Applicant Tracking & Recruiting Trends: When the War for Talent is About Time

By. T. Murray, HR Leader/Consultant & Resume Writer (www.TMurrayHrTech.com & www.PersonalityOnaPage.com)

Join me as I lead the webinar “Online Job Applications That Rock: Getting Top Talent to Click Submit” at 2PM EST on Wednesday, February 7, 2018.

The world of recruiting has changed. For most employers, gone are the days of the resume drop box in the lobby, welcoming walk-ins interested in filling out a paper applications or entertaining calls asking to speak to HR about open positions listed in the newspaper. More often than not, when walking the rows of a career fair or networking at an industry event, you'll hear the words, "Go apply online." If you don't hear those words, a recruiter or company insider might say "Connect with me on LinkedIn." The majority of job seekers are going to go through a technology system or social media hub to get their credentials in front of decision makers and hiring managers. The latest trends in Applicant Tracking Systems are all about things that will make the process faster and easier for both the candidate and the recruiting team. From more improved resume parsing, that reduces the time for an applicant to upload their work history, to the option to "apply with LinkedIn," companies realize that the longer it takes someone to complete the applicant process, the more likely they’ll lose fresh talent to a company with a career site that takes fewer clicks and time.

As the war for talent is being redefined there is still a need for organizations to build pipelines and keep passive candidates interested and engaged. 

Integrations are critical. Applicant Tracking Systems and HR Technology vendors are making sure that they are enabling their systems to either integrate with other solutions that allow for job marketing or that those marketing tools are built in. It's not just about locating candidates "just-in-time" anymore. Executives and leaders want talent “on-the-ready,” and innovative technology tools are helping that to become a reality.  Applicant Tracking Systems are also branching into new sources for candidates. There may be integrations with top online social or search destinations like Facebook, Google, Indeed and other prominent sites that people visit on a daily basis.

Mobile is also important. There are statistics that show an increasing number of job seekers are applying to jobs on their phones. Applicant Tracking Systems have to be able to adapt for this trend, as well as let recruiters review resumes and take next step actions on candidates from a mobile device. Gone are the days where top talent is willing to spend thirty minutes completing a job application. CareerBuilder recently shared a study that indicated 60% of candidates will abandon a job application halfway through due to the number of questions or the time it is taking to complete it. Employers realize this and are reformulating what is required information for someone to be considered for employment. 

Submission times have become drastically reduced with everyone clamoring to be able to tout it takes less than five minutes to apply to a job at their company.

More automation to come. In the next phase candidates will be exposed to more automated screening and interview technology. In an effort to save recruiter time and scheduling woes for candidates, we will see more and more hiring tools that allow for screening to be done at any time. Applicants will get a link and go to a site to see questions and record their answers in video. It's all coming despite healthy debate around how impersonal this approach can be. For many millennials in the workforce, this is a welcomed option. They want to take care of business quickly and on their own time. Face-to-face interaction is optional. These methods of sourcing and screening are a bit more challenging for hiring managers and professionals who are used to the handshake as a first impression and react with discomfort to the pressure of finding the room in their home with the right background and soundproofing for a virtual interview. Despite the virtual interviewing anxieties of the more seasoned workforce, expect that in five years or so most organizations will be using some kind of prescreening technology. This will be a combination of automated questions and/or video screening.

The war for talent will be won by the talent acquisition teams that find the sweet spot of taking the least time to engage, recruit and employ top professionals, without sacrificing quality of hire or culture fit. 

This is easier said than done and involves more than reducing the number of required fields or prescreening questions in the process. It will take redesign and reengineering of the applicant flows that may have been in place for years that hiring managers have become married to in order to feel like they’ve done their due diligence to find the right hire. Look for more technology in this space, a demand for decreased time to fill from ROI motivated leadership and, more importantly, an increase in talent that applies to new gigs quickly and often, in the name of career progression and opportunity.

Join me as I lead the webinar “Online Job Applications That Rock: Getting Top Talent to Click Submit” at 2PM EST on Wednesday, February 7, 2018.