What is recruiting software?

Recruiting software is designed to help recruiters and hiring managers to manage recruitment drives and the overall hiring process. The recruiting system collects applicant information and allows recruiters to filter, grade, and match candidate skills against job requirements. Often, recruiting software can help recruiters post openings on multiple online job boards, connect with candidates, schedule interviews, and track their progress. 

The benefits of recruiting software

• Unified channels. With recruiting software, recruiters can connect multiple job boards, career pages, internal referral portals, and social media platforms within one system and access them via a single screen. This unified view also lets recruiters post job openings and source resume across these channels in just a few clicks, saving the time and effort required by manually posting on each channel.
• Consistent candidate screening. With the sheer number of applicants per position, it can be difficult for recruiters to review and screen each applicant with the same level of attention. Through features like candidate screening and resume parsing, recruiting tools can screen hundreds of resume in a single go and shortlist applicants with desired skill sets. This speeds up the overall shortlisting process and ensures only candidates with sufficient skills are interviewed. 

Typical features of recruiting tools

• Candidate management: Build and manage relationships with candidates and track their progress throughout the hiring process.
• Interaction tracking: Track interactions and maintain a log of all communication with relevant managers, job seekers, and other stakeholders.
• Interview management: Organize and schedule interviews for potential candidates.
• Job board posting: Post openings on various job boards and social media platforms.
• Resume search: Search resumes and curriculum vitae (CV) within a document database using applicant name, job title, ID, work experience, skill sets, and more. 
• Resume parsing: Convert free-form resumes into a structured format to facilitate storage, analysis/screening, and data extraction.

Considerations when purchasing recruiting software

• Mobile access. Mobile accessibility is now a mainstream requirement for recruiting software. As more and more job seekers utilize mobile devices to search for openings, recruiters have started using smartphones to post job openings and connect with candidates anytime, anywhere. Look for vendors that offer either a mobile app or mobile browser accessibility to ensure that users can stay connected on the go.
• Integration with existing systems. Some software vendors offer a comprehensive HR suite that includes almost all necessary human resource management functionalities, while standalone recruitment software offerings focus on a specific are. If you have an existing HR system, it's essential for whatever recruitment software you purchase to integrate with it. Carefully review vendors' integration capabilities to ensure you don't end up with a siloed recruiting system, requiring HR personnel to manually duplicate entries across multiple applications. 

Relevant recruiting software trends

• Artificial intelligence is upgrading the recruitment exercise. As the demand for software with high data-crunching capabilities and increased analytics speed rises, more and more recruiting tools are adding artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning capabilities to their products. According to a recent survey by Harvey Nash Human Resources , about 26% of HR professionals believe that AI and automation are impacting their workplace right now, and more than 60% believe it will impact their workforce planning within two to five years. AI-enabled recruiting software helps businesses automate the candidate search process using requirements such as work experience, skill set, current location, and more. 
• Social recruiting tools will continue to rise. According to research from 2017, the average person spends almost two hours on social media each day. In response, recruiters have added popular social media platforms like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter to their recruitment channels while posting openings and searching for candidates. According to research by Betterteam , over 90% of professional recruiters use social media to post job openings and network. The same report states that about 70% of hiring managers have successfully hired passive candidates through social media platforms, confirming the continued rise, importance, and success of social recruitment.