But when it comes to recruitment tech, setting up for future success has never been more important.

As we begin the year, we’re excited to launch our brand-new report: TargetRecruit’s Staffing and Recruitment Tech Trends for 2025. Focusing on insights that will keep you aligned with your goals throughout the year, we’ve identified the key tech trends set to transform the recruitment industry in the months ahead.

From AI-powered virtual assistants that streamline resume reading, to composable technology that helps you build a flexible and effective tech stack, our report explores the significant shifts coming in 2025.

This isn’t about fleeting trends. It’s about equipping yourself for success in an industry where AI and technology are rapidly changing the way we work.

What’s inside the report?

• AI agents: Your very own personal assistant that will play a crucial role in automating routine tasks and improving candidate interactions.
• AI-powered CRMs: They’re smarter than your inbox filter. Learn how predictive insights can make your recruitment process smoother than your morning coffee.
• Predictive analytics: It’s like a crystal ball, but without the fog. Discover how historical data can forecast your hiring future.
• Composable tech: Build the recruitment tech stack of your dreams, without the tech headaches.
• And much more!

Why you need this report

Technology is advancing rapidly, and staying ahead is crucial. This guide is designed to ensure you’re not left behind using outdated methods. Our checklist will help you implement these trends effectively.

Download the full report now to discover how these trends will shape your recruitment strategy. Plus, gain access to a practical checklist to guide your progress throughout the year.

Make sure you’re prepared for 2025—the future of recruitment is here!

The post New Year, New Recruitment Tech Trends appeared first on TargetRecruit.

Salesforce has been a hot topic in staffing and recruitment this year with many industry leaders learning about its potential benefits as a front, middle, and back-office solution. As the industry delves deeper into new technology, especially with the integration of AI, understanding the role of platform solutions like Salesforce becomes crucial for staffing and recruitment firms to achieve long-term success.

When educating yourself on the latest recruitment technology, there are three main options to consider for an ATS/CRM solution: a custom build, a commercial off-the-shelf system, or a solution like TargetRecruit, built on the Salesforce platform. Let’s explore all three at a high level and what makes them different.

Breaking Down the Different Solutions

Custom Build 

A custom build involves hiring a team of developers to design software tailored to your specific business requirements. This option entails the development of proprietary technology that can set you apart from competitors, and provide maximum control over features and functionality. However, it requires significant time, financial investment, project management, and IT resources upfront.

Additionally, ongoing maintenance and modifications are necessary as your business evolves. Therefore, you must continuously update your technology and systems to keep up.. Innovation speed may lag behind other industry-leading platforms that have dedicated resources for technological enhancements year-round.

Commercial Off-the-Shelf

A commercial off-the-shelf approach involves a pre-built solution that offers faster implementation and lower initial costs compared to custom builds. However, off-the-shelf solutions are often limited in terms of customization and flexibility, as they can only be configured, not truly customized. This limitation can also result in a forced system switch in 3-5 years as your business will outgrow your tech capabilities. Moreover, future integrations with other applications may be restricted or incompatible, further hindering growth and scalability.

Enterprise Platform – The TargetRecruit Approach

A platform solution approach involves selecting best-of-breed applications that fit your business processes and building your tech stack within the Salesforce environment. This method allows your business to hand-pick applications that operate together seamlessly, offering maximum flexibility and scalability.

This often requires a higher initial investment compared to an off-the-shelf solution, but does include access to dedicated experts and resources behind the planning and implementation. With constant innovation and upgrades from Salesforce, recruitment firms can benefit from the latest advancements in technology, AI, and more without having to change platforms in the future.

In the end, the right choice for recruitment software will depend on your organization’s unique needs, business requirements, budget, and long-term strategy. However, a ‘platform solution’ will always be your best option to achieve time and cost savings, enhance operational efficiency, access the latest technology and ensure that your tech can grow and scale with your business.

Common Misunderstandings about Salesforce

Whilst Salesforce is the #1 CRM platform in the world, used by over 150,000 businesses, there are still plenty of questions surrounding the solution. The platform’s capabilities are often misunderstood, leading to hesitancy in adoption. By addressing these misconceptions, we’ll highlight Salesforce’s ability to transform recruitment operations.

