6. spectrum： 范围。of backgrounds, the practice of using resumes to select candidates can exclude those who can’t afford education or taking unpaid internships.Very often, they end up in lower-paid jobs with limited future prospects. A recent study in the UK, for instance,shows that 3 out of 4 judges, 2 out of 3 doctors, 3 out of 4 finance directors, and 1 out of 2 chief executives come from fairly well-off families.

What can be done about this?

Companies truly interested in hiring people from diverse backgrounds must abandon the conventional practice of filtering by resume. Recruiters must seek proof of competencies to find the most promising candidates, those capable of becoming senseable leaders with skills needed to succeed in a rapid-moving,interdependent world.

New tools and hiring processes can help recruiters find more diverse talent pools and reach candidates who may have previously been excluded from consideration. If hiring companies pay less attention to skill- and history-focused resumes and focus instead on the socio-emotional, cognitive, and behavioral traits of applicants, those from economically underprivileged7. underprivileged： 贫困的，社会经济地位低下的。backgrounds would have much broader job prospects.

And more companies can use smart data to improve the recruiting process. Some are already paving the way, with examples ranging from large multinationals like Coca-Cola, which uses data-driven strategies to increase innovation in its Atlanta HQ, to start-ups like Seedcamp, which uses psychographics(the study of personality, interests, etc.) to identify teams with the greatest chance for success, to tech companies like Kestral in Australia, which identifies the strongest performers through team optimization processes.

这一过程已不再可靠，因为它将收入的不平等转化成了工作机会的不平等。虽然企业宣称很愿意广纳贤才，但通过简历挑选时总会把那些付不起学费和做不了免费实习的应聘者排除在外。最终，这些人通常只得到薪水较低的工作机会，工作前景也不乐观。例如，最近英国的一项研究表明，75%的法官、67%的医生、75%的财务主管和50%的首席执行官都是来自相当富裕的家庭。那么，我们能做些什么呢？

真正愿意广招贤士的企业必须抛弃传统的简历筛选流程。招聘者必须通过考察能力来找到最有潜力的候选人，也就是那些能成为英明的领导，有能力在瞬息万变、互相依存的世界中取得成功的人。

新的工具和招聘流程能够帮助招聘者开辟更多样的人才库，并接触到那些曾经被拒之门外的候选人。如果招聘公司不再看重那些强调技能和经历的简历，而将目光转向应聘者的社会情感、认知和行为特征，那些经济地位较低的人将能拥有更广阔的职业前景。

越来越多的企业能够使用智能数据来改进招聘流程。一些企业已经开始做准备，一些大型跨国公司如可口可乐，其亚特兰大总部正通过数据导向型策略来提高创新；一些新兴企业如Seedcamp通过心理图案学（即对于人格、兴趣等因素的研究）挑选出成功几率最大的团队；还有一些科技公司，如位于澳大利亚的Kestral公司则通过团队优化选出能力最强的员工。

Successful placement also greatly depends on “fittingness,”so recruiters need to take other off-resume elements into account. Saberr pays attention to applicants’ core values and specific behavioral traits, in order to create a metric mapper8. metric mapper： 度量映射，此处指通过数据定义和分析等定量化过程，来判断应聘者与企业、未来领导、工作环境等能否相互匹配。—the main element of their data-driven HR Strategy. Using algorithms to process fundamental values and behavioral compatibility, as well as diversity, the company predicts how strong the interpersonal relationship between the applicants and the potential employer can become. The algorithm allows the company to “project” how the new hires will fit into the environment.

Large technology corporations like IBM are also helping build “social businesses” to determine fittingness (which IBM defines as the “ability to create more effective work experiences through social collaboration and digital experience”) by harnessing9. harness： 利用。the power of social media and an individual’s web presences. And companies like Quid in San Francisco are using semantic analysis to analyze and visually depict10. depict： 描述，描画。where the most attention, creative energy, and financial resources are being spent online. While private equity investors and advertising firms are the primary users of this tool, it has huge potential for the recruiting profession, because it could allow staffing executives to see where candidates are devoting their professional energies.

While many privacy questions still have to be sorted out,the likes of Saberr, IBM, and Quid point to the future of human resource acquisition and development, through their use of smart technologies that help predict prospective employees’behavior and their integration into the work community—something resumes can’t always do. These game-changers are helping organizations embrace talent wherever it surges,transforming the way companies recruit and source the workforce.

成功的人员配置很大程度上也取决于“合适”，因此招聘者需要考虑一些除了简历之外的因素。Saberr公司很注重应聘者的核心价值观以及具体的行为特点，从而创建出一个度量映射，这也是他们数据导向型人力资源战略的核心元素。公司通过演算法来处理基本的价值观、与人和睦相处的能力以及人的多样性，从而预测应聘者和未来领导之间的人际关系能达到何种程度。这一算法使得公司能够“预测”新员工是如何融入到工作环境中去的。

一些大型科技公司如IBM也通过利用社会媒体的力量和个人的关系网来帮助创建“社交商业”，从而决定员工的合适程度，并将其定义为“通过社会合作和数字体验，创造更为有效的工作经验的能力”。还有一些公司如位于旧金山的Quid公司通过语义分析的途径，形象化地描述了网络上人们在哪些地方关注最多、最能体现创造力，并且投资最多。尽管这一工具主要由私募股权投资者和广告公司来使用，但它在招聘行业的前景却十分广阔，因为它可以让人事主管了解到应聘者的专业能力都用于何处。

虽然还有很多隐私问题有待解决，但是像Saberr、IBM和Quid这些公司，它们通过智能科技预测未来员工的行为以及与工作环境的融合程度，指明了人力资源获得与发展的未来，而这些都是简历所做不到的。这些“规则改变者”正在帮助企业从各个阶层广纳人才，改革公司招聘和寻求人才的机制。