The adage used to go: “Common sense isn’t common anymore.” Now, especially as people are outsourcing their thinking to LLMs like ChatGPT, things seem to have gotten to the point where those who do have it are at a competitive advantage.
As more and more recruiting firms offload their business functions to AI in the name of efficiency, those (like Skinner) who keep human beings at the center of the process can understand workers and employers on a deeper level. This, in turn, enables better matches that everyone’s happier with.
Because, sometimes, a “gut feeling” from someone with decades of experience is worth more than a billion-dollar AI model.
Key Takeaways
- In skilled trades, context, certifications, and real-world experience matter; these are best evaluated by humans with industry knowledge.
- Shallow matches, compliance issues, declining candidate quality, and long-term recruiter skill erosion can quickly outweigh short-term efficiency gains.
- Agencies that prioritize common sense, local insight, and decades of hands-on experience create stronger matches for both workers and employers.
How Are Companies Using AI in Skilled Trades Recruiting?
AI adoption has become so widespread that we’d probably take less time talking about how companies aren’t using AI. But in all seriousness, the sheer number of applicants combined with the limited resources companies have at their disposal right now has made automation and AI tools an attractive option for handling growing recruiter workloads:
- Scanning databases for candidates with the appropriate certifications and experience (e.g., welding, electric, HVAC)
- Screening incoming resumes for trade-specific competencies
- Forecasting potential talent gaps created through predictive analytics to surface retirements and new projects
Overall, the way that most agencies are using AI in their processes is to reduce mental load and accelerate screening and hiring decisions. However, as we’ll see below, that effort can backfire very quickly.
What Are the Problems with Using AI in Skilled Trades?
The skilled trades are facing a crisis over the next few years. The demand for skill trade workers is expected to skyrocket from now to 2030. One of the biggest drivers of this demand is the spike in data center construction that’s necessary to meet projected AI needs. We’re certainly seeing this in the North Texas area; the state as a whole could very well be receiving hundreds of billions of dollars in overall investments.
In a sense, there’s an irony to the fact that it’s the very expansion of AI data centers that’s causing the explosion in skilled trades demand. This, in turn, is prompting companies to use AI to handle these workloads. However, when recruiters offload work to AI, it's not uncommon to end up with the following problems when trying to fill blue collar jobs.
Shallow matches
People experienced in the skilled trades know that a general maintenance tech doesn’t always have the certs for specific skills, nor the ability to meet compliance standards. A human recruiter with background in electrical, plumbing, or mechanical work can ask a few questions to test a candidate’s mettle. AI often doesn’t have the context or knowledge to know which questions to ask, let alone evaluate responses.
Decline in candidate quality and job experience
Shallow matches translate into bad experiences on both sides of the desk. Candidates don’t have the skills to meet employer expectations, resulting in turnover and costly re-hires. Workers, likewise, end up in jobs they aren’t qualified for, leading to a poor experience and frustration at a time when we need to keep every skilled tradesperson in the industry that we can.
Risk exposure
Outsourcing entire processes to AI can end up removing the human oversight needed to maintain compliance with laws, regulations, and governance standards. For example, recruiters who use AI for screening can end up amplifying existing biases, which could turn into costly lawsuits later. Similar things can happen with a failure to protect candidate and client data by feeding into non-secure platforms and models; data breaches are expensive, and that’s a storm you do not want to be caught in the middle of.
Productivity reversals
Although AI tools often promise to be a net gain on productivity, those gains can quickly turn around and become liabilities. AI errors are just one example. When errors go unchecked because you’re letting an automated process run in the background, those can compound into bigger issues that become harder to fix.
Brain drain
Over time, overreliance on AI can lead to an erosion of cognitive effort among recruiters, which degrades their long-term quality and value to the agency. This turns AI into a liability that becomes systemic and much harder to reverse.
How Skinner Uses Common Sense to Find and Place Skilled Trades Workers
Although the Skinner team isn’t opposed to using technology to boost our efficiency where it makes sense, we’ve committed to prioritizing common sense and human expertise over outsourcing everything to AI. With nearly 85 years of background in our industry and community, we’re not about to give up an advantage that provides an edge over newcomers and flashes in the pan.
When you work with Skinner, you get a team of experts who can:
- Find trusted contractors who know the industry and their craft; then, connect them with companies who are incredible work and take care of their people
- Look ahead to local needs that we can foresee because we literally have boots on the ground
- Use our best judgment and common sense to find people who not only have the technical qualifications, but the soft skills and good judgment to succeed in high-stakes environments
- Tailor our worker support to each individual, giving them opportunities that align with their potential and set them on a path to greatness
Choosing an Agency that Keeps the Human Touch
For all its benefits, AI will never see you as a person. It can’t. That's something only a human being can do. So if you’re sick of being treated like a number, throwing your lot in with an AI-first agency is a sure way to end up with a bad experience.
Likewise, if you’re an ambitious firm that needs workers who not only have technical skills but can integrate with your existing team and culture, AI will have a hard time finding people who actually end up being a good fit.
The solution is to work with an agency that leverages common sense and deep human expertise. At Skinner, we’ve been recruiting in North Texas for decades, and we’re not about to stop now.
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