Disclosure: The blog post is intended for informational purposes only and should not be construed as legal advice. Sense recommends customers and partners consult legal counsel to determine how New York City’s Local Law 144 and similar regulations impact their business.
Sense is proud to announce a significant step forward in our mission to help organizations promote fair and equitable hiring practices. Sense Candidate Matching and Chatbot have successfully completed an audit conducted by Holistic AI, ensuring that our candidate screening features are not influenced by any biases.
Completing this audit helps our customers comply with New York City's groundbreaking Local Law 144.
New York City’s Local Law 144 went into effect last year and requires all employers to follow specific steps before using automated employment decision tools (referred to as “AEDTs” in the law) in employment decision-making processes (hiring-related or for internal promotions). Specifically, employers must:
The exact organizations this law applies to is unclear. One could assume that it applies to any employer or employment agency based in New York City, as well as an organization that considers candidates or has employees who live in New York City (even if the organization is based elsewhere). This is why it’s crucial to consult your legal counsel to understand how you’re impacted.
Even if your organization has no presence in New York City, it’s still a good idea to ensure any AI solution you use is making fair, bias-free recommendations. Similar laws are currently under consideration in numerous states and local jurisdictions and we can expect them to become commonplace in the coming years.
At the heart of this law is the requirement that AEDTs used for employment decisions pass a bias audit. AI-powered solutions are commonly used for automated applicant screening and to identify employees for promotions, as they help talent teams efficiently review the skills, qualifications, and backgrounds of multiple candidates and/or employees.
However, there are legitimate concerns that these solutions can be prone to bias and prefer certain people based on ethnicity, gender, and other demographics, resulting in candidates and employees losing out on opportunities they’re qualified for.
Here is more detail on how an audit determines whether or not an AEDT makes bias-free decisions or recommendations:
Using AEDTs that have passed bias audits not only helps organizations comply with New York City Local Law 144. It also gives them peace of mind that they have fair and equitable hiring and employment processes and are identifying people who truly are the best fit for their available roles.
Sense currently offers two products that automate candidate screening: Sense Candidate Matching and Sense Chatbot.
Sense Candidate Matching uses AI capabilities to understand an applicant’s skills, experience, and preferences and determine if they’re fit for the role. It then provides recruiters with a short list of qualified candidates to move forward with. Sense Candidate Matching is considered an AEDT that is required to pass a bias audit under New York City Local Law 144.
Sense Chatbot uses conversational AI to learn about a candidate’s qualifications and pre-screen them against role requirements. However, the decision-making component is based solely on rules set up by the customer, meaning Sense Chatbot is likely precluded from the scope of this law.
Out of an abundance of caution, both Sense Candidate Matching and Sense Chatbot underwent a multistep audit conducted by Holistic AI. The first step of the audit analyzed gender and ethnicity data from the Sense instances of customers who had such data readily available. The second step used Applicant Tracking System (ATS) data that was provided by customers who integrate with a number of our partners.
Using impact ratios based on intersectional groups, Holistic AI determined that the use of Sense products do not result in any adverse impact related to the application of “the four-fifths rule.” The four-fifths rule (also known as the 80% rule) is a guideline from the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) that states a hiring process is biased if any group’s selection rate falls below 80% (or has an impact ratio below 0.8). For your information, the blank intersectional populations below have no impact ratios due to a statistically insignificant sample size.
Customers whose data was included in the audit can now disclose the results to candidates. We recommend these customers take the following steps:
For customers who prefer to do their own audits, the Sense team can introduce you to Holistic AI and provide the required data. We can also provide data in a standard format in the event another company is conducting your audit.
If you have any questions about the bias audit conducted by Holistic AI, New York City Local Law 144, or Sense in general, reach out to your account manager or get in touch at sensehq.com/contact-us.
