High-Tech & High-Touch: Inside Picnic’s Approach to Solving the Recruitment Paradox at Scale
22 Apr 2026
HR Tech Talks Theatre
Tech Talk
In high-volume recruitment, organisations face “The Great Paradox”: the more technology we deploy, the more we fear losing the human touch. Yet at the scale many organisations operate, delivering a personal candidate experience simply isn’t sustainable without technology. The future of hiring isn’t “tech vs. human”; it’s high-tech and high-touch.
In this session, Jeroen will share how Picnic worked with VONQ to solve this tension. By using automation to handle routine questions 24/7, and collect data points, Picnic removed the “robotic” tasks from their recruiters’ plates and further improved applicant experiences (AX), creating the breathing room needed for genuine connection where it matters most.
The session will provide a pragmatic look at how high-tech and high-touch can work together to provide a tailored experience for every individual, while ensuring a human recruiter always makes the final call.
In this session, Jeroen will share how Picnic worked with VONQ to solve this tension. By using automation to handle routine questions 24/7, and collect data points, Picnic removed the “robotic” tasks from their recruiters’ plates and further improved applicant experiences (AX), creating the breathing room needed for genuine connection where it matters most.
The session will provide a pragmatic look at how high-tech and high-touch can work together to provide a tailored experience for every individual, while ensuring a human recruiter always makes the final call.
Topic
AI Automation & Agentic Systems
Learning Objective 1:
Enabling human touch at scale: Learn how to design a process where smart automation and human judgment support each other.
Learning Objective 2:
Rapid testing & iteration: Discover how to set up lean experiments that prioritize speed and learning over perfection, allowing you to pivot based on real-world results.
Learning Objective 3:
Closing the feedback loop: How to combine qualitative insights (actually talking to your candidates) with quantitative data to continuously improve the hiring process.