Applicant tracking systems, why a sourcing strategy alone is not enough

But, how do you centralise all of this information?

One complete recruitment system

The ideal is to have a central repository for all recruitment efforts with information that can be stored, accessed, searched and shared by all those involved in the hiring process. Recruitment is a time intensive process with quite a bit of paperwork from requisition through to hire. Handling these processes electronically can also help companies save huge amounts of time and money while operating more effectively.

An applicant tracking system (ATS) is a software application that enables companies to collect, store, search, sort, rank and track the CVs received from all its job channels. This could include workflow with candidate requisitioning and sign-off, CRM with candidate management and communication, building and sharing talent pipelines across the whole HR team, as well as reporting and analytics.

Modern ATSs can also integrate with social media sites to automate selected job postings and for CV collection from applications received via these platforms. For example, with LinkedIn Apply, candidates can easily apply to jobs using their LinkedIn profiles.

A critical aspect of an ATS is that the company owns all the data collected. This reduces business risks, allows cost-effective access to the data for the whole HR team, and enables extensive mining of the data to determine results. Good systems are normally configurable so they can be adapted to the unique information requirements of each business.

By integrating leads from all sourcing channels with a full ATS, companies can have the best of both worlds in talent sourcing and recruitment management.

Improving the quality of hire

In South Africa, around 40% of organisations use a recruitment management system compared to research out of the US that has found over 60% of all companies are using some kind of applicant tracking.

ATSs are no longer just for big companies. Smaller companies can also benefit from locally developed solutions, specifically for smaller businesses, to store and archive resumes with. Getting hundreds of job applications via email and having no ability to manage them is just a killer. By automating the time-consuming aspects of recruitment, companies can free up their HR recruiters or hiring managers to place more strategic focus on how to attract the premier talent.