The race for AI agents in HR: How Workday, SAP SuccessFactors and Metaview are changing recruiting

Workday, SAP and Metaview all announced background AI agents for recruiting in the same week. We compare the three announcements and lay out a practical roadmap for HR teams under Türkiye's data protection law and the EU AI Act.

AI first arrived in HR software as an "assistant". As of October 2026, the industry's biggest players are taking the next step: agents that work in the background on their own. On October 13, at Workday Rising 2026, Workday announced "autopilot" agents for HR, finance and IT ^[1]. A day earlier, SAP had introduced the SuccessFactors 2H 2026 release under its "Autonomous HCM" vision ^[3]. And on October 14, recruiting AI company Metaview said it had expanded its Workday integration into application review and interviewing ^[4]. In this article we look at what AI agents in HR mean for recruiting teams, with sources.

The three announcements share a common thread. The agent is no longer a chat window that answers questions. It is positioned as a "digital teammate" that watches the hiring queue, suggests candidates, schedules interviews and drafts feedback. So what does this race change for HR teams, and where do they need to be careful?

At a glance: Three announcements

Workday: "From copilot to autopilot"

At the center of Workday's announcement is its Talent Acquisition Agent. According to the company, the agent continuously monitors open roles, starts finding qualified candidates as soon as a job is posted, and gives recruiters information about each candidate's qualifications for the role as well as potential gaps. If the pipeline is too thin, it notifies recruiters in tools such as Slack, suggests sourcing actions and drafts outreach ^[1].

The key detail: Workday says sourcing runs in the background, but outreach to candidates still requires recruiter approval before anything is sent ^[1]. The agent can also coordinate interview scheduling, give interviewers context and draft feedback for review. Recruiter preferences such as interview timing or format can be saved to the agent's memory ^[1].

Workday stresses that its agents inherit each company's policies, permissions and approval rules from day one. Customers decide which tasks run automatically and which need a person, and every action an agent takes is logged ^[1]. According to the company's blog, these autonomy settings can vary by region, role or organization ^[2].

One data point Workday shared shows where the pressure is coming from. According to its Global Workforce Report, the median number of applications per offer rose from 58 in July 2025 to 69 in July 2026 ^[2]. More applications mean more admin work for recruiting teams.

On timing, the Talent Acquisition Agent's autopilot capabilities are available to early adopter customers now, with general availability planned for early 2027. Autopilot capabilities for the Payroll, Accounting and Deployment Agents are planned for early adopters in early 2027 ^[1].

SAP SuccessFactors 2H 2026: "Autonomous HCM"

SAP's answer covers broader ground. The SuccessFactors 2H 2026 release rests on three pillars: automating the HR function, redesigning how work is split between people and AI, and reinventing how organizations recruit, develop, move and reward their people. These capabilities are delivered through Joule Assistants working together in a single workspace called Joule Work ^[3].

The recruiting highlights are ^[3]:

• Winston Screen: Repeatable, configurable screening designed to narrow large applicant pools to a focused shortlist.
• Winston Match: Results are now fully reportable in Report Builder, which SAP says gives recruiters visibility into the reasoning behind AI-assisted decisions.
• Winston Companion and Winston Interview: Within SmartRecruiters for SAP SuccessFactors, Companion monitors pipelines and books interviews, while Winston Interview delivers a conversational, AI-led screening experience.
• Interview Summary Agent: Automatically captures a structured interview summary and posts it to the candidate profile.

SAP also announced a Payroll Assistant that flags anomalies, an HR Operations Assistant that detects approval bottlenecks and a Learning Assistant that recommends learning based on skill gaps ^[3].

Metaview: An agent added to the existing system

The third move comes from the ecosystem growing around the big platforms. Metaview, which says more than 7,000 companies use it, expanded its two-way integration with Workday. Its Application Review Agent assesses inbound applicants and syncs advancement and rejection decisions directly into Workday. Interview notes are written into Workday scorecards automatically, using existing interview templates ^[4].