Is Salesforce expensive? While Salesforce is comparable in price to other suppliers in this space, it’s essential to consider the total value- the platform’s robust features, integration capabilities, and consistent upgrades. All of these lead to significant long-term savings on maintenance, new features, and future enhancements. 

Do I need to use Salesforce as my CRM? No. When using TargetRecruit, it comes embedded with a Salesforce license, meaning you don’t need any existing Salesforce technology. Salesforce is highly adaptable and can integrate seamlessly with various applications, making it an excellent choice for building your tech stack.

Do I need a full-time admin? While having a dedicated administrator can be beneficial, Salesforce’s user-friendly design and extensive support resources at TargetRecruit means that  teams can manage the platform effectively and without coding or development.

Challenges that Salesforce Solves for Recruitment

Platforms like Salesforce, even though very clever, don’t aim to replace recruiters but to enhance how recruiters delegate their time and resources to find the best candidates. By automating routine or manual tasks, recruiters can focus on the more human aspects of their work, such as building relationships with candidates and understanding client needs. This shift allows for greater efficiency and a more personalized service, ultimately leading to better placements and higher satisfaction for both clients and candidates.

Single Source of Truth to Run Real-Time Reports

Salesforce enables your business to operate from one interface rather than switching from one application to another. The platform consolidates all data into one unified system, providing a single source of truth. This capability enables real-time reporting and analytics, allowing you to make informed decisions quickly.

Workflow Automation and AI Tools

With Salesforce, workflow automation and AI tools are integrated within a single platform, eliminating the need for business processes to span multiple systems. This integration enhances operational efficiency and reduces manual errors.

System Administration With No-Code Development

Salesforce allows system administrators to make changes and customize the platform without needing extensive development work. This flexibility means that recruitment  firms can adapt their processes quickly and efficiently as business needs evolve.

Is Salesforce the Future of Recruitment?

When considering the right tech stack for your recruitment firm, it’s essential to weigh the pros and cons of custom builds, commercial off-the-shelf solutions, and enterprise platform solutions like TargetRecruit. Each option offers unique advantages, but an enterprise platform stands out for its flexibility, scalability, and continuous innovation. 

Salesforce is the ideal software solution due to its comprehensive and robust features, backed by enterprise-level data security and government-grade encryption. With automation capabilities that streamline complex recruitment workflows into efficient processes, seamless native integrations, and advanced configuration options with ‘clicks, not code’, Salesforce customization options enable businesses to quickly adapt to shifting business requirements. Lastly, its advanced reporting and dashboards provide real-time data and historical insights, powering actionable business intelligence for smarter decision-making and enhanced operational performance.

Salesforce is considered the future of recruitment because, as the world’s #1 CRM, it enables recruitment firms to operate seamlessly from a single interface, integrating the most advanced applications tailored exactly to your business operations. 

To learn more about how a platform solution can accelerate your digital transformation and power your business into the future, contact TargetRecruit today. 

The post Exploring Salesforce as the Future of Recruitment appeared first on TargetRecruit.

As technology continues to reshape recruitment, organizations are investing in cutting-edge tools and platforms to streamline business. However, the age-old question remains: How do we get our recruiters to actually use the technology we invest in?

What’s in it for them?

The answer to this dilemma lies in understanding the needs and motivations of your recruitment team and providing them with user-friendly, intuitive, proactive, and automated tech solutions that enhance their productivity and job satisfaction. In this article, discover how to create a recruiter-centric approach to utilizing technology that mobilizes user-adoption by making tech work for your recruiters, not against them.

1. Empowering Recruiters with User-Friendly Technology

One of the most significant barriers to technology adoption among recruiters is the complexity of the tools which they are asked to use. Clunky, slow and confusing interfaces can quickly deter even the most tech-savvy professionals. Fear not, it’s not impossible to address this, there are solutions out there which offer a user-friendly platform that is easily customizable, not just for your business needs, but for the needs of recruiters as well.

With a user-centric interface, seamless integration of essential features, and intuitive navigation, you can make it simple for recruiters to embrace the platform, get started without a massive learning curve, and maximize their productivity from day one.

