Finding the Right Applicant Tracking System
Finding the Right Applicant Tracking System
With the economy beginning to finally show signs of upward mobility, employers are slowly beginning to hire again. There is a surplus of candidates on the market, and without an easy and automated process to manage candidate flow, the recruiting process can become increasingly more challenging. Do you feel like you are spending too much time with the wrong candidates and not enough time with the right ones? Have you ever lost a top candidate to a competitor because the candidate fell through the cracks or your process wasn’t timely enough?
These inefficiencies are costing your company real dollars each and every day. Although the “human touch” may never be completely eliminated in the recruiting process, technology can certainly help you become more productive and decrease your time to hire. Not only will an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) eliminate redundancies in data entry, it will also allow you to match skill set, experience, education, and geographic location quickly, thus giving you an edge in a competitive marketplace.
Once you have decided that you have the need for an ATS, look for these key features in a vendor:
Profile Creation: Allows candidate to create career preferences such as salary range, desired position, location, skill set, etc that are viewed by potential employers. This profile can be edited and activity can be tracked by the candidate. Resumes can be attached to this profile.
Scheduler: Tracks all aspects of your recruiting including calling candidates, arranging interviews and follow-ups, and taking notes from phone calls. Allows you to share tasks, manage status of activities, and link hiring managers to potential candidates. Managers are able to update HR when milestones have been met with work-flow capability.
Remote access and Smartphone Integration: Provides better time management by helping you get things done without being in the office. Grab information from any secure online connection including applications that are downloadable to smartphones. Share and collect information, schedule interviews, and monitor the process from anywhere you can reach the internet.
Keyword/Data Search: Saves the time it takes to sift through every detail of a resume or cover letter. Can search data fields and email attachments for specific keywords to best match employees.
Saved searches/hot lists: Sorts by characteristics such as open job orders, locale, position, or years of experience. Save customized searches for future reference so you don’t need to re-enter the data.
Online application with job screening questions: Requires candidates to answer qualifying questions for quicker filtering of candidate pool. This could range from compliance based questions that are answered via drop down menus to behavioral based questions that allow you to screen for personality and cultural fits.
Automated Candidate Communication: Ability to send system generated emails to candidate communicating profile receipt, acceptance and rejection of the profile, and interview process status. Create emails and send to multiple people at once including the candidate, hiring manager, department head, etc. directly from the system. Keep track of correspondence with potential candidates.
Reporting capabilities: Provides details on candidates and suggests which ones are the best for the job. Documents response rates and helps you determine if you’re getting an ROI through your ATS. Provides capability to track successful hiring sources including recruiting agencies, job boards, or internal referrals. Capability to facilitate EEO reporting and ensure compliance if applicable.
Customizable fields: Creates fields for specific departments, contact managers, job responsibilities, and other items unique to your organization. Allows you to easily search for specific information when you need it.
Promote job openings: Can publish open jobs to company Web site and fee-based job boards.
These are basic functions that are core to most applicant tracking systems on the market today. Depending on the complexity of your needs, function rich systems could include employee assessments in conjunction with the system.
To maximize integration, you may want to consider an HRIS system that includes an ATS within it, as opposed to buying a separate ATS system. At the very least, make sure to select an ATS that can create an export file for upload into your existing payroll or HRIS system. This will eliminate the timely data entry process involved with on-boarding as well help you to build a skills inventory which will help your organization to promote internal candidates as part of your total recruiting strategy and succession plan. Robust HRIS systems with Applicant Tracking will also store job descriptions, include job requisition creation with workflow for approval and job offer letter creation and approval processes.
If your organization is considering implementing a system to better manage your recruiting efforts and would like to explore the options available, contact Centripetal Consulting Group to learn how we can help.
Recruiting Top Sales Talent
It is sometimes very difficult to discern a quality candidate when you are in the interview process. This is especially true of salespeople who communicate for a living. Most salespeople come across very personable and make it tough to decide whether they truly will benefit your organization or if they are just a nice person. It was once said to me by an old sales manager that all salespeople are “just a little bit off”……. after all who would honestly CHOOSE to spent their career being constantly rejected? Surprising several. These days, I definitely find truth in that statement and as a sales recruiter it is my job to separate the true talent from the truly desperate.
How I Find and Evaluate Top Talent
My Network. In sales it is all about who you know, who they know, and what people know about who you know. I look to the people I trust in business to send me the names of potential candidates before I do anything else. Once I have some quality leads it is easy to build rapport based upon the referring person’s recommendation. In this case, I have moved past sourcing active candidates and into recruiting passive candidates. These are the salespeople that are consistently #1 and #2 in sales rankings and don’t have time to talk with a recruiter because they are out closing so much new business. A great tool to use in this capacity is LinkedIn, Click Here (Check out if we know any of the same people!)
Candidate Referrals. Your best candidates usually produce your best referrals. Salespeople are ego driven and will certainly not pass along the name of someone that is not at least as good as them. It is key to ask early and often for referrals. I even compensate for these because they are so valuable.
Once I have located candidates, I have a method for qualifying them further.
Proof of Performance. Many salespeople love to talk about the success they have had….. It is my job to determine if it what they claim is really fact. Before submitting a candidate to my client, I ask for all supporting documentation of sales success. I want to know where the stand in the rankings, the biggest deal they’ve ever closed, and what they have forecasted to close. From here, I utilize my resources to verify as much information as possible. The truth really is in the numbers, at least from a sales managers perspective. If the salesperson has documented repeated success, chances are it was not by luck.
Creativity and Uniqueness. I challenges my candidates to answer questions around why they feel like they are better than the next salesperson. I am curious to know what they do differently then their peers and why it works. This involves everything from sales process to contract negotiation. I need to know why people buy from them and how they have adapted during challenging times. If I am not hearing new ideas, I begin to wonder about the long term success probability.
Manageability. I must truly understand the management style that my candidate is most successful under. It is amazing the diversity that I find in this area. If I cannot match a candidate with my client’s management style, I know this will not be a successful match for either party. It is also important to understand what may be going on in a candidate’s personal life that may end up affecting their performance. It is better to uncover these issues up front so management is aware and can react accordingly.
Professionalism. I feel that a salesperson must take pride in how they appear in business if they are going to be successful. Outward appearance is a direct reflection on how one feels about oneself and the confidence that they have about their company and/or profession. A positive professional appearance is essential in my criteria for evaluating sales success likelihood.
