Key ATS (Applicant Tracking System) Requirements and Features

The process of hiring a new employee has completely transformed over the years. Paper applications are becoming a rarity, like finding a needle in a haystack. Processing every job application from different channels is nearly impossible without an applicant tracking system. But just as you assess every candidate on how well their abilities match the job, you must evaluate ATS requirements to find the best-fit software for your company.

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Applicant tracking systems offer numerous benefits to small and medium-sized businesses, making their recruitment and hiring tasks much more efficient. It’s no surprise that ATS software has become increasingly popular, with more companies realizing how easy hiring can be with the right software.

To help ATS newcomers, this article explores the top applicant tracking system requirements and features to consider when adopting such software.

• Where To Start
• Identifying Requirements
• Key ATS Requirements & Features
• Conclusion

Where To Start?

Now, I know you’re getting excited about learning all of the possibilities of ATS systems, but there are a few things to check off your list before diving into the process.

Create Your Team

You must first choose the individuals who’ll be the driving force behind selecting and implementing a suitable system. The squad should consist of an executive leader, selection manager, committee members and committee contributors.

Both the leader and manager should have exceptional knowledge of hiring processes to make the final decisions regarding ATS selection. These members should hold power and the capability to choose software to benefit the entire organization.

Committee members and contributors give users a voice. Choose from within the HR department working directly with the software and offer deeper insights into the organization’s wants and needs. Contributors should belong to an outside group like IT or finance. They can provide advice and allow individuals from external departments to chime in on what works best.

Analyze Current Hiring Processes

The next and final step is gathering your team to analyze current hiring processes. Figure out what works, what doesn’t and what features you can’t afford to skip. Weeding out unnecessary steps and clarifying essential ones makes creating a list of requirements for your solution much easier.

Identifying Requirements

There are still plenty of challenges to choosing the right platform. All organizations are different and have their own complexities, so selecting the right vendor can be quite an overwhelming task. Knowing the key features and having specific requirements laid out ahead of time make selecting an ATS much less cumbersome.

Key ATS Requirements & Features

Be on the lookout for these ATS requirements during your search:

1. Applicant Tracking

While applicant tracking is a prerequisite of every ATS software product in the market, there’s more to the process than the name suggests.

It’s no secret that the hiring process involves juggling recruiting activities, candidates and hiring priorities. If you select the right ATS, you can use automation features to standardize those tasks and systematically progress candidates through applicant pipelines.

When you’re evaluating applicant tracking system requirements, it’s important to consider how expansive you need the support to be.

• AI-based Candidate Hire Prediction
• Automated Task Assignment
• Customizable Hiring Pipeline
• Custom Rejection Reason
• Hiring Flowchart
• Key Performance Indicators (KPI) Tracking
• Recruitment Stage Alert

2. Candidate Assessment & Evaluation

Recruitment efforts pay off when you hire and retain quality talent. By using means to evaluate candidates on technical knowledge, aptitude and soft skills, you can develop comprehensive candidate profiles.

Use an ATS to screen candidates based on qualifications for the open role. Early identification of certain applicant qualities can help increase job and culture fit.

• Personality Evaluations: Ensure that potential employees possess soft skills that align with your organization’s culture. Does the ATS provide the option to assess applicants’ personality traits and emotional intelligence?
• Pre-screening Tests: To save time and effort, can you schedule preliminary tests for candidates before the next round of interviews?
• Applicant Shortlists: Assess applicants in a way that expedites and simplifies decision-making. Is the ATS able to screen candidates and develop comparable scorecards?
• Background Verification: Is there full integration with reputable background check providers? What about the one that you use?

• Candidate Background Screening
• Candidate Behavioral and Cognitive Assessment
• Candidate Pre-screening
• Candidate Reference Checking
• Take Home Assessment

3. Career Websites

A recent study by Appcast revealed that 92% of job seekers abandon the application process. While specific candidates are likely to drop off during the process, a sloppy career page shouldn’t be the reason why candidates drop off from the process.

Think about whether or not the system provides an intuitive, user-friendly experience for the candidate. Ensure that the tools you implement provide responsive designs, easy sign-up processes and extensive branding options to create lasting positive impressions.

Some ATS platforms provide quick application capabilities like auto-populated fields, drag-and-drop features to upload resumes and cover letters, and AI-based assistants to answer queries.

• AI-based Bias-language Scan in the Job Description
• AI-based Chatbot
• Automated Alerts to Candidates
• Branded Career Page
• Candidate Application Form
• Candidate Portal
• Creating and Customizing Job Templates
• Employee-generated Video Posting for Promotion Purposes

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4. Communications

Being on the job hunt is already tiring and time-consuming, so you don’t want to turn away quality candidates by adding a lengthy application process.

