AI prepares, your team decides. An AI agent collects the answers. Your recruiter reads them and makes every decision about a candidate.
Monday, 07:00. A temp worker doesn’t turn up for their assignment, and nobody had time to call them on Friday. Recruitment looks much the same: two hundred applications, and first calls pushed back to next week.
That is what AI in HR is for, first of all: taking on the repetitive tasks that slow your team down. This guide covers its uses, the limits to set and the first agents to launch. It draws on more than 600,000 conversations our AI agents have held with a person.
You will also see how an AI recruitment agent works, and what stays with your recruiters.
What is AI in HR?
AI in HR, or AI for HR, covers the tools that do part of the work of human resources. They read, write, sort or hold conversations, based on your instructions and your documents.
There are two families:
- Assistants: you ask them for a text or a summary, then you rework the result. They help you draft a job advert or interview notes.
- AI agents: they carry a task through to the end, within limits you set. An agent calls a candidate, asks your questions, notes the answers and sends you a summary.
For an HR team, the difference shows quickly. An assistant saves you time on a document. An agent takes on a whole queue of tasks, such as a hundred confirmation calls.
In both cases, the AI works on people: candidates, temp workers, employees. The subject is more sensitive than elsewhere, so it calls for clear rules and close oversight.
What is AI used for in HR?
A good use case is a precise task, such as calling candidates to check their availability. “Recruitment” is too broad to hand to an AI as it is. Here are examples of AI in HR, area by area.
| Area | What AI can do | What stays human |
|---|---|---|
| Recruitment | Draft a job advert, call candidates, ask the questions for the role, follow up with those it couldn’t reach, summarise the answers | Choosing which candidates to meet, running the interview, making the hiring decision |
| Temporary staffing | Confirm assignments, record cancellations, answer questions about the assignment (hours, dress code, address) | Choosing the replacement, looking after the client company |
| HR admin | Log a request for a proof of employment letter, file it, alert the right department | Preparing the document, changing payroll or a contract |
| Employee questions | Answer frequent questions from your documents, direct the others | Personal situations and sensitive subjects |
| Training | Summarise course material, suggest a quiz, send a session reminder | Choosing learning paths, supporting each employee |
The middle column lists repetitive tasks, often done by phone or email. The last column lists decisions that affect a person. The more a task looks like the middle column, the easier it is to hand over.
Which AI for which task?
The right tool depends on what you expect at the end. For a text you will reread, a writing assistant is enough: a job advert, training material, interview notes.
For a task repeated with dozens of people, you need an agent. It calls, asks everyone the same questions and stores the answers in one place. Your team reads the results instead of making the calls.
The phone, the use people forget
AI in HR is often associated with CV screening and internal assistants. Yet a recruitment agency or an in-house recruitment team spends a good part of its week on the phone. You call to pre-screen, to confirm an assignment, to follow up.
That is where time slips away: a candidate on voicemail, a temp worker who calls back at 19:00, Monday’s assignments still to confirm.
An AI phone agent makes these calls in parallel and notes every answer. Your consultants take over where their judgement counts.
How do you use AI in HR and stay in control?
AI in HR deals with people’s applications, jobs and personal data. A few clear habits keep your team in charge and your candidates informed.
A person makes every decision about a candidate
Keep a person between the AI and every decision about a candidate. The agent collects the answers; the recruiter reads them and chooses what happens next.
Before choosing a tool, ask what it does exactly. Does it sort candidates, or does it collect answers that your team reads?
Questions that stick to the role
An AI that ranks profiles can reproduce the biases in the data it learns from. So keep its questions to the role: availability, travel, essential requirements. Leave private life out of it.
People know they are talking to an AI
If an AI agent makes the call, the person should know from the start of the conversation. Tell them too who will read their answers, and what the next step is.
In practice, four habits cover the essentials before you launch an agent:
- questions limited to the role or the assignment;
- a recruiter who reads each record before any decision;
- an AI that introduces itself as such from its first message;
- data whose hosting location and retention period you know.
For the data protection side, the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO), the UK regulator, publishes guidance on AI and data protection.
Which AI HR agents should you launch first?
An AI HR agent takes on a precise task, from the first call to the summary. Start with the one that comes back every week. Here are three agents to begin with.
Pre-screen candidates by phone
When applications pile up, first calls take days. Léa, your AI agent, calls each candidate in your campaign, in the time slots you set. She says she is an AI in her first message, then asks your questions: availability, travel, the requirements of the role.
If an answer stays vague, she asks for more detail. If the candidate doesn’t pick up, she calls back at the interval you set, up to 4 attempts. These automated calls are available from Starter, with your candidates added one by one or from a file.
For each candidate, your recruiter finds the transcript, a summary and the answers recorded. Léa doesn’t shortlist or reject anyone: your team chooses who to meet. From Pro, a workflow (a chain of automatic actions) then sends the interview invitation by SMS to the candidates you keep. The details are on our AI recruitment page.
- Your teamYou launch the campaignYour candidates, added one by one or from a file, and your time slots.
- Léa · PhoneLéa calls each candidateShe says she is an AI, then asks the questions for the role.
- Your ruleLéa doesn’t shortlist or reject anyoneShe passes on the transcript, a summary and the answers recorded.
- Your recruiterYour recruiter decidesThey read each record and choose who to invite to interview.
