A review by reggiewoods
The Algorithm: How AI Decides Who Gets Hired, Monitored, Promoted, and Fired and Why We Need to Fight Back Now by Hilke Schellmann

challenging dark informative sad medium-paced

4.0

AI is an inevitable part of HR processes in work culture today. Companies are using it to make crucial decisions, and they don’t even know how the technology is making those decisions. Schellmann gives numerous examples of how AI learns to discriminate against applicants on factors not related to ability to perform the job. Once you learn how the AI is discriminating, the different examples can feel repetitive because it is an identical process applied to various cases, but the magnitude the examples illustrates shows how closely these tools need to be monitored, and how thoroughly. It’s a frightening book, and you can’t help but join the call to reign in the use of this technology until we can better regulate it to comply with EEOC practices. She does include tips for job seekers on how to navigate the current climate, and provides suggestions on how we might better regulate the technology. Outside of job seekers and professionals with recruiting and hiring duties, this book is a helpful read for those that want to understand more about what AI is currently doing and how it works.