Artificial Intelligence in Practice

23LinkedIn: Using Artificial Intelligence To Solve The Skills Crisis

LinkedIn has built a social network for the professional world. What Facebook has done for keeping us in touch with friends and family, LinkedIn replicates for our working lives.

So, while Facebook primarily makes its money selling our data to businesses so they can advertise products to us, LinkedIn's revenue comes from employers looking to entice us to join their ranks.

Instead of categorizing us by what movies or music we click “like” on, it looks at our job skills and experience. Then it uses artificial intelligence (AI), which is baked into every feature on its platform, to match us with opportunities or bring us to the attention of prospective employers.

What Problem Is Artificial Intelligence Helping To Solve?

Matching applicants to job roles is a challenging and expensive task for businesses – according to Glassdoor, the average hire in the United States costs a company $4,000.¹

That's a fair chunk of money even if you get lucky and find someone good – however, evidence seems to suggest humans aren't particularly great at selecting the right person for the job.

A study last year by the UK Recruitment and Employment Confederation found that businesses were failing to make the right hires for two out of every five roles.² It also calculates that an unsuccessful hire at middle management level can cost a company an average of £132,000.

Part of this inefficiency is that recruiters have traditionally ...