- Lucie · SMSThe invitation goes out by SMSA workflow sends it to the candidates you keep (from Pro).
of conversations in which the agent fills in the useful details itself (need, availability, interest), for a typical customer
Confirm temporary assignments
On Friday afternoon, you need to know who will be there on Monday. Léa calls each temp worker, goes over the date, time and place of the assignment, then records their answer. She also answers their questions, such as what to wear, using the instructions you have given her.
Depending on your plan, she makes 1, 5 or 10 calls at the same time. Your consultants see who has confirmed before the weekend, and who is still to be reached.
The time of the call matters too. Across all uses, the contact rate is 27% higher between 15:00 and 16:00 than the daily average.
When a temp worker cancels, Léa records the reason. From Pro, a workflow alerts the consultant by email, and they choose the replacement.
Answer common questions
Some calls come in when the agency is closed. A temp worker asks for a proof of employment letter at 18:45; a candidate wants to know your opening hours. Léa picks up, replies using your instructions and records what she can’t handle.
For a letter request, she notes the assignment concerned and the document needed. Your team finds the request the next morning, with what it needs to prepare it. Léa doesn’t touch payroll or contracts: she takes the request and passes it on.
If the caller wants to speak to someone, she transfers the call or records a callback request, according to your instructions. Inbound calls are handled from Starter.
What stays with your recruiters
These three agents share the work with your team in the same way.
| Agent | What Léa does | What your team decides | Plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| Pre-screening | Calls, asks your questions, follows up with those she couldn’t reach, summarises | Who to interview, who to hire | Calls from Starter, interview invitations by workflow from Pro |
| Assignment confirmation | Confirms date, time and place, records cancellations | Who replaces an absent temp worker | Calls from Starter, alerts by workflow from Pro |
| Common questions | Answers using your instructions, logs requests, transfers calls | Answers to special cases, payroll, contracts | Inbound calls from Starter |
Léa prepares each file. Your consultants focus on the conversations that need their judgement.
Which AI tools suit a recruitment agency?
A recruitment agency doesn’t need a single AI tool, but one tool per task. What’s on offer falls into four families.
| Type of tool | What it does | What to check |
|---|---|---|
| Writing assistant | A draft job advert, a message to candidates, interview notes | Reread every text: the tool knows neither the role nor the client company |
| CV screening and matching | Ranking applications against the criteria for the role | The most sensitive use: written criteria, human review, candidates informed |
| Chat for candidates | Answering questions about a job or a process on your website | Answers drawn from your documents, a handover to the agency |
| Phone agent | Pre-screening, confirming an assignment, following up, answering when the agency is closed | The AI announcing itself, your questions, a record of each call for the consultant |
To choose, start from your week: where does your team spend the most time? In temporary staffing, it is often the phone. Then check three points: where candidate data is hosted, whether the tool connects to your recruitment software, and whether you can test it on your real cases.
Starleads fits the last two families: Léa on the phone, Marc on your website chat. Data and models are hosted in France, in the EU. Neither of them screens CVs.
AI or recruitment consultant: who should pre-screen?
Phone pre-screening checks that a candidate meets the basics of the role: availability, travel, requirements. Should you hand it to an AI agent or keep it with a consultant? Each has its strengths.
| AI phone agent | Recruitment consultant | |
|---|---|---|
| Volume | Several calls at once: 1, 5 or 10 depending on the plan | One call at a time |
| Hours | The time slots you set, up to 4 attempts per candidate | Their working hours, between interviews |
| Questions | The same for every candidate, in the same order | Adapted to the candidate, with the risk of missing a point |
| What it picks up | The answers given, word for word | Motivation, hesitation, soft skills |
| Written record | Transcript, summary and answers for each call | Their notes, when they have time to take them |
| Decision | None: it doesn’t shortlist or reject anyone | They choose who to meet |
The most effective approach combines both. The agent makes the first calls and stores the answers. The consultant reads the records, calls back the profiles that interest them and keeps their time for interviews. The candidate, for their part, gets an answer sooner.
How do you get started in 4 weeks?
A first agent is quick to launch if you stick to a single process. Here is a possible pace, to adapt to your team.
| Week | What you do | What you get |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Choose one process: assignment confirmation or pre-screening for one role | A clear scope and a baseline to compare against |
| 2 | Write the questions and instructions with your recruiters | A call your team has reviewed |
| 3 | Test with the team, then on a short list | Instructions corrected before launch |
| 4 | Measure and adjust | The decision to extend, correct or stop |
Week 1. Pick a task that repeats, on the phone, with a steady volume. Note how long it takes today and how many people you need to reach each week.
Week 2. Tell the agent how to introduce itself, what to ask and when to hand over. Keep the questions tied to the role or the assignment. Prepare answers to the questions that keep coming up: dress code, address, hours.
LéaEnglishOutboundWeek 3. A test call lets you hear Léa before launch. Play a candidate in a hurry, then a hesitant temp worker, and correct her instructions. Then launch on a short list.
Week 4. Track the share of people reached, the complete answers and the time given back to your consultants. Ask a few candidates what they thought. Change one thing at a time.
Check where the data goes, too. At Starleads, it is hosted by OVH, in France, and encrypted; no call is used to train the models. You can try the platform free for 7 days, with no limits.
In short
AI in HR takes on the repetitive tasks: first calls, confirmations, common questions, summaries. Decisions about candidates stay with your team. Start with a single process, measure, then extend.
Do your consultants spend their Fridays confirming assignments and chasing candidates? Hand those calls to an AI recruitment agent. They keep their time for choosing the right profiles and looking after client companies.