Artificial Intelligence (AI) is changing the world of work. That much is certain. For most industries, the big question is how it will change the way people work. With all the noise around AI tools – like ChatGPT – and what they can and can’t do (or what they should and shouldn’t do) it’s easy to forget one thing: AI can make social recruiting easier and more effective.

Any digital tools – AI or not – that enable recruiters to spend less time on repetitive and time-consuming tasks and more time engaging with clients and candidates have got to be a good thing.

Social recruiting is great, but building an engaging personal brand and consistency at every touchpoint can make serious demands on your time. This is where an AI assistant really comes into its own.

To discover how easy it is to enhance social recruiting with AI, we spoke to Darren Westall, CEO of Paiger, the AI marketing assistant built for recruiters and salespeople.

Build A Better Network

People buy from people. LinkedIn has moved away from being a headhunting tool to being a social network for professionals.
– Darren Westall, CEO, Paiger

Let’s face it, posting job ads across multiple social media channels and job boards is a time-consuming task. Especially when you want to maintain consistency, avoid unintentional bias, and present a cohesive and appealing employer brand. There’s a lot of extra work involved. From manually entering details about a company and a role to setting up the correct metadata and choosing a captivating and on-brand image – it’s all time taken away from core activities. But it’s also a social recruiting essential.

For professional platforms such as LinkedIn, in the last 5 years or so, the balance has started to shift. They’re no longer just another space to headhunt or be headhunted; they’re somewhere to grow a professional social network and develop a personal brand for both businesses and people. They’re also a space where companies can build their brand as an employer to increase their appeal to ideal candidates.

And yet, 95% of people and businesses don’t actually share content on LinkedIn. This represents a huge missed opportunity. For employers and their recruiters, putting together engaging social content can help tease out passive candidates. Get social recruiting right, and it can surface hidden talent. The challenge, as always, is the time and cost it takes to create this content.

Cut Through The Noise

I don’t expect a recruiter in the software development space to understand Python. I do expect them to know the average salary for a Python developer with machine learning experience, based in London.
– Darren Westall, CEO, Paiger

Getting the attention of passive talent across different sectors from healthcare to software development takes carefully crafted content posted in the right places. A good starting point is to think about where your potential candidates are, who they are, and which social networks they’re likely to spend time on. That information then determines where to invest in terms of social recruiting.

Social media platforms are busy places. Standing out from the crowd is no easy feat and, according to the statistics, only 5% of people and businesses are posting. The effort it takes to cut through the noise requires creativity and confidence. Sadly, many brands feel they don’t have the right to occupy a particular space. They question their own authority: are they really the expert?

Recruitment is one of those industries which can quickly become very niche. For that reason, there’s sometimes a lack of belief in recruiters who need to niche down further on their market. Often, all it takes is to remove writer’s block to enable recruiters to get posting. That’s where AI comes on.

Inside The AI Toolkit

Paiger is an AI assistant. Not only can it be used in social selling and business development, it’s also helping tech-savvy recruiters to streamline their social recruiting processes. From CV writing prompts to tips for starting a new career, with Paiger’s AI assistant, recruiters and marketers can instantly get content-writing suggestions.

Not only that, but Paiger’s Ghost Writing tool automatically puts together content, leaving space around it for users to customize different aspects such as the company’s tone of voice, and the call to action. In this way, Paiger enables recruiters and businesses to build their personal brand by sharing relevant content to attract candidates or new clients.

Of course, recruiters’ networks are also another great place to share employer value proposition (EVP) content – anything from downloadable white papers to blog posts. Whether it’s the results of an employment survey or recent employer news, sharing company content across these networks is a surefire way to boost visibility and engagement with a recruiter’s or employer’s brand.

Positioning job postings within a wider package of engaging value-added content helps to build trust, authority, and engagement with prospects. The difficulty is that recruiters have enough to do without concerning themselves with brand guidelines. With Paiger, any content shared on behalf of a company goes out with the right assets and follows brand guidelines.

Integration With PCRecruiter

For social recruiters using PCRecruiter, integrating Paiger enables them to automatically feed it with their new job roles, ready for posting across social media. All it takes is the PCR Job Board and a request to our technical team for your database’s Paiger XML feed. The AI then combines this information with a marketing approved-image, the relevant hashtags, and the correct brand guidelines before sharing it out to their social media channels – whether that’s LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram – all or just one. Job done!

AI is making social recruiters more efficient by supporting them with automated content creation, so they can get on with more important tasks – like talking to candidates. Find out more about combining PCRecruiter with powerful integrations like Paiger.

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No matter what type of recruitment you’re working in, there are always going to be market trends. In the fallout from the pandemic and the ‘Great Resignation’, remote working not only became a viable option for some workers, but the preferred choice for many. This possibility has created new opportunities – and challenges – for those hiring.

Jeff Kaye helped grow Kaye/Bassman to become one of the largest single-site search firms in the US. With over 30 years experience in the recruitment industry, Jeff’s seen just about every recruitment trend there is come and go.

For this blog post, we spoke to Jeff about the challenges of recruiting in a remote-first world and how companies and recruiters can adapt to ensure they’re getting the best talent available.

Supply And Demand

“Recruiters have to go where the talent lies. In the last few years, there’s been a low unemployment rate in the US, with candidates in feverish demand. On top of that, the pandemic created the possibility of a distance-based workforce.”
Jeff Kaye, Co-CEO, Kaye / Bassman

In recent years, many sectors in the employment market have seen increasingly fierce competition for the best talent. In fields such as software development and digital marketing, demand has been on the rise, leaving local talent in short supply.

With the global pandemic opening up more opportunities for remote working, recruiters started to meet the talent where it is — whether that’s in a different state or another part of the world. The trend we’ve become accustomed to seeing is a less homogenized workforce from both the perspective of diversity and economics.

However, with most of the world now fully emerged from the pandemic and many countries facing up to economic uncertainty, there’s a sense that the hiring frenzy is poised to slow down. And it’s this supply and demand curve which correlates with what companies are willing to do to secure the best talent.

For many companies, there’s an increasing expectation that employees will return to the workplace in some capacity, either for a certain number of days a week or on a daily basis. For recruiters, the challenge comes in selling a company’s best offer in order to secure the right candidate.

Earning The Right

“We’re likely to find less receptivity to remote-first positions except in cases where people have earned the right – by their background, their skills or qualifications, or their time at a company to demonstrate their suitability for a remote role.”
Jeff Kaye, Co-CEO, Kaye / Bassman

There’s no question that where people work has an impact on their effectiveness and productivity. Some people are more effective when they work from home, others perform better in the office, whilst others do better in a hybrid environment.

Instead of falling back on a universal, blanket policy around where employees work, we’re starting to see companies evaluate the effectiveness of employees in a distance-based environment. In short, workers need to earn the right to distanced-based employment.

At the same time, companies also need flexibility when there is a shortage of the right talent locally. In this scenario, recruiters need to expand the talent pool by county, state, or even country to secure the right candidates with the offer of remote working.

Widening Recruitment Practice

Search professionals working in specific industries, such as medtech and pharmaceuticals, are already used to a national practice. On the other hand, there are more general recruitment firms who specialize by state or city.

To align with clients looking to fill open roles with national or even international talent, local recruiters will need to widen their capabilities, so they can quickly attract the right candidates for open roles. One approach is to push the possibilities of distance-based working. Another is to form partnerships with other recruiters within a larger network.

Access to a wider network of trusted advisors, means the recruiter maintains the client relationship but works with another recruiter to source potential candidates

The advantage of partnership is that a recruiter with local