HR Tech Does Not Improve Candidate Experience; How You Use it Does

The promise of new technology is tantalizing. It will streamline processes, save us money, make the work day more bearable – and sometimes, it will even do some of our work for us.

Because of this recent reliance on technology, 40 percent of human resources (HR) departments were either restructured this year, or will be next year, reported HRCloud.

That’s a huge impact – and it’s one that can easily cloud an employee’s vision. It’s easy to forget that the technology we purchase is something we have to make work for us, and HR is no exception.

For recruiters, technology is a promise that sifting through massive amounts of incoming resumes will be easier, and that candidates will enjoy the process more. But candidate experience can’t be improved with just technology alone – you have to control it the right way.

Your candidate experience has a lot to do with your application process.

A lot of your candidate’s experience with your organization takes place during the application process – your applicant tracking system (ATS) is probably the most important piece of HR technology that a recruiting team can leverage.

The right ATS can help you find the right candidates through tracking their processes, using keywords to sift through their resumes, sending out automated responses to let candidates know where they stand in the application funnel, and much more.

But the ATS can only go so far – at some point, a candidate is going to want to talk to a person. Understand that your ATS will only work as well as you allow it to. Rely on feedback from candidates to better understand how to improve.

Find out the answers to questions like:

• Do you feel that all application questions were relevant to the position you applied for?
• Did you feel that the application process was personal and straightforward?
• When do you expect to hear from a member of our recruiting team?

Candidate experience goes beyond the ATS, and often begins when recruiters leverage content on other platforms that might not be a staple in every HR office.

Optimize the HR tech you’re using that doesn’t come with the ‘HR tech’ name.

Social media, email marketing and employer branding campaigns are areas where the work of recruiting and marketing overlap. In this case, social media tools, email automation tools and other marketing platforms become HR tech – they need to be utilized optimally for a recruiting team.

The way the industry talks about social recruiting, you’d think that just signing up for a LinkedIn account would provide you with an influx of candidates for a perfect position. In a way it does, but that doesn’t discount the experience candidates have when speaking with a recruiter online, or interacting with them through a social account.

The same goes for candidate nurturing through email marketing, and employer branding campaigns. Each time a potential candidate sees or interacts with a brand online, it’s a contribution to their candidate experience.

Think about some of the following questions:

• Which social technologies will provide me with the biggest yield for my efforts?
• How does communication through technology differ than direct communication?
• How can technology be leveraged for candidate nurturing and employer branding to give a specific candidate the most personal and positive experience with my organization?

You’re not the only one communicating with your candidates. If the candidate is working with an agency, or directly with the hiring manager, your use of HR tech to communicate with these sources is just as important to improve candidate experience.

Communication and ease of use are what improve candidate experience – use HR tech to streamline it.

You’re probably using several different acquisition channels to bring candidates in through the funnel. This means you’re probably not the only one talking to these candidates.

In the cases in which an open position is sent to search, recruiters have to field incoming calls and questions from several different recruiting agencies at once, while dealing with the assessment of an increased volume of candidates from these sources.

Using an HR technology vendor management system (VMS) will help streamline your communication with your agencies. This will increase the speed at which they can communicate with the candidates they’re submitting, and therefore, improve their candidate experience.

The following questions can help you streamline your agency communication:

• Am I making my requirements for this position crystal clear for each agency?
• Have I allowed the recruiting agency to get a feel for exactly what it’s like to work at my organization?
• Am I talking to my agencies in the most effective way possible for both parties?

Optimizing HR technology to work for you is your best bet for recruiting success – but personal communication is what really improves candidate experience. The best experiences come from those candidates that found the process quick, personal and valuable.

We know that working with direct hire recruiting agencies is necessary to improve your candidate search, and also that it can be expensive. We work hard to provide you with the insights you need to make informed agency decisions. To learn how, contact us.

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