2. Integrating Social Channels for Enhanced Connectivity

In today’s digital age, social media is playing a pivotal role in recruitment. Recruiters need to stay connected and engage with candidates and clients across various online platforms. To support this, offer built-in social media integrations, allowing recruiters to seamlessly interact with their external network without leaving your platform.

This type of integration not only saves time but also ensures that recruiters can harness the full potential of their online presence. When recruiters can leverage their own social networks without friction, this leads to better candidate and client engagement, ultimately enhancing their ability to build strong relationships and an even stronger pipeline to make successful placements.

3. Proper Onboarding and Training

To ensure successful user adoption, proper onboarding and training are absolutely essential. The technology may be user-friendly and intuitive, but it still requires recruiters to understand how to harness its full potential. Planning a comprehensive onboarding program that covers all aspects of the software’s functionality is crucial. Providing hands-on training sessions, instructional materials, and access to support resources empowers recruiters with the knowledge and skills they need to effectively use the technology. A good provider will tailor the training to address a customer’s specific needs and workflows, ensuring that they are well-equipped to make the most of the tools at their disposal.

This commitment to their growth and development not only boosts their confidence but also reinforces the idea that the technology is an asset, not a hindrance, to their daily tasks. By prioritizing proper onboarding and training, you set your recruitment team up for success, enabling them to embrace the technology with confidence and unlock its full potential, ultimately leading to improved user adoption and the enhanced performance of your agency.

4. Proactive and Automated Solutions

Recruiters often find themselves buried under administrative tasks that consume valuable time. Focusing on enabling proactive and automated features takes the burden off their shoulders. Streamline repetitive tasks and manual tasks, allowing recruiters to concentrate on high-value tasks, like building meaningful relationships or making strategic placements, that drive revenue and business success.

5. Motivating Recruiters Through Empowerment

Embracing a recruiter-centric approach is now key for organizations, so when perception of technology shifts, and is understood to be a tool to enhance recruiter abilities and contribute to their success, motivation increases. Being willing to use the technology consistently also not only increases user adoption and product ROI; it also cultivates a team that prioritizes business productivity and builds lasting, meaningful relationships with fellow recruiters, candidates and clients.

Getting recruiters to embrace and utilize the technology you invest in requires a recruiter-focused approach that puts their needs at the forefront. When recruiters see the value in the technology and how it enhances their workflow, user adoption becomes a natural outcome. It’s not about forcing adoption or usage but rather about providing the right tools that align with both your business needs, and team goals. You’re not just investing in technology; you’re investing in your recruitment team’s success and the long term growth of your agency.

The post Empowering Recruiters to Unlock Technology Adoption appeared first on TargetRecruit.

The 2024 staffing and recruitment landscape promises exciting advancements in recruitment technology. Bringing forth a paradigm shift in recruitment software, rigid out-of-the-box or one-size-fits-all applicant tracking systems (ATS) are falling behind in the market as customization, flexibility, and cutting-edge integrations begin to take center stage.

Navigating the future of recruitment tech requires a strategic approach, embracing the demand for advancements within your tech stack while answering to the evolving expectations and standards of clients, recruiters, and talent.

By staying informed and proactive, staffing and recruitment firms can position themselves ahead by enhancing the core of their recruitment software to meet the exact needs of their business. As the labor market tightens, the ability to stay ahead of the competition will be a defining factor for recruitment growth and success this year.

AI-Driven Innovations in Recruitment

AI is 100% at the forefront of transforming recruitment software. From sourcing candidates to reviewing resumes and scheduling interviews, AI is enhancing the efficiency and objectivity of the hiring process. For example, with TargetRecruit’s Copilot– advanced algorithms can be employed to summarize resumes, create candidate summaries, and even craft interview questions that align with exact job descriptions- constantly learning from the data to push forward candidates who are the best fit. 

Although this is one example of AI leveraged in recruitment tech, by incorporating AI, companies can streamline their processes, boost productivity, reduce biases, explore new avenues of AI automation, and make smarter, data-driven decisions at a quicker speed.

Predictive Analytics for Informed Decision-Making

The integration of predictive analytics into recruitment software is not new, but this year it’s in the spotlight to be taken more seriously by enterprise firms looking to stay ahead of the curve. Predictive analytics adds a layer of data-driven decision-making by leveraging historic and current data so recruiters can make informed estimates about future hiring outcomes. For example, with Salesforce Einstein Prediction Builder– generate predictions without any requirement for machine learning expertise or coding, expanding your business with future vision insights.

