What is an Applicant Tracking System?
Jaime Ramos
Applicant Tracking System is a software that helps manage an organization’s recruitment and hiring needs.
Hiring the right people for your team is a big challenge. This process, many times managed manually, can become extremely complicated. Without the right tools in hand, opening and closing a position can take days – or even weeks – of hard work. That’s where an Applicant Tracking System comes in. This software optimizes your hiring process by helping you automate tasks and screen candidates efficiently.
In this article, we’ll learn more about ATSs:
- What is an Applicant Tracking System?
- How does an ATS work?
- Benefits of applicant tracking systems
- How to choose the best ATS?
- Why is Plooral the best ATS platform?
What is an Applicant Tracking System?
ATS is a software that offers all the features your company needs to manage its entire hiring process.
Applicant Tracking Systems are similar to a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system, but it is tailored for HR teams and their recruiting needs. With an ATS, your team can consolidate all company hiring processes and applicant information in one place.
How does an ATS work?
You will use your ATS in all the stages of your hiring process, from the moment you need to open a position to the moment you’ve hired your candidate.
Many ATSs today will automatically publish your open positions on job boards or other sourcing channels as a way to attract more candidates to your jobs.
When candidates apply to a position with your company, your ATS will most likely give you the opportunity to set a few qualification questions for your applicants to answer as they attach their resume.
Once they apply and send in their resume, they will appear in your recruitment funnel. Your ATS will come into play in this phase of your hiring process as well. Many ATS’s offer features that allow you to filter and screen candidates, conduct interviews, apply tests and collaborate with your hiring team, within your application funnel.
Applicant Tracking System – Benefits
Investing in the right Applicant Tracking System (ATS) can give your team major benefits, such as automating your hiring processes and helping you find qualified candidates in less time. Many growing businesses are still hesitant to invest in these types of technologies, specifically for their recruitment needs.
However, regardless of the number of positions you open a month or the size of your team, Applicant Tracking Systems can still bring amazing results to your hiring strategy and process.
- Helps increase team productivity
ATS’s help reduce, if not eliminate, manual operations, which can replaced by automated features. This allows your team more time to dedicate their brain power to other important tasks!
- Improves internal and external communication
Most Applicant Tracking Systems integrate with your inbox, allowing you to communicate directly with candidates through your account. With Plooral, you can also speak to team members and hiring managers directly through the platform, tagging them in tasks or to view candidate resumes. We provide an email template feature and automatic communication triggers to promote end to end seamless communication strategies.
- Streamlines processes and gathers key analytics
One of the main benefits ATSs provide is the ability to organize all of your open positions, candidates and processes in one place. You’ll be able to track key indicators and metrics that give you valuable insights on what’s working and what isn’t!
The best way to understand how an Applicant Tracking System can help your team is by talking to other businesses who use these tools.
4. Speeds up your hiring process
Applicant Tracking Systems offers features that automate your workflow and day to day tasks. It also provides intelligent filters to find qualified candidates easily in your funnel, ultimately speeding up your hiring process.
How to choose an ATS thats right for your company?
Now that you know the importance of having an ATS, you need to decide which one out of the thousands that exist, is right for YOUR company!
It’s important to choose a system that meets your needs, gives you a good ROI and fits your budget.
Don’t forget about candidate experience when choosing an Applicant Tracking System. It’s important that you provide applicants with a humanized process and you’re able to give everyone a fair chance to be screened and evaluated.
It’s important to ask yourself the following questions when looking for an ATS:
- How personalized do you want your recruitment process to be?
- What does the candidate journey look like?
- Do you want to automatically eliminate candidates without screening them first?
- How many job portals would you like your ATS to connect to?
- Which tasks do you need to automate?
- Do your managers need to be involved in your recruitment process? Do they need different permissions?
- Would you like to apply tests or ask your candidates questions?
What makes Plooral stand out from other ATSs?
Plooral is a modern and intuitive applicant tracking system that not only streamlines your recruitment process from beginning to end, but also delivers a fantastic candidate experience to your applicants. Count on Plooral to automate your workflow, involve your entire team, help you attract and screen candidates efficiently and much more. Plooral is very simple to navigate and use on a daily basis, offering powerful features that allow you to make the most of your recruitment process.
Plooral features include:
- Automatic job board integrations
- Schedule and conduct online interviews
- Collaborate with your entire team
- Promote your company benefits and culture through vídeos
- Track KPIs and Indicators
- Create and manage talent pipelines
- KanBan board to organize processes
- Apply screening and search filters
- Apply assessment tests and video interviews
And much more!
Here’s what our clients had to say about Plooral in our newest survey:
If you like what you see, speak to one of our team members!
Finding the right ATS for your organization can be a difficult task! After you understand exactly what needs to be met in your hiring process, speak to other recruiters in your network and learn what ATSs have worked for them! Schedule demos and make sure to have at least three options to choose from when making your final decision!