Promoting decisions based on context, evidence

Dickson pointed out that the law is narrower than its name implies: ‘No Robo Bosses’ sounds like a ban, but it is not. “The law does not keep AI out of the decision. It keeps a human in it,” he said.

According to the legislation, a human must corroborate the system’s output using the data behind it and other supporting information like performance evaluations, personnel files, work product, peer reviews, or witness interviews. If the reviewer finds the output inaccurate, incomplete, or misleading, the employer cannot use it, Dickson said.

“The test is whether the human checked the evidence and had the power to say no [to the AI’s decision],” he said, observing that a manager simply forwarding the bot’s verdict is a mail carrier, not a decision maker. In a sense, it’s like an instant replay in sporting events: The umpire watches the video and makes a judgment call, rather than just rereading the call from the field.