Your ATS also allows better communication with applicants throughout the hiring process. Whether it’s after applying or following an interview, many potential hires are left to sit in limbo as they wait, hoping to hear back from their potential employer. CareerBuilder’s recent Candidate Experience Study found that the biggest frustration for 52% of job seekers is a lack of response from employers.

You can avoid that fate by using an ATS to keep candidates updated and track their status in the hiring process. Additionally, if you’re a staffing agency, you’ll require an applicant tracking system capable of delivering timely emails and updates to clients.

• Automated Email Response
• Built-in Email Communication
• Creating and Customizing Email Templates
• Email Client Integration
• Email Scheduling
• Microsoft Outlook Plug-in
• Text Messaging Communication

5. Interview & Offer Management

Scheduling conflicts can occur when your team can’t coordinate to the best of their ability. With ATS implementation, get your team on the same page by synchronizing calendars and communication.

• Internal Communication: Does the ATS offer effective communication such as tagging users, creating notes and assigning comments for tasks?
• Calendars Sync: Can you synchronize existing calendars and schedules into the ATS?
• Video Interview Capabilities: Does the ATS allow video interview integrations to schedule and host live and on-demand video sessions with prospective hires?

• Offer Tracking: How well does the ATS manage the final onboarding stages? Can you send offer letters and onboarding forms to candidates with options to view e-forms and record digital signatures?

• Add Notes/Comment
• Built-in E-signing
• Candidate Scorecard for Interviews
• Creating and Customizing Offer Letter Templates
• Internal Chat
• Interview Guides for Interviewers
• Live Video Interviews
• Meeting Room Booking
• @Mentions
• Offer Tracking
• One-way Asynchronous Video Interviews
• Online Offer Letter Review for Candidates
• Scheduled Interview Tracking for Interviewers

6. Onboarding

Deploying an offer letter is halfway toward hiring someone. But to set things in stone, your selected candidate should agree to the terms of employment, which involves integrating them into your organization after processing the necessary paperwork.

So another thing to consider is how well an ATS can track document completion and send reminders to fill out forms.

• Automatic Reminders
• Creating Onboarding Tasks
• New Hire Checklist
• New Hire Onboarding Portal
• Onboarding Forms

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7. Platform Features

You can have the most advanced recruitment functions and facilities in the world. Still, none of that matters if the system doesn’t let your hiring team easily access information, share resources and monitor candidate pipelines.

You need to know the degree of flexibility that a potential applicant tracking system offers when for custom reporting and providing high-level visualizations. Many ATS systems allow you to analyze candidate sources or flow by exporting the data into an Excel spreadsheet.

• Mobility: Mobile apps can recruit potential employees and let users do small tasks away from the office or computer. Does the ATS platform have a responsive design? Is the ATS accessible on different mobile devices?
• Compliance: Manually adhering to the U.S. compliance laws for equal opportunities, such as the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, can be time-consuming and stressful. Does the ATS vendor provide built-in EEOC reporting?
• Data Visualization: Does the vendor provide an insight and analytics module to measure key recruiting metrics?

8. Talent Sourcing

The good news is that complex tech like automation, AI and machine learning are making their way into every business function. The ATS solutions of today use AI to screen, score and rank candidates, freeing your hiring teams to focus on other recruiting activities.

A complete ATS system is capable of identifying and evaluating potential hires. Acquiring the right talent requires a systematic approach and a varied talent pool.

• Talent Search: To leave no stone unturned, you want your talent hunt to include active and passive leads. Is the ATS able to reach out to passive candidates? Does it offer filtered keyword searches to find candidates with better accuracy?
• Equitable Hiring: Human bias can unconsciously weed into recruiting. With the right technology, you can employ a democratic approach. Does the ATS provide DEI features and AI-based functions to eliminate hiring bias?
• Expansive Distribution: Can the ATS generate and launch far-reaching campaigns across multiple job boards? Is the system able to gather insights on the performance of ongoing campaigns?
• Knowledge Base: Ask vendors if capabilities like universal, semantic, and natural language searches are part of the package. Does the software have an easily searchable knowledge base? Can the ATS solutions allow looking up keywords or phrases to pull relevant resumes, candidate profiles and support documents?

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Conclusion

The right software benefits both your hiring team and your potential hire. A better candidate experience paired with an efficient and structured hiring process is a win-win. With abundant providers in the market, making the right choice depends on how well a platform checks all your company requirements.

Although many vendors provide the same features, there are differences between them all. Comparing vendors based on how well they align with your business goals will help you make the best decision for your business.

Are there any key ATS requirements or features we missed? Let us know in the comments!