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What is Application Tracking System

What is an Applicant Tracking System?

An Applicant Tracking System (ATS) refers to a software program employed by businesses in recruiting which encompasses the collecting, processing, and management of all applications. The primary objective of any applicant tracking system (ATS) is to make the recruitment process easier by allowing for the performance of several administrative functions with little manual effort. It is built in a way that supports recruiters and HR personnel in keeping track of, reviewing and administering numerous job applications in a simple manner.

As IT Solutions put it, an Applicant Tracking System is primarily a storage system that helps every recruiter handle and sort – when necessary – several – sometimes hundreds – of applications for a job. From posting a vacancy, through resume screening, interviews scheduling, to the actual contact with the candidates – any recruitment process is in one way or another covered by an ATS.

 What are the most commonly used ATS?

Nowadays, the marketplace contains a lot of applicant tracking system, which is functional at different levels. Among the most popular ATS for already few years are:

  • Workday
    Workday is an effective ATS that is known mainly among users for its advanced functionality and it can be integrated with other systems of the organization. The system offers solutions, which serve both big companies and mid-sized organizations allowing the human resource team to manage processes ranging from hiring to payroll. Organizations prefer Workday because they are able to integrate the entire workforce management process within the human resource management system which is one of the reasons why Workday comes the top again in the ATS category.

  • Lever
    On the other hand, Lever is a well known ATS software also but this one puts emphasis on managing candidate relationships, not only recruiting. Available desktop app and features like team discussions help Lever users to manage the recruitment process without causing any problem to the recruitment team. It also has powerful analysis functionality that allows the HR to focus on the most effective ways of recruiting and retaining the talent in the Firm economy in which it operates.

  • Greenhouse
    Greenhouse is a cloud-based applicant tracking system with a range of great functionalities and works basically to improve the recruitment process by creating the options to fully customize the system for companies of all ranges. It comes with Systematic reporting of hiring workflow, use of individual candidate scorecards, and the ability to set up interviews through the system. In addition, Greenhouse connects easily with numerous HR systems and job posting sites which is ideal for businesses that want to increase their rate of hiring while ensuring that the process remains consistent and effective.

 

How does the Applicant Tracking System work?

How does Application Tracking System

  1. Job Posting and Sourcing: When a corporation decides to fill a position, it is able to generate a job posting via the Applicant Tracking System (ATS) that can be posted on multiple job sites, social networks, as well as the career page of the organization. The system generates the applicants from the given sites and other variables.

  2. Application Collection: Candidates submit their applications through the company’s career site or one of the job boards. The ATS gathers all the applications and CVs and puts them into one system.

  3. Resume Parsing and Screening: One of the most important features of an Applicant Tracking System is resume parsing. The system scans resumes and cover letters for appropriate keywords, skills and qualifications, and experiences that a candidate possesses in order to grade applicants according to the needs of the job.

  4. Candidate Evaluation: The ATS dashboard allows recruiters to easily evaluate candidates by looking at the resumes, screening question answers, and other hiring exercises information. The ATS also ranks the candidates based on the relevance of the candidates to the applied position.

  5. Communication and Collaboration: An ATS provides functionality so that the users can work together, taking internal notes, scoring the applicants and booking interviews in the software. It makes it easier for the whole team to work with hiring candidates.

  6. Onboarding: Some late-model ATS solutions are well equipped with onboarding functions allowing HR departments to begin the steps towards the new hire processes which capture document management, benefits provision, and other areas of administration.

 

 When should an organization implement ATS?

An organization must look into implementing an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) when it starts having difficulties managing the applications, such as receiving high volumes of applications or wants to speed up its hiring process. This is Important in instances where a company will be advertising for many, on a regular basis, or in the instances where the company is growing exponentially. A concern arises due to many applicants as simply going through their resumes and other information of candidate becomes an automatic burden. An ATS most of the administrative workloads through automation of some activities such as resume shortlisting, interview appointments, and candidate logistics.

In addition, in case a company is also interested in the idea of improving its HR members’ interaction with each other or wishes to extend its recruitment activities into numerous job boards and other platforms, it can facilitate the process because of its centralization. Therefore, for organizations aiming to increase effectiveness, improve candidate quality and shorten the time taken to hire, putting an ATS in place from the onset can be an advantage in the battle to recruit and retain suitable individuals.

  • What is the Difference Between an ATS and CRM

  • As an ATS (Applicant Tracking System) and a CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system might seem parallel features of an organization that are geared towards enhancing work processes or work organization of a company, the two solutions are designed for different functions. An ATS places emphasis on employment offering relayed to potential employees only and to the hiring process exclusively. To this end the HR team employs an ATS in posting jobs, downloading and uploading resumes, culling through applicants, and even securing interview slots for potential hires. The ATS’s primary focus is to attract candidates as well as enhance the entire recruitment pipeline stretcher up till the hire. It is geared mainly to the usage of focused on specific groups such as recruitment personnel, HR admins, and hiring managers who help in maintaining candidate profiles for easy access and timely decision making while also cut down on manual work.

