An ethics researcher ripped apart my AI resume screener and I had to rebuild it from scratch

This grad student from Stanford emailed me a 3 page critique of my hiring algorithm after I posted about it here. She pointed out it was penalizing candidates who listed volunteer work because the training data came from corporate jobs. I changed the weighting on community service entries and now I'm seeing way more diverse applicants come through the pipeline. Has anyone else had to overhaul their system after getting called out on bias?

2 comments

2 Comments

johnson.daniel26d ago

So is the fix actually working long term or did you just see a temporary bump in diversity apps? Curious if you tracked it past the first month.

grantadams26d ago

That's a fair question (and honestly, the kind of follow-up that most people skip). @johnson.daniel actually we kept the data going for about six months after the fix, and the bump stayed pretty consistent. The first month was the biggest jump, sure, but it didn't crash back down or anything. It leveled off at a point that was still way higher than before the fix, so it feels like a real change in how people find and apply to us. The real test will be the one year mark, but so far the numbers are holding.