According to Metaview, Workday approvals, candidate dispositions and audit trails keep running throughout. Guardrails can define what agents can and cannot do, and organizations get full audit trails of agent reasoning, actions and outputs ^[4].

AI agents in HR: The race is really about control

Put the three announcements side by side and one thing stands out: each promises control as loudly as it promises speed. Workday talks about agents that inherit permissions and approvals ^[1], SAP about reporting the reasoning behind AI decisions ^[3], and Metaview about human oversight and audit trails ^[4].

There is good reason for that. Recruiting is one of the most sensitive uses of AI. Annex III of the EU AI Act lists as high-risk the AI systems intended for the recruitment or selection of people, in particular those that analyse and filter job applications and evaluate candidates. Systems that make decisions on promotion, termination or performance evaluation fall under the same heading ^[5].

In short, buying the agent is the easy part. The hard part is deciding which decisions stay with the agent and which stay with a person.

What it means for companies in Türkiye

Large companies in Türkiye running Workday or SAP SuccessFactors, along with local HR teams of multinational groups, will meet these features as part of their release cycles. The message is the same for smaller firms: AI agents will arrive embedded in the HR system you already use, not as a separate tool.

Local law matters here. Article 11 of Türkiye's Personal Data Protection Law No. 6698 (KVKK) gives individuals the right "to object to the occurrence of a result against the person himself/herself by analyzing the data processed solely through automated systems" ^[6]. A process in which a candidate is rejected based solely on an agent's assessment needs to be reviewed against this right. Companies that work with candidates in the EU or serve the EU market should also follow the EU AI Act's high-risk classification closely ^[5].

If you want the candidate's side, see our guide to optimizing your LinkedIn profile for modern hiring. For the security side of agents connected to HR systems, read our piece on employee-built AI agents, and for SAP's Joule agents in logistics, our article on AI agents in the supply chain.

Practical takeaways

1. Draw an autonomy map. For each step (sourcing, scheduling, screening, rejection notices), write down whether the agent acts, the agent proposes and a person approves, or only a person acts. Vendor autonomy settings ^[1][2] should implement this map, not replace it.
2. Keep a person in rejection decisions. Having a recruiter make the final call, especially in screening and rejection, is also easier to defend under the KVKK right to object to automated decisions ^[6].
3. Ask for reasoning and logs. During procurement, ask whether records showing what data the agent used, why it made a recommendation and who approved it can be reported ^[1][3][4].
4. Don't automate candidate messages. As Workday does ^[1], route outgoing candidate messages through human approval.
5. Update privacy notices. If interview recordings, transcripts or AI summaries are used, tell candidates clearly. If data goes to a cloud abroad, check the KVKK rules on cross-border transfers separately ^[6].
6. Start small. Pilot low-risk steps like interview scheduling and note summaries first. Measure time-to-hire and candidate experience, then move on to higher-risk steps like screening.

The race for AI agents in HR has only just begun. The winners won't be the companies that automate the most work, but the ones that govern automation best.

Frequently asked questions

What is an AI agent in recruiting?

Unlike a chat window that answers questions, it is software that works in the background: it monitors the hiring pipeline, recommends candidates, schedules interviews and drafts feedback. Workday's Talent Acquisition Agent, for example, continuously monitors open roles and starts finding qualified candidates as soon as a job is posted ^[1].

When will Workday's autopilot agents be available?

According to Workday, the Talent Acquisition Agent's autopilot capabilities are currently available to early adopter customers, with general availability planned for early 2027 ^[1].

Is AI candidate screening high-risk under the EU AI Act?

Yes. Annex III of the Act lists AI systems intended for recruitment or selection, in particular to analyze and filter applications and evaluate candidates, as high-risk ^[5].

What does Türkiye's KVKK say about rejections made only by AI?

Article 11 of Law No. 6698 gives individuals the right to object to an outcome against them that results from analysis of their data exclusively by automated systems ^[6]. Keeping a recruiter responsible for the final decision at rejection steps is therefore the more defensible setup.