RolePoint Connect: A New Era for Talent Data

CONNECT: A NEW ERA FOR TALENT DATAA R O L E P O I N T W H I T E PA P E R B Y @ B I L L B O O R M A N

2RolePoint Inc. © 2016 Connect: A New Era for Talent Data

C O N N E C T : A N E W E R A F O R T A L E N T D A T A

INTRODUCTION

Collaboration has been the watchword of

work in the last few years, primarily

enabled by technology. Where once the

vogue was to attempt to build secure

repositories for data, the effect was to

create a walled garden. There was one

way in and no way out. Whilst this was

secure, the system architecture (the way

things were built), gave no opportunity

for the data that was housed there for

any other purpose.

When we consider recruiting, this was

principally the ATS (applicant tracking

system). The early legacy ATSs were built

for data storage and all applicant

transactions needed to occur within the

same single technology. The candidate

journey bounced about from one web

destination to another, requiring the

creation of new accounts with each new

technology and the requirement to

duplicate the manual input of information

multiple times.

What might have started by clicking on a

link from an e-mail, might take the

prospective candidate to a job ad on a

job board, which required a registration,

only to be diverted to a career site to

apply, and then an applicant tracking

system to complete the application. The

candidate had to do all the work and the

technology operated in isolation with no

digital communication between one tool

and another.

Jumping forward to 2016, the modern

recruiter will use multiple sourcing tools

and channels to lead or entice applicants

to apply. Technology operating in

isolation creates work and an unpleasant

experience for the modern job seeker. It is

no wonder that up to 70% of applicants

who commenced applying for a job

on-line abandoned the process before

completing because it was just too

complicated and confusing.

The other complication was that whilst

some enterprise ATSs might dominate

the market (Taleo being the largest

player), there are hundreds of different

ATSs being used in the market, and each

individual technology, although similar in

design and purpose, has it’s own way of

working.


“The modern recruiter will use multiple sourcing tools and channels to lead applicants to apply. Technology operating in isolation creates work and an unpleasant experience for the modern job seeker.”

In this discussion paper we, aim to

examine this technology environment,

draw on comparisons from best practices

in e-commerce and digital retail, and

make recommendations for

considerations regarding hiring online.

The aim is to make things simpler and

better for all the stakeholders in the

recruiting chain, not least the recruiters

and job seekers who are mostly impacted

by these technologies. Whilst this is by no

means a singular solution, we hope you

find it useful.

Bill Boorman

RolePoint Lead Advisor



THE ATS MARKET

It is increasingly common for the

organizations to employ some level of

ATS to process job applications. The ATS

runs end to end and is where the

applicant applies and their data resides.

When we consider integrating recruiting

technology, the ATS is almost always

considered the final destination for data

and the place where people apply.

Our research revealed that the average

recruiter used up 22 different tools and

technologies when sourcing talent.

Respected software research house

Datanyze researched the ATS market by

user companies in 2015. The methodology

they applied to conduct this research was

to interrogate the data behind the top

career sites limited to those in the Alexa

rankings for 1 million visitors, searching

for instances of any ATS being attached.

Datanyze found over 100 individual ATSs

in play, with the market dominated by

Taleo (owned by Oracle), with just over

32% of the market, iCIMS with 8.3%,

Jobvite with 4.8% and SilkRoad with

4.5%.

The full top 20 were:

1. Taleo

2. iCIMS

3. Jobvite

4. SilkRoad

5. Greenhouse

6. Jazz

7. UltiPro

8. Kenexa

9. Workable

10. Lever

11. Lumesse

12. SuccessFactors (SAP)

13. SmartRecruiters

14. Cornerstone On Demand

15. Applicant Pro

16. ADP

17. Recruiterbox

18. Workday Recruit

19. myStaffingPro

20. BambooHR

Source: Datanyze: Recruitment Market Share in the

Alexa Top 1M

With such a fragmented market, the

challenge faced when figuring out the

digital job seeker workflow was how to

connect other technologies with the ATS

when there was no one-size-fits-all

solution and when the ATS will be the

final destination for the candidate data.


ATS where the candidates need to apply,

without the need for any new sign in or

duplication of information.

At present, individual job boards would

be required to integrate with each of the

many ATS vendors one by one to provide

a better experience for their users and

prevent the high drop off rates that were

prevalent.

Taleo, 32.6%

iCIMS, 8.3%

Jobvite, 4.8%

SilkRoad, 4.5%Greenhouse,

3.6%

Jazz, 3.3%

UltiPro, 3.3%

Kenexa, 3.2%

Workable, 2.7%

Lever, 2.3%

Lumesse, 2.2%

SuccessFactors, 2.1%

SmartRecruiters, 1.8%

Cornerstone On Demand, 1.5%

Applicant Pro, 1.4%

ADP, 1.4%

Other, 18.4%

THE API APPROACH

As technologies have evolved in all

sectors, utilizing APIs is not a new

challenge. In the same way as retail

organizations needed to seamlessly link

the check-out with the digital store, so

too hiring companies needed to create a

similar data flow from the job board or

career site that hosts job listings to the

Source: Datanyze: Recruitment

Market Share in the Alexa Top 1M


S E C T I O N H E A D E R

V



Integration, initially, was a cumbersome

process because no two vendors are the

same. Each has a different set of rules,

requiring data to be presented in a

different format. Despite campaigning

by the HR Open Standards Consortium,

there has been little change in this

regard, with many ATS technologies

requiring an entirely different set up.

The solution to this from ATS vendors

was to introduce APIs (application

programming interface). An API is a set

of routines, protocols, and tools for

building software and applications.

