AI reads resumes, makes calls, and even conducts video interviews, all before recruiters get involved
For companies struggling to hire the right talent, mainly from India's Tier 2, 3, and 4 cities, the problem isn't a shortage of applicants or qualified people. It's the time-consuming process of sifting through thousands of resumes to find the few who actually fit the job.
In a conversation with AIM, Rahul Veerwal, CEO and founder of GetWork, said he believes the solution lies in reimagining recruitment through the use of artificial intelligence.
"In Tier 2 and beyond, the population is huge, but only about 10 to 12% of job seekers are adequately skilled," said Veerwal. "The challenge is not the number of applications but the ability to identify the few that really match."
Its AI-driven hiring engine is designed to do just that, handle the "heavy lifting" of sourcing and screening candidates so that HR professionals can focus on final interviews and onboarding.
GetWork eliminates the first three steps of traditional hiring, which usually consume around 80% of the time spent on recruitment. These steps include matching resumes to job descriptions, conducting initial calls to gather missing data such as salary expectations or shift preferences, and assessing soft skills like communication. Instead, GetWork automates the entire process. Once a job is posted, every application is instantly scored against the job description using AI. From there, an AI-powered system calls selected candidates to fill in resume gaps.
Candidates who clear this stage then move to AI video interviews, where communication skills and confidence are evaluated across different parameters. By combining insights from the resume, the AI call, and the video interview, the platform builds a 360-degree profile of each candidate.
This hyper-personalised, AI-led approach has delivered real-world results.
When real estate tech firm NoBroker needed to scale its customer support team quickly, traditional hiring platforms only led to a flood of unsuitable applications. Using GetWork, the company received over 2,500 applications, out of which 1,430 candidates were contacted by AI. The system identified 220 as potential matches. These candidates went through AI video interviews, and 57 were shortlisted for final human evaluation. Eventually, 21 offers were rolled out, with a hiring budget of just ₹30,000.
Not all AI-led interviews have won hearts. On Reddit, a user shared, "It was really awkward and I almost lost interest by the end of it."
Krishna Khandelwal, co-founder & CEO of Hunar.AI, a frontline hiring platform, said, "One of India's top food delivery firms used to take up to four days to onboard delivery partners, with only 12-13% converting. With our voice-first AI, the same process now takes less than 24 hours, and conversion rates have improved to 15%."
He added that voice agents have also helped tackle attrition. "Follow-up calls after a few deliveries revealed key drop-off reasons, like missed incentives or salary disputes, allowing HR teams to intervene early."
This shift is part of a larger trend in Indian tech hiring. The Instahyre Product-Tech PayCheck 2025 report, based on data from over 54,000 candidates and 14,000 recruiter conversations, shows that recruiters are increasingly looking beyond metro cities and beyond conventional hiring metrics. According to the report, 42% of backend engineers and 37% of frontend professionals now live outside the top five metros. Cities like Indore, Jaipur, and Chandigarh are emerging as new hiring hubs, driven by remote-first companies and greater broadband penetration.
Even pay trends are evolving. While early-career frontend salaries have dipped slightly (by ₹1.5 LPA), experienced backend developers are commanding up to ₹49.37 LPA. Skills like Python, Java, and AWS are now must-haves, not just nice-to-haves.
"The future of hiring lies in identifying deep tech talent early, investing in skill development, and being agile in workforce planning," said Sarbojit Mallick, co-founder of Instahyre. "Those who upskill and adapt will lead the pack."
Using AI for hiring also brings concerns around bias. Veerwal acknowledges this but insists that GetWork's systems are built with safeguards. First, the large language models (LLMs) used are retrained and updated monthly based on feedback, ensuring the AI evolves with industry needs.
Second, the models are layered with industry-specific training. For instance, for technology roles, the AI might prioritise analytical ability, while for BFSI roles, it emphasises communication and compliance-related parameters.
Third and most critically, GetWork operates on a human-in-the-loop model. The AI works in a "suggestive mode" offering recommendations with clear explanations. Final hiring decisions are always made by humans, and their choices are fed back into the system, making the AI more intuitive over time. "Bias in hiring often stems from fatigue and volume," Veerwal noted. "We're trying to replace gut reactions with structured, explainable decision-making."
The underlying tech that powers GetWork includes in-house agentic models, LLMs from OpenAI and Anthropic's Claude, and orchestration tools like LangGraph. These systems have been fine-tuned using supervised learning on a massive dataset of over two million job roles, four million resumes, and nearly two million interview questions. This data has been accumulated over more than five years through GetWork's engagement with over 15 colleges and 9,000 companies.
Looking ahead, GetWork is planning to decentralise hiring by building a full-stack solution for recruitment and staffing agencies. The idea is to launch a "franchisee model" where local agencies can operate using GetWork's AI engine and demand-generation platform. "We envision a future where even smaller players can run smart recruitment operations using our tools," said Veerwal. "This is especially critical as companies begin expanding into Tier 2 and 3 cities."
GetWork's clientele includes the Motilal Oswal Group, Aditya Birla Group, IndusInd Bank, Blinkit, Red FM, ITC Infotech, and Paytm across sectors like BFSI, retail and technology. "Our mission goes beyond cost efficiency or speed," said Veerwal. "We're building a more equitable hiring ecosystem, one where someone in Bhopal or Bhubaneswar can have the same opportunity as someone in Bangalore or Mumbai."
Meanwhile, reactions to such interviews conducted by AI agents are varied. 'Talking to AI interviewers has felt very dehumanising," Charles Whitley, a 22-year-old computer science and mathematics graduate from Santa Clara University, reportedly said. Whitley, who has had two such interviews in the past seven months, recounted that during one for a software engineering role, the AI voice attempted to sound more human by inserting "ums" and "uhs," which he described as "some horror-movie-type stuff."
