How to Automate High-Volume Hiring with AI: Insights from SocialTalent Live

High-volume hiring is being reengineered – and fast. With pressure mounting to hire at scale and speed, recruiters are turning to a powerful new partner: automation. But what does it really look like when AI takes the wheel?

That was the central question at SocialTalent Live: How to Automate High-Volume Hiring with AI, our latest virtual event where TA leaders and tech pioneers came together to unpack the seismic shift happening in hourly recruitment – and what it means for the future of hiring.

For many organizations, automation is no longer an experiment. It’s operational. Entire workflows – from application and screening to scheduling and onboarding – are now being handled with little or no human intervention. The result? Greater efficiency, faster time-to-hire, and candidate experiences that are surprisingly seamless.

But it’s not all plug-and-play. Behind every successful transformation is a hard-won story of change management, tool selection, and lessons learned.

Hosted by Johnny Campbell, CEO of SocialTalent, this high-impact event featured bold, practical insights from leaders who’ve been through the trenches:

• Rachel Allen, Sr. Director of Talent Acquisition at 7-Eleven
• Matt Howe, Head of Volume Recruitment at BT Group
• Barb Hyman, Founder & CEO of Sapia.ai

Below, we’ll explore the standout ideas, success stories, and cautionary takeaways from each session – giving you a clearer picture of what full automation really means, and how you can lead your team into this new era of high-volume hiring.

— Watch the full event [HERE]

1. Rebuilding to Win: How 7-Eleven Transformed High-Volume Hiring

Key theme: This panel explores how 7-Eleven rebuilt its hourly hiring strategy from the ground up by eliminating complexity and embracing full automation.

In our opening session, we got a front-row seat to one of the boldest overhauls in high-volume hiring in recent years. Rachel Allen, Senior Director of Talent Acquisition at 7-Eleven, took us inside the retailer’s dramatic shift from managing two legacy systems and relying on 400 field recruiters to empowering store leaders with a chatbot-driven hiring process built on speed, simplicity, and scale.

To set the stage, 7-Eleven operates across the U.S. and Canada with over 13,000 locations, making more than 100,000 hires annually. After acquiring Speedway, the company inherited not just another brand, but a completely different hiring model. 

“Legacy 7-Eleven was highly franchised. Legacy Speedway…was 100% corporate,” Rachel explained. The merger meant reconciling two tech stacks, two cultures, and two radically different approaches to hiring.

A System Under Strain

The operational reality? “We found on both sides it was really a slow manual process, and our store leaders were strapped for time… It was this vicious cycle,” Rachel said. Store managers didn’t have the time to hire, but without hiring, they couldn’t create the time to do anything else.

Initially, the team scaled up recruiter headcount – 300 on the Speedway side, 100 more from 7-Eleven – to address the surge. But even with 400 recruiters in the field, they couldn’t move fast enough. “We still weren’t getting fast enough. We didn’t have enough recruiter capacity… which is crazy to think.”

Recognizing this wasn’t sustainable, 7-Eleven made a bold pivot: shift hiring accountability back to store leaders and create a Center of Excellence (COE) to support them. Rachel was asked to lead the transformation, but without those 400 field recruiters. “It didn’t take long for me to understand in order to be successful, that’s going to mean technology,” she noted.

Enter AI: A Chatbot Named Rita

That’s when they turned to conversational AI.

After assessing existing tools, Rachel and her team implemented Paradox as their full-service solution for hourly hiring. The chatbot “Rita” became the new face of 7-Eleven recruiting – screening, scheduling, and communicating with candidates in real time. Today, store leaders simply toggle a requisition on or off. The rest is automated.

“95% of the process is automated for our store leaders now, which is incredible,” Rachel said. That change has had massive ripple effects. Time-to-hire dropped from over 10 days to under 3. Candidate ghosting plummeted. Store leaders regained more than 40,000 hours per week – time they now use to run their stores more effectively. And candidates? They’re often scheduled for an interview within an hour of applying.

Ghosting Down, Retention Up

Even better, the transformation had an unexpected bonus: better hires. “Because we improved the speed, we were getting to the stronger candidates faster… unintentionally, we improved the quality of our hires and in turn actually decreased the turnover.”

The results speak for themselves: less ghosting, improved retention, and a more human process – ironically powered by bots. But Rachel was quick to highlight where tech ends and people matter most. “We purposely are not automating that last mile because we feel that’s where the human element in the process adds the most value.”