A good API makes it easier to develop a

program by providing all the building

blocks, which are then put together by

the programmer, and is the most

common way technology companies

integrate with each other.

APIs are one of the most common ways

technology companies integrate with

each other. Those that provide and use

APIs are considered as being members

of a business ecosystem.

The APIs allow one platform, such as a

job board, to deliver data to another

(the ATS), without the need of a log in,

whilst converting data formats to be

compatible. This enables a job seeker to

apply in one place and connect

seamlessly from one destination to

another, without needing to switch

screens or start again.

EMULATION VS INTEGRATION

The short term fix for many technology

companies was to build on the principle

of emulation. Emulation is the practice

of copying what is needed in one

technology, and “pasting” the data file

into another technology.

This process is much the same as if the

source of the data, such as a resume,

was manually being inputted into the

destination technology by a human. This

has the benefit of enabling the job

seeker to only input the data once in one

place, for example, completing the

application on a job board and

uploading the resume or CV. The drop

off rate reduces in this instance because

the user is not required to change

destination and the data provided is

roughly translated to a format that can

be received by the other technology..


V


The downside of the commonly used

emulation approach is that the

technology is cumbersome to setup and

maintain, and the resulting data flow is

only one way (into the ATS). Whilst it is

easier for the job seeker to move their

data to the final destination in a

seamless way, there is no flow of data

out.

OUT AS WELL AS IN

By contrast, the integrated API approach

makes the return flow of data out as

simple as it is to get the data in, and this

is the real appeal to job boards and

other technology companies, because it

becomes possible to fully attribute

response and outcomes, because each

applicant can be uniquely identified.

With emulation, the job board follows

the rules of the destination technology.

With API integration, the job board or

career site sets the rules as to data flow,

creating a simple flow of data in and out.

A good example of this would be a job

seeker uploading their resume on a job

board in response to a job listing and an

apply button. The resume goes through

a process of intelligent parsing to create

the record within the ATS and because

the engineers have done the hard part in

creating the rules, enabling one

technology to speak to other, users such

as job boards can set the rules as to

what happens.

In this way, the job board can be notified

of every change of candidate status,

such as interviewed, rejected or hired.

With the engineers doing the hard yards

developing on the API of each individual

ATS, integrations are enabled across a

wide range of technologies following the

same rules for data flow. These rules are

known as protocols. For example, setting

the protocol that if an applicant in the

ATS originating from the job board gets

hired, then the job board receives a

notification of such.



MEANINGFUL METRICS

Linking the ATS with the job board

enables us to rethink the metrics that are

important for attributing performance.

This has deeper implications when

considering the potential for progressing

the job board pricing model to one of pay

per performance from pay for post, which

is an evolution from pay per application, “

which is increasingly being explored and

adopted by job boards.

What has been restricting the

effectiveness of this has been accurate

attribution. The research organization

CareerXroads, who are seen as an

authority for their annual source of hire

report, have recently announced that they

will stop issuing this research because of

the lack of quality of raw data, which is

impacted by largely relying on the

memory of candidates or inconsistent

methods of collection.

Automating this process from apply (on

the job board), to changes in the

candidate status within the ATS will

resolve this problem, providing

consistent, accurate and real time data

each time something happens, with each

applicant tracked with a unique identifier

that follows the candidate for their full

lifetime within the ATS.

By cleaning up tracking data, setting

meaningful metrics around performance

and adjusting rewards accordingly offers

significant potential to job boards and

career sites moving forward.

“By joining up technologies through the use of intelligent APIs, we can begin to think of all the tech we use as one.”


THE CASE FOR COLLABORATION

Moving on from the social and the mobile

age (and ages last a short period of time

these days), we can now consider

ourselves to be entering the age of

collaboration.

Collaboration, in terms of the way we

structure our workplace and collaborative

in the technology we use. By joining up

technologies through the use of

intelligent APIs, we can begin to think of

all the tech we use as one.

For the job seeker we can provide a

seamless experience, navigating easily

from one digital destination to another,

without the need of multiple sign-ins or

requests for duplicate information. There

will be less drop offs and a better

candidate experience that makes sense.

For hiring companies, they can properly

understand where candidates come from

and can attribute success accordingly. In

this day and age, the full technology

stack needs to communicate both ways,

moving data in and data out in a simple

way, avoiding duplicate processes.

For job boards, this is a gateway to a

whole new way of working where the

users set the rules or protocols. API

integration represents a new era of

collaboration.

CONCLUSION

When examining the argument of

whether to adopt open API integrations,

it is easy to see the real benefit of being

able to setup two way data flows.

I hope you have found this discussion

paper useful, and can see the benefits to

everyone of an integrated ecosystem.

Welcome to the collaborative age, where

technology need not be strangers.

Bill



N E X T S T E P . . .

R O L E P O I N T . I O

I N Q U I R I E S @ R O L E P O I N T . C O M

a range of job boards, SaaS applications

and Fortune 500 companies.

Understanding that at the core of any

successful applicant experience is

simplicity, RolePoint Connect focuses on

providing an engaging and frictionless

technology for candidates and recruiters

alike.

For recruitment teams, RolePoint offers a

comprehensive set of tools, enabling

tracking, automation and recruitment

intelligence for greater control and insight

into sourcing within your organization.

B I L L B O O R M A N

The author, Bill Boorman, has over 30

years’ experience in and around recruiting.

He has spent the last 3 years working with

social recruiting technology start-ups on

product and with corporate clients

including Hard Rock Café, Oracle and the

BBC to integrate social into their recruiting

practices. Bill has also hosted recruiting

events in over 30 countries worldwide.

R O L E P O I N T

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