The future of recruiting: How a central talent ecosystem can elevate an organization’s recruiting database

Presented by Hiretual 

Recruiting today isn’t as simple as submitting an application and having it reviewed by a recruiter.

AI and big data technology are shifting traditional recruitment practices by uniting and standardizing data from independent — and often siloed — recruitment software to create digital talent ecosystems.

A Hiretual survey of 700 talent acquisition professionals showed 67% of hiring teams invested in new technology since the pandemic began, including new applicant tracking systems (ATS), AI-powered sourcing tools, video interviewing software, collaboration platforms, and more. A centralized talent ecosystem marries these moving parts together so each technology system has a clear path for data to contribute toward a recruiting goal.

As businesses brace themselves for post-pandemic economic recovery, a centralized talent ecosystem will be a necessary investment for businesses to maximize available data for targeted and hyper-personalized hiring approaches.

Refreshed and up-to-date databases

In the same Hiretual survey, 40% of recruiters were spending over 15 hours each week proactively searching for qualified talent from a variety of individual online sources, such as social media and professional networking sites, or AI-powered talent platforms that brought those sources together. Without an ecosystem, data from different tools are dumped into individual piles, disconnected from each other.

For example, let’s take the ATS, which has been the primary legacy database for hiring teams since the 1990s. When an ATS is siloed from other hiring tools in place, hiring teams become dependent on data analysts or developers to make sense of integrations and large data dumps. When this happens, companies are slow to identify how old and new data in their ATS can be brought together for a more comprehensive picture of the talent they engage with.

This year, 97% of talent acquisition professionals plan to re-engage talent within their ATS, as it houses years’ worth of previously interested candidates.  For talent ecosystems like Hiretual, AI technology is introduced to identify repeating patterns in internal databases for data deduplication and standardization so companies capitalize on their existing data for open roles. If businesses are able to make successful hires from their ATS, they gain a competitive advantage in reducing time-to-hire and reducing cost-per-applicant.

Centralized candidate searches

Recruiter activity has significantly increased on the Hiretual platform since the fourth quarter of 2020, showing  businesses are ready to start hiring. However, companies are still struggling to find the right talent for open roles. Over 50% of recruiters in Hiretual’s survey stated sourcing talent will be the biggest recruiting challenge in the second half of 2021.

A centralized talent ecosystem will help businesses scale their talent pipeline by combining their recruiting efforts on open web talent communities like LinkedIn, Twitter, and GitHub with applications on career platforms and job boards. When internal and external talent pools are centralized into a single ecosystem, businesses can depend on it to be their single source of truth for talent.

With more talent from different recruiting channels accounted for, hiring teams can easily view and analyze the composition of their pipeline and refine their searches accordingly. One Hiretual customer found their talent pipeline for an Account Manager role surfaced candidates with extensive product experience. This signaled an opportunity to expand the scope of their search for a position they did not plan on hiring for this year. With one click of a button, they supplemented their pipeline to include candidates from a Senior Product Manager role that was open a year ago.

By updating past candidate records, filling existing gaps, and projecting patterns based on the current talent market, a central talent ecosystem becomes a strategic investment to inform future hiring needs.

One location for personalized engagement

For businesses, personalized consumer engagement equates to increased revenue and decreased cost of acquisition. Everybody wants a personalized experience, including candidates.

When multiple data sources sit within one central talent ecosystem, businesses have more context on the talent they’re engaging with. Suppose a candidate’s current resume is automatically mapped toion their social media profiles, online portfolio, and notes from an initial screening call and interview for a position three years ago. With this information available, a recruiter can better understand who this candidate is as a person and take the time to curate personal candidate outreach.

If they know a candidate rejected their offer three years ago because they were looking to hold more managerial responsibilities, they have the opportunity to refer to the information right off the bat in their first attempt to reconnect via email.

When data is in one ecosystem, it also becomes easier to measure results, identify recurring patterns and remove bottlenecks impeding progress. Teams can track and measure the recruitment experience that works best for a given position, the messaging that results in the higher reply rates, and the stages of the recruitment cycle where the most candidates drop off. Now, teams can see where their current candidate communication process stands and compare that to where they want to be to reduce the length of their hiring cycles.

Making central essential

As digital ecosystems continue to connect the workplace, talent acquisition will soon follow in a similar direction.

In the next few years, the adoption of a central talent ecosystem will empower more businesses with the tools they need to leverage existing data, increase hiring efficiency, and overcome even the most complex recruitment challenges.

As it’s commonly said of many world-altering innovations, “it’s not a matter of if, it’s just a matter of when.”

Steven Jiang is CEO/Co-Founder at Hiretual.

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