In short, 7-Eleven didn’t just adopt new technology. They rebuilt their entire high-volume hiring model – one that puts store leaders in control, candidates in conversation, and hiring velocity back in the fast lane.

2. The Case for Automation

Key theme: This panel unpacks why automation has become essential for high-volume hiring, and how TA leaders are tackling scale, speed, and experience with AI.

In our second panel of the day, the conversation turned to solving one of high-volume hiring’s most expensive, and often hidden, problems: attrition. Joining us were Matt Howe, Head of Volume Recruitment at BT Group, and Barb Hyman, CEO and founder of Sapia.ai. Together, they unpacked how BT tackled its costly turnover problem by reimagining hiring with AI – not as a luxury, but as a business imperative.

The Business Problem: Retention, Not Recruitment

At first glance, BT’s hiring needs sound manageable: around 5,000–5,500 hires per year across contact centers and retail stores in the UK. But behind those numbers lies a deeper challenge. “Time to competency in a sales role… is six months,” explained Matt. “Our gold star is to get people to a minimum of twelve months in the role.”

Yet too few were getting there. Attrition was high and expensive. “We calculated that [losing someone early] cost us £4,500,” said Matt, referencing hard costs like training and salary before new hires contributed value. “That became an accepted part of our business case.”

Getting Buy-In: Start Small, Show Value Fast

Despite the clear cost, funding an AI solution wasn’t automatic. In a cost-conscious climate, the TA team had to get creative. “We gambled,” said Matt. “We would take money from our advertising spend… because if we got this right, we would need to hire less people.” That bet paid off. A small, three-month pilot with Sapia.ai demonstrated strong candidate experience (with a 9.1 NPS), faster progression through the funnel, and better alignment between assessment results and on-the-job performance. Crucially, it also showed no adverse impact on demographics. “Our pass rates were equal to our application rates,” Matt shared. “It was allowing us to be… more fair across the board.”

From Pilot to Full Rollout: Results That Mattered

The impact was swift and measurable. BT saw a 10% improvement in 12-month retention for contact center roles and an 18% uplift in retail. “That is saving in the millions per year for the business,” Matt said. They also slashed time to hire from 35 days to 18, with further reductions expected as automation expands.

And it didn’t stop there. “We’ve seen ten consecutive months of 50% or more female hiring in our EE retail stores,” Matt added. “Prior to using this, we had never achieved a single month.”

Barb’s Perspective: Solve the Right Problem, Not Just Faster

For Barb Hyman, it’s not about deploying AI for AI’s sake. “Start with what’s the business problem, not ‘bring me some AI,’” she said. “I’m not really interested in working with businesses where they want to automate a faster status quo.”

Instead, Barb emphasized transformation over incrementalism. “We’re selling transformation, but we’re also selling trust,” she said. That trust is built through rigorous AI governance – including twice-yearly audits with legal, data privacy, and AI ethics teams. “Someone in your organization… has decision rights around the concept of retraining,” Barb noted, referencing how Sapia’s models evolve based on real hiring outcomes.

The Applicant Experience: Simpler, Faster, More Empowering

Before Sapia, BT’s process was slow and inconsistent – sometimes taking up to two weeks before a candidate heard back. Now, it’s near-instant. “You immediately get sent a link to complete your Sapia assessment,” said Matt. “We’ve seen 90% completion rates… and people love it.” The downstream impact is equally significant. “The content of those follow-up interview stages is now significantly different,” Matt said. “We’re noticing a different candidate get there.”

Final Thoughts: Less Tech, More Insight

Barb closed with a challenge to HR and TA leaders: rethink your tech stack. “Less tech is better,” she said. “AI is an incredible data-rich technology. And if you have good data, a lot of your other platforms really become redundant.”

Conclusion

The future of high-volume hiring isn’t just faster – it’s fundamentally different.

As this SocialTalent Live made clear, automation isn’t about replacing recruiters. It’s about redefining their role. With the right tools and strategies, teams can free themselves from repetitive admin, scale hiring like never before, and deliver better experiences for candidates and hiring managers alike.

But this shift requires intention. You can’t simply automate what’s broken and expect it to work. Success lies in taking a problem-first approach, choosing technology that fits your goals, and building internal buy-in from day one.

Whether you’re just starting to explore automation or already deep into the transformation, the insights from our expert speakers offer a roadmap for what’s possible – and a reality check on what it takes.

Don’t forget to join us for our next SocialTalent Live event “AI and Interview Intelligence” which takes place on September 24th!