Predictive analytics can identify applicants more likely to be interviewed, hired, and stay with a certain company. This feature is especially invaluable in high turnover roles, allowing recruiters to anticipate cultural fit, position flexibility, and long-term engagement to maintain a healthy candidate database.

Leverage Core Data to Track Trends with AI

Leveraging AI to track trends in large sets of data in recruitment software has evolved beyond conventional methods. Modern tools now utilize advanced algorithms and data analytics to monitor and identify emerging trends that your organization might not be noticing amongst candidates. For example, with Salesforce Einstein Discovery, augment your business intelligence with statistical modeling and machine learning to identify, surface, and visualize strategic insights into your business data.

Quickly operationalize data analysis, predictions, and improvements around trends that encompass various factors, such as job market demands, candidate preferences, and industry-specific requirements. By making custom predictions about what happens next in your business, this holistic approach significantly enhances the ability to identify trends that impact the recruitment process, providing valuable insights for making informed decisions on what matters for your business.

Recruitment Marketing & Social Media Integration

Recruitment software is evolving to incorporate strategic features that support more robust recruitment marketing strategies for the digital age. Building a compelling employer brand and showcasing unique aspects of company culture is crucial in attracting top candidates across social channels. Social media integrations will play a pivotal role in amplifying employer brand messages while expanding recruiters’ outreach capabilities.

Social media integrations provide real-time insights into candidate behavior, allowing recruiters to adapt their strategies based on the evolving landscape of the job market. Recruitment software with popular social media integrations, like LinkedIn for example, enables social prospecting to remain connected to the CRM, so opportunities don’t get lost in the digital wind. In essence, the integration of social media enhances the visibility of job opportunities, fosters proactive candidate engagement, and empowers recruiters to have a full view of the talent landscape.

Automation for Streamlined Processes

Automation technology is taking a front seat in recruitment tech, with approximately 67% of companies using it to streamline day-to-day tasks. Automation not only expedites mundane processes but also significantly reduces the likelihood of human error.

By leveraging algorithms and artificial intelligence, automation tools can analyze vast datasets to identify patterns and predict candidate suitability more accurately. For example, with Salesforce Flowbuilder access a robust set of development tools that take automation to the next level. This is why having your data all in one place is critical so it’s accessible to be automated.

As companies prioritize automation, recruiters, unburdened from repetitive tasks, can optimize workflows and redirect their efforts toward building meaningful relationships with candidates, gaining a deeper understanding of company needs, and contributing to greater organizational success.

The year marks a pivotal moment in the evolution of recruitment technology, where advanced features and innovations are taking recruitment tech to new heights. From AI-driven enhancements to predictive analytics and automation, upgrading your ATS and CRM will be essential for long-term growth and success. It is not just a matter of modernizing; it is an investment in the efficiency to scale effortlessly as your business grows. By embracing these trends, recruitment firms can not only elevate talent acquisition strategies but also harness technology for sustainable business growth. Staffing and recruiting firms that seize the opportunities presented by these innovations are poised to redefine the future of recruitment tech, setting the stage for a more agile, data-driven, and successful approach to recruitment.

Explore our Powerful AI Suite, TR Intelligence

Learn more about TR Intelligence

The post Top 5 Staffing & Recruitment Technology Trends 2024 appeared first on TargetRecruit.

TargetRecruit is excited to introduce a groundbreaking addition to our latest product release – Copilot, an advanced AI Integration Framework. This innovative framework marks the first step in a series of forthcoming AI capabilities designed to revolutionize the efficiency of sales and recruiting teams.

The first of Copilot’s immediate and impactful features is its ability to effortlessly generate highly tailored job descriptions. By seamlessly integrating Copilot through a simple configuration process, users can harness the power of AI-generated content with just a few clicks. This game-changing feature empowers teams to save valuable time and effort, as Copilot crafts comprehensive job descriptions that precisely align with your specific requirements.

At the core of Copilot lies the robust ‘AI Companion Framework,’ an expansive architecture that seamlessly interfaces with a diverse range of REST-based AI APIs. This architecture minimizes development efforts and unlocks a world of potential capabilities, providing customers with limitless opportunities for exploration and innovation.

