Checklist For Choosing A New Applicant Tracking System (ATS)

For corporate hiring managers, the primary function of an ATS - Applicant Tracking System always has to be to help find the best possible person for their vacancy.  

Stuart Hobbs, Managing Director of online interview management and ATS supplier, Interview Coordinator (http://www.interviewcoordinator.com/), comments: “Picking the right people is a key element to business success, and the recruitment and interview process is obviously fundamental. However, hiring people takes a significant amount of time and organisation. An ideal ATS should therefore provide all the tools and options needed to streamline the recruitment process. It should also reduce administration and overheads, eliminate duplication of effort and enable contributors to view the interview content at their convenience.

The ATS may include the option for video as well as text responses from the interviewee. This can lead to  significant environmental benefits, as the travel activity by the candidates (and job campaign contributors) is reduced compared to conducting a face to face interview. And planning ahead, an ATS with a central database of the contributor comments and interview content can also help create a valuable talent pool for use in the future.

However, most importantly, an ATS should make it easier to pick the best person for the role.”
The following 10 point checklist identifies the important factors that will determine how a new ATS system can provide the right solution for your requirements:

1.      Was the software designed specifically for hiring managers or modified from a recruitment agency system?

2.      Whether you advertise your vacancy, use agencies, social media or head hunters, each recruitment campaign is different. Does the system mirror all the recruitment methods used by my organisation?

3.      Most good ATS systems will do the basic applicant tracking, but what features will help me collaborate with my colleagues, pool opinions and provide a decision structure to help ensure we pick the best candidate?

4.      Can the system be tailored to my needs?

5.      Is there a video option that could help streamline the selection and interview process?

6.      Can I easily integrate the system with my website?

7.      Is the system affordable and what are the options? There are different payment methods ranging from ‘pay as you go’ per job campaign, through to monthly or annual contracts.

8.      Can the supplier provide testimonies from existing users? Ideally call the user to get a real feel for the supplier’s service.

9.      Is there the offer of a free trial? Can I try before I buy?

10.  How easy will it be to implement? What support is there if needed?

Stuart concludes: “Whether your recruitment is managed by an HR team, or devolved directly to line managers, adopting and implementing a clear process is as important when hiring people, as it is throughout the rest of your organisation. A good ATS system will provide a foundation and structure to your recruitment campaigns and will certainly help you pick the best people“.

Interview Coordinator is available through any browser on a “pay as you use” basis for £35 or less per campaign. The product is currently available on a 60 day FREE trial.

New ATS Report Saves Time for Hiring Managers

Interview Coordinator (www.interviewcoordinator.com) is introducing an exciting new feature. The new “pay as you use” online interview management and applicant tracking system now includes innovative reporting functions designed to help Hiring Managers save time and money.

With the push of a button, Interview Coordinator will generate a single comprehensive report on a candidate. The report contains the consolidated up to date interview results and comments or opinions from the various collaborators involved in the job campaign.

Stuart Hobbs, Managing Director comments: “Interview Coordinator already provided an efficient method for multiple contributors to record their comments on a candidate and this neat new feature allows the Hiring Manager to review all those opinions at a glance in one report. Anything that helps reduce the need for unnecessary meetings, separate reports or numerous phone calls with fellow collaborators is going to save time and money and streamline candidate selection.”

When the new reporting function is used in conjunction with the existing online video options, it can  eliminate even more wasteful duplication of effort. The Hiring Manager, at their convenience, can now review a candidate’s status and interview performance with the knowledge that the report will be fully up to date and accurate.

Interview Coordinator is available through any browser, where users pay on a ‘per job campaign’ basis and the system is currently available on a 60 day FREE trial.

For further press information, call Stuart Collins on 01793-250093

 or email stuart.collins@interviewcoordinator.com

 

How Much do Video Interviews Help Reduce Carbon Emissions?

Recording a video on your PC webcam, or digital camcorder is fairly commonplace these days. It is therefore unsurprising that video is being much more widely used to help select candidates for a job vacancy. However, can using video to avoid unnecessary travel for face to face interviews really claim to help with reducing carbon emissions?

When considering this question, it might be best to look at the way candidates have traditionally been screened and selected before video technology became widely available. Most recruitment campaigns follow a basic structure. A long list of applicants is compiled. A screening exercise is then undertaken to discard those who are unsuitable. Leading to a shortlist of the best people being invited in for an interview.

Looking at this process, the amount of carbon saved will depend on the reduction of unnecessary journeys. How many journeys are saved will perhaps depend on how enthusiastically an organisation uses video in the hiring process. Using videos within initial screening process can certainly help save unnecessary journeys. It could even create a better pool of shortlisted candidates.

Videos can then be reviewed by multiple campaign contributors whenever it is convenient. This can make it easier for more people at the hiring organisation to provide better, more informed opinions on each of the candidates.

In theory, the more information decision makers can access about each candidate, the better the shortlist will be. This will inevitably result in fewer journeys to interview, as those deemed unsuitable will be excluded before this stage. Using video to replace the face-to-face interviews will reduce travel, but many hiring managers may consider this a step too far. Perhaps where distances are too great to make face to face interviews practical, or where the seniority of the position does not necessarily warrant a full interview, then video conference interviews can help with the final decision.

However, will a video conference ever be able to give the interviewer the same insight into the candidate as a face to face meeting? That is perhaps a topic for a different discussion.

In summary, along with other techniques to help select of the best candidates, video can play an important part in the recruitment process and may well reduce wasted travel time. The carbon saved from reducing interview journeys always has to be somewhat offset by the increased electricity used to store the videos on computer servers. On the whole though, I think we can claim that video technology does do something to reduce carbon emissions.

This article is brought to you by Interview Coordinator (www.interviewcoordinator.com). Interview Coordinator is designed as a centralised applicant tracking system for use by hiring managers and all the participating campaign collaborators. Along with a multitude of other features, the system uses online video to help save time and costs by streamlining the recruitment process. Users pay on a “per campaign’ basis and the system is currently available on a 60 day FREE trial.

For further press information, call Stuart Collins on 01793-250093

 or email stuart.collins@interviewcoordinator.com