Conversely, sales and marketing as well as customer services employ a CRM to enhance their relations with prospects and existing clients. It stores client information, updates the progress of a sales process, encourages teams to maintain contact with clients, and retains them. Even as a CRM is concerned with building relationships with customers and facilitating marketing campaigns, the ATS seeks to facilitate proper relationships with candidates in order to ease the burdens of hiring employees. Both systems share the similarity of communication tracking and engagement tracking but have very different primary purposes—ATS is used for recruitment while CRM is used for selling and sustaining business.

Why use an Applicant Tracking System

Organizations today rely on Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) for various reasons. The main reasons include the following benefits:

Source and Attract Qualified Candidates

The ability to source and attract the best talent is one of the key reasons why you should implement an ATS. ATS tools allow organizations to put up job openings in as many places as possible and work well with job boards, social media, and recruitment marketing tools. Hence, being able to source for candidates and mass hire helps the organization in attracting the best candidates more easily.

    Improved Onboarding

Integrating systems with new employees is also a step in the recruitment process. Many ATS systems also have an onboarding module and perform systematization of onboarding processes such as certifications, adding benefits, and training courses. An ATS allows the easement of onboarding process of the new employees such that it is captivating to them allowing for smooth transition with working environment.

    Faster Hiring

Features such as resume parsing, phone interview scheduling, and candidate ranking among other capabilities define the applicant tracking system; hence it makes the process of recruiting efficient. This means that recruiters can easily screen and ranked aspirants enabling quick filling of the vacant post.

   Increased Diversity

There is a clear advantage of using an ATS system to reduce bias in the course of the recruitment process to enhance diversity. Aids in Looking at People’s Talents and Capabilities Over Their Demographics So More Applicants are Included in the Process.

Major Misconception about Application Tracking System

Despite the numerous benefits of using an Applicant Tracking System, there are several misconceptions about ATS platforms that may deter some organizations from adopting them.

ATS Eliminates Human Involvement

Although an exemption and misconceptions especially surrounds the ATS systems due to the belief that a hiring manager is not needed anymore. ATS may take out some elements which do not require any human judgment e.g. resume shortlisting, however selecting appropriate candidates still needs human judgment and decision making. Simply, ATS eases and quickens the whole process.

 ATS is only meant for Large Companies

There are those who think that systems for applicant tracking are fit only for very big corporations with many hundreds of job vacancies. However, in practice all companies no matter their size can find ATS tools. Even small firms struggling to get employees would have plenty of reasons to purchase an ATS as it would help them in overseeing their recruitments.

  ATS is challenging and complex to use

Yet another false belief is that ATS systems are user unfriendly. Some older generation systems of ATS might have been hard, but the present ones are very friendly and easy to operate. Most of the time, an ATS software will also include training materials and customer support to its clients to help them use the software without any problems.

 ATS supports only Certain File Types

There are some recruiters who might think that an ATS will only accept certain formats like word documents. In fact, most current-day ats systems, allow for a number of format types, not only word and pdf, in some instances, even including images. The only thing that matters is the formatting of the resumes to allow the system to parse them effectively.

 

FAQs

1. Define what Applicant Tracking System is?

An Applicant Tracking System (ATS) is a software tool for organizations to streamline and simplify the recruitment process by integrating various tasks like job posting, applications collection, resumé screening, among others, into one package. It improves the entire procedure in that it enables the recruiters’ evaluation and selection of the candidates in a more convenient way.

2. Explain how the Applicant Tracking System works?

An applicant tracking system (ATS) performs such operations during the recruitment process: it places advertisements for job openings, gathers the necessary documents such as CVs an applicant tracking system, parses and clears applicants for job positions, and manages interview appointments. Therefore, it assists recruiters in completing any steps in the process of turning an applicant into a hired employee without excluding any of them, and offers better segregation of duties.

3. What are the merits of using an Applicant Tracking System?

An organization is able to acquire the best raw materials quicker and efficiently because it can be able to retain its customers and in this case, prospective employees towards the end of the mission for the best candidate. Apart from lessening the administrative tasks because of the system’s features on return on investment in key areas like resume checking or interview coordination, it enhances the speed and effectiveness of making recruitment decisions.

4. How does one assess whether his or her CV can get past the ATS?

Avoid using any fancy formats, mixing colors or using graphics when finishing off your CV to make it ready for an assorted systems which is ATS, reader. Or better, use the widely accepted headings such as ‘Work Experience’, ‘Skills’ among others in order for the ATS to capture your details without any hitches.

 

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