Copilot’s initial integration showcases compatibility with OpenAI’s ChatGPT, encompassing the text-davinci-003 and gpt-3.5-turbo models. However, the true strength of Copilot lies in its extensibility—thanks to its underlying architecture, it stands ready to integrate with an array of AI models in the future. With Copilot, users will gain unprecedented access to seamlessly integrate their preferred AI services, setting the stage for unparalleled productivity enhancements through AI.

The configuration experience offered by Copilot is designed to be intuitive and user-friendly. Customers have the freedom to define prompt templates, prompt fields, and mapped fields on a per-object basis, tailoring Copilot’s behavior to the unique context and requirements of each task. Additionally, seamless integration into Lightning Record Pages ensures that end users have access to Copilot’s capabilities, complete with a predefined prompt template that auto-populates with relevant record information.

Central to Copilot’s utility is its AI-driven text suggestions. As users interact with the system, Copilot engages the AI model to generate text recommendations based on prompt input and context. These versatile suggestions can be effortlessly applied to record fields for immediate and practical application.

Flexibility remains a cornerstone of Copilot’s design. System administrators possess the authority to activate or deactivate specific configurations, providing dynamic control over Copilot’s presence. This control extends to refining prompt templates to ensure optimal results aligned with the unique needs of each user or use case.

In essence, Copilot transforms text generation into a harmonious collaboration between users and AI. Its robust architecture, flexible configurations, and AI-generated suggestions open a new era of possibilities for customers, propelling text generation into an age of unparalleled ease and innovation.

Prepare to embark on a journey where the boundaries of what’s possible are pushed further than ever before. Discover the future of artificial intelligence and recruitment software with TargetRecruit’s Copilot.

Copilot: Our New Artificial Intelligence Tool

Learn more about Copilot

The post Introducing Copilot: Elevating Recruitment Efficiency with Artificial Intelligence appeared first on TargetRecruit.

Choosing an applicant tracking system (ATS) for your staffing agency is an important decision to make. An ATS is crucial for your hiring process; it may be the most important tech investment for your organization.
Due to the significance of the ATS, it is crucial not to make a hasty decision. Picking the wrong solution for your team can waste months as you reassess and repeat the evaluation process.

Taking too long to make a decision isn’t optimal, either. If the decision-making process continues for a long time without ending, it’s more likely that you won’t make a decision. Instead, you will keep doing things the same way as before.

How can you compromise and find a solution? What are the best practices for selecting an ATS for your staffing agency? Let’s look at the things you should consider as you begin your ATS evaluation process:

Check Your Bias

This isn’t the time to play favorites. When you’re choosing an ATS, it’s important that you put any personal feelings or previous experience aside.

Even if you have previously employed a specific solution with a different company, that same solution may not be suitable for your present organization. Even if you possess extensive knowledge about that platform, it may not align with the operational needs of your organization and team. Functionality and adoptability should be the key contributing factors to your decision — not how much you like it.
If you have a strong preference during the assessment phase, you may try to influence others towards your preference. You will focus on the flaws in other solutions and ignore any potential issues with the platform you prefer.

Keep in mind that what may be optimal for you may not necessarily be optimal for your organization. Look at each potential software solution with fresh eyes and an open mind.

Fight the Urge to Overanalyze

Occasionally, the burden of a choice – or the anxiety of selecting the incorrect one – can halt the process of decision-making completely.

Think of it this way: Your kids ask you to pick up a box of cereal on your way home. You stop by the grocery store, walk to the cereal aisle, and you’re hit with the sudden realization that sometime between your childhood and theirs, 300 extra varieties of cereal were created, and it’s up to you to pick the right one.

Do you panic? Do you run screaming from the store?

Do you stand there in the aisle for thirty minutes looking at ingredient lists and cartoon mascots? Picking one ATS from all the options out there isn’t all that different. (Though we do think it would be easier if cartoon mascots were involved.)

Most people don’t realize that a software company’s biggest competitor isn’t another software company. Forrester found that almost half of lost sales opportunities in the internet technology industry were due to “no decision.” The company in question simply chose not to choose anything and remained with the status quo.

Realizing that your solution can greatly improve a business can be scary. The process of deciding and making changes may still feel overwhelming. Some companies find it easier to stick to their old ways, even if those ways are not effective.

The enemy of progress is not regression — it’s stagnation. Do not allow information overload or an intimidating number of options overwhelm you. Remember that there was a reason you started shopping for other options. Don’t go back to the status quo just because the decision grew more difficult than you expected.

(Read about the other 5 things to consider when selecting an ATS for your staffing agency by downloading our eBook!)

The post 7 Things to Consider When Selecting an ATS for Your Staffing Agency appeared first on TargetRecruit.

As we look beyond pandemic pain and begin to see better days ahead, TargetRecruit President Andy Widgerson takes a look back at staffing industry triumphs and turmoil in “Lessons Learned from Pandemic Pain,” just published on Staffing Industry Analysts’ Staffing Stream.

The Staffing Stream post shines a light on the ingenuity of staffing teams in addressing some of the pandemic challenges their businesses faced. In addition to the accelerated pace of digital transformation, the post focuses on some of the actions taken to emerge stronger, more agile and better prepared to seize opportunities in the post-pandemic world.

What were the biggest pandemic peaks and valleys for your business? Share your success stories with us.

The post Lessons Learned from Pandemic Pain appeared first on TargetRecruit.

A recruiter’s success depends largely on candidate and client satisfaction, which is why staffing technology prioritizes improving candidate experience and client services. In fact, there are thousands of tech tools available today that do just that.

Unfortunately, back-office processes and operational systems critical to the smooth functioning of recruitment enterprises too often get pushed to the back burner in favor of the “cool” tools that excite recruiters and help account managers win more business.

As with utilities like plumbing and electricity, when something goes wrong with staffing business basics like payment and billing, cool front-office tools can’t help you. When payroll is late or riddled with errors, the firm’s reputation can take a nasty hit. When customers question billing accuracy, their satisfaction and brand loyalty are in jeopardy.

Adding a new software solution dedicated to one or even a few back-office functions may offer a short-term fix, but it won’t address long-term needs. To ensure a sustainable difference in your ability to operate more effectively and scale for growth, it’s time to consider a fully integrated enterprise solution.

Battling for Tech Dollars and Focus

Staffing firms spend millions of dollars every year on competing technology applications that promise to deliver a better candidate experience or a better match of candidate to corporate culture. Lots of talent acquisition technology options vie for the attention of staffing firms and their limited technology investment dollars.

Staffing leaders face difficult decisions when figuring out where to put their focus. Recruiters tend to vote for automation in candidate engagement, video interviewing, and the ability to communicate more effectively to nurture relationships. Operational specialists in other areas of the business lobby for better marketing automation, timekeeping systems, or digital onboarding capabilities. These are all good strategies for leveraging technology to increase competitiveness. The problem is that the strategies are often short-sighted and the technologies not necessarily compatible.

Taking an Enterprise View

Most people tend to stay in their own lane, looking for opportunities to improve the way they do their jobs and achieve their specific goals. They do not necessarily think about how the actions and priorities of others can impact their jobs nor how their agendas affect others or the enterprise as a whole. Consider these scenarios from the recruiter’s point of view:

• You invest in a great mobile technology that makes it easy for applicants to engage with you on the go, but the tech directs them back to your website to complete a traditional application or a lengthy assessment
• You deliver a fast and frictionless candidate experience that culminates in a complicated onboarding process
• You introduce a sleek new timekeeping application without upgrading legacy back-office processes that may struggle with data transfer and lead to mistakes or delays in payroll

What happens to candidate experience in these scenarios? Your employer brand will definitely take a hit. In each of these cases, the decision-makers were short-sighted. From a practical standpoint, they may have overlooked how a single application interacts with every other application it touches. Beyond the impact on candidate and employee experience, this kind of siloed thinking can lead to maintenance headaches and integration nightmares. That may be why more companies are now looking to consolidate all their resources on a single platform.

Why a Single Platform?

The main component of your staffing technology stack may evolve from a homegrown solution to a cloud-based front office. Along the way, however, most firms hang on to the legacy systems and point solutions they added over the years to enhance client and candidate experience, digitize the business, and improve operational efficiency. Such a technology roadmap shows a somewhat haphazard journey, with more stops based on the capacity of the gas tank than on any structured plan.
Aside from minimizing the burden of maintaining multiple legacy solutions alongside a host of newer cloud applications, a single comprehensive system can provide enterprise visibility and that elusive single source of truth from front office to back. What else can it provide?

1. When you build your solution on a powerful platform, you can quickly and easily configure it to match your specific needs rather than rethinking your needs to match what the solution offers.
2. You can leverage data coming from different applications.
3. You can maximize efficiency.
4. You can count on top-notch security.
5. Perhaps most importantly, a secure, established platform provides opportunities to grow and adapt as your business needs change.

Prioritizing the Coolness Factor

If you were to rate the coolness factor of your technology priorities, getting all your applications to work together is likely not as exciting as introducing the latest chatbot or client portal. Prioritizing the platform on which you build your technology, however, can ensure every clever tool and smart application you deploy in the future is more likely to function optimally. That’s because integrating lots of different solutions into a highly flexible and powerful enterprise system gives you far more options and greater agility to adapt and grow in the future. How cool is that?

The post Beyond the Coolness Factor: Why Staffing Firms Should Reconsider Their Technology Priorities appeared first on TargetRecruit.

AI is everywhere. More and more recruiters are being enticed by the potential benefits of the technology to their businesses. But before artificial intelligence, recruitment firms need to consider the following: automation & integration.

We take a look at the key reasons why automation and integration should come before artificial intelligence.

The Right Tech Stack

Having the right tech stack in place is key, not only to successful AI deployment, but also the general management of your data. Good quality data is fundamental for your AI to perform and so having the right controls in place over the quality of your data is also key.

Why does this matter? AI is generally very linear today, and is very good and fast at doing very specific things. Generally speaking: AI today doesn’t think outside the box like a human does, and it is going to do specifically what you ask it to do. So in order to get anything meaningful from it, you need to have the right data (specifically clean data) in place to make it work correctly.

It is best practice to have good quality clean data for your AI to perform well. Therefore you need your tech stack integrated to prevent siloed data.

Quality In. Quality Out

With artificial intelligence being so reliant on good quality data, recruitment firms will need to make sure their systems have reliable and relevant data in order for AI to perform. If the system has poor and inaccurate data, any AI investment will never realize it’s true potential. So how do you make sure you only have quality data entered into your system?

Automation can help with this. For example, by removing manual data entry when it comes to your mid-office, i.e. time capture, pay & bill.

You can also incentivize recruiters to put the right data into the system in the first place. Management will need to consider how to incentivize their recruiters to put the right information into the system at the right time. If it is made to be beneficial to the recruiter, then the business will benefit as a result. Automation and integration again help here because if you have a fully integrated tech stack then the data is always within the system and not an afterthought. Streamlined processes will make it easier for recruiters as there will be less manual entry required.

Differences Between Artificial Intelligence vs Automation and Integration

The majority of artificial intelligence applications today are all about decision-based tasks and processes built off data. It’s what you are doing with that data, how you are reporting for further insight and then taking action as a result of that insight.

Automation and integration is making sure you’ve got one source of truth for your data, so whichever system you look in, the data will always be the same. Many businesses use their recruitment CRM as that one source of truth and then everything is integrated via that CRM – that’s the cornerstone to your recruitment tech stack. If you have siloed information and if you’re not yet ready to fully integrate, then you must decide what that one source of truth is in your business. However, without integrations in place, the result will be either mismatched data across systems or a requirement for the manual effort to update said systems which are both inefficient and at risk from human error.

It’s All About the Right Processes

Before you consider implementing any artificial intelligence, you need to think about the processes within your business. Consider what human intelligence sits where and what data sits where. Is data being shared across your business, among your people properly (in or out of your system)? Automation (done correctly) is a more efficient processing method than doing it manually.

If, however, you have inefficient processes in place then by automating those you’re simply scaling that inefficiency – so you need to think about those processes and how that data is being shared before you scale it.

Other Considerations in Terms of Tech Stack

When you can automate processes well, you can do more, have more coverage, operate faster and more efficiently and essentially grow your business and grow your profitability.

The most important thing for recruitment business owners and operators to consider is that whatever technology solution they are considering deploying, they should ensure it has open APIs. With open APIs, the world is your oyster – you can integrate and change them out in the future to flex with your business. If there are no open APIs and you decide that one piece of your tech stack doesn’t quite work, then you’re stuck with it.

So, if you’re considering investing in any kind of artificial intelligence in your business, make sure you get your automation and integration in place first. What matters most is the quality of your data – this should always come first.

To learn more, listen to my recent podcast.

The post Why Automation & Integration Comes Before Artificial Intelligence appeared first on TargetRecruit.

If you’re like most people, there is at least one spot in your home that isn’t company-ready. It could be an overcrowded closet or a catch-all drawer or the cords and cabling behind your entertainment center. In a staffing business, it’s often the duct-taped and jerry-rigged systems that connect the staffing front office to the back. When multiple applications and systems are cobbled together over time, you eventually reach a point where what was once cool or expedient is now costly and inefficient. That’s the bad news. The good news is that there are now highly flexible solutions built on powerful platforms that allow you to transform your business with a fully integrated, single-source enterprise solution.

How Companies Outgrow Their Technology

When a staffing business starts, everyone wears multiple hats and performs lots of different jobs, creating unique processes to streamline the work. That could mean a simple accounting solution, a timekeeping application or a payroll and billing system. As the business grows, we add an ATS, then a CRM solution. We fill in with email marketing and content management apps. Some may be created in-house; others we buy. As the speed of technology accelerates, we may switch from do-it-yourself to off-the-shelf. As the business grows, we become more sophisticated and specialized, and we get more tools to help us do our jobs.

What happens to the business processes and tools that fall into disuse? Some may disappear, others get pushed into the corners of our offices, our computers and our closets. They are forgotten until that moment when they unintentionally disrupt process flow or complicate operations or decelerate growth.

Staffing Companies Focused on Growth Need Technology Designed for Growth

We may plan for measured expansion and incremental growth, but we all take advantage of opportunities as they arise. Building your technology stack is a similar exercise. We plan for future needs, but immediate opportunities may require unplanned decisions. Sometimes we buy new technology outright; sometimes we inherit it via mergers and acquisitions. No matter how it is accumulated, the result is usually a somewhat chaotic collection of overlapping and duplicative applications that are difficult to manage and eventually impossible to support and sustain.

Growing Pains

When you outgrow all the different applications and point solutions that helped you build your business and hone your capabilities, it’s time to make a significant shift to a solution that is big enough and flexible enough to grow with you. You need a trusted enterprise platform with out-of-the-box security, performance, reliability and scalability. No matter how great the features and functionality of the latest software, if it cannot support your end-to-end requirements, it will only delay the inevitable discussion of how to get past the plateau growth state. You can no longer rely on fill-in solutions that are only as good as the workarounds created to connect one to another.

Take Advantage of Enterprise Technology Designed to Grow with You

Anything on your technology wish list is attainable, given enough time, money and development skill to create it, but why would you want to do that? Why expend resources on technology that could be better invested in recruiting and staffing capabilities? When you choose a powerful and flexible enterprise technology platform, you multiply your capabilities at any scale. You can configure features and functionality to meet your specific needs without the expense or time commitments that always accompany heavy customization. For example:

• Automate workflows through clicks rather than code. Build complex workflows with visual elements and reusable building blocks. Cut down on unnecessary extra effort, reduce human error and deliver a better service to your candidates and clients.
• Integrate everything faster. Connect disparate systems with API-led services or access a large, established library of proven apps, components, templates and more, without the need for customization.
• Keep it simple. No matter how many different countries you operate in or how many business units or brands you have, an integrated enterprise solution allows you to run everything on a single platform. System users only see what they need to see, despite the many different requirements users may have.

It’s Time to Open that Closet and Clean It Out!

Get ready for a new beginning. Clean out the proverbial mess in your technology closet. Prepare to accelerate growth for your business with a fully integrated, single-source enterprise solution that will give you the flexibility to expand when possible, pivot when needed and take advantage of opportunity whenever and wherever it is presented. Explore the possibilities for your staffing business by scheduling a demo or reach out to learn more.

The post Don’t Open that Closet! appeared first on TargetRecruit.