The adult social care sector faces a significant staffing challenge, with Skills for Care’s 2024 data reporting 131,000 vacant posts on any given day. Despite increased application volumes reported by many providers over the past year, extensive screening and engagement are required to find the right candidates.
Skilled recruiters adopting values-based approaches play a crucial role in this process; but without the right technology, recruitment efforts can fall short. Relying on spreadsheets for hiring activities leads to major inefficiencies, making an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) essential for streamlining the process.
Here’s our key considerations to help you choose the right ATS for your organisation.
Ease of Use and User Experience
A well-designed ATS should be user-friendly for both recruiters and candidates. The ATS should enable quick responses to candidates. Look for an ATS that allows for automated SMS and email communication and interview scheduling features to enhance engagement with candidates.
Customisation and Scalability
Choose an ATS that offers customisation options, such as tailored workflows for process design, automated communications, and detailed reporting. Talent pool management is crucial – your ATS should be intuitive and easily searchable when relevant roles become available. Don’t just think about the now – consider future hiring needs too.
Integration & Screening Capabilities
An ATS should seamlessly integrate with your existing tools, such as HR systems, job boards, AI tools, and background screening platforms. Consider an ATS that introduces care-specific psychometric assessments to the process. These tools add efficiency to identifying candidates with the necessary values and lead to improved hiring outcomes and retention. Involve experts in your team – and theirs – who can support discussions around APIs and integration options.
Candidate Experience
A poor candidate experience will deter top talent. An ATS should deliver a seamless application process, including a mobile-friendly interface, simple online application and CV upload features as well as clear job descriptions. Automated updates and communication help keep candidates engaged.
Careers Site and Online Forms
Now is the time to cast the net wider, bringing in fresh talent from outside the sector. Ensure your careers site can host engaging materials that allow you to truly dress your shop window. Advanced onboarding modules will automate content sharing and assist new hires to navigate online learning. Online forms should follow a staged application process, capturing only essential information at the point you need it.
Compliance Features
Pre-employment oversight is essential, particularly in the care sector. This is often where off-the-shelf systems that serve a range of industries can fall short for our needs. An ATS fit for social care should capture the employment timeline, automate reference checks, allow for digital right-to-work verification, and offer DBS integration.
Reporting and Analytics
Data-driven decision-making is crucial. Look for an ATS with robust reporting capabilities, including time-to-hire metrics and candidate conversion rates. These insights will prevent unnecessary advertising spend wastage and improve hiring outcomes.
Compliance and Security
An ATS must ensure compliance with employment laws, GDPR data privacy regulations, and regulatory hiring requirements. Secure data storage, access control, and audit trails are essential features. Consider partners with accreditations such as Cyber Essentials and ISO27001.
Cost and ROI
Pricing structures for ATS solutions vary, including subscription-based models and pay-per-hire plans. Assess costs relative to the system’s features and potential return on investment. Consider the opportunities to reduce time-to-hire, enhance candidate quality, and drive overall efficiency improvements.
Customer Support and Training
Customer support and training enhance user adoption and troubleshooting. Look for ATS providers that offer comprehensive onboarding, live support, and ongoing training to help your team maximise the system’s capabilities.
Making the Right Choice: Ensuring Long-Term ATS Success
Choosing an ATS does take time – and it starts with clearly defining your needs and creating a specification of your essential requirements and nice-to-haves. Make sure you include your hiring teams – they are your experts in recruitment after all! Test, test, test via demo sessions and access to test environments – a must so you know what you’re getting.
Be sure to explore more than one product and understand it’s features, implementation timelines, and additional or hidden costs that might present down the line such as SMS credits, changes to user and hiring levels, and integration needs.
Make sure it’s the right choice for your organisation; is the provider committed to a true partnership who will actively listen to your feedback? Are they open to working with you to make improvements and developments?
By carefully considering these factors, you’ll be sure to select an ATS that improves your recruitment process, enhances candidate engagement, and ultimately drives better hiring outcomes.
Working with Cohesion to deliver recruitment and retention campaigns, projects, or solutions includes access to our ATS – contact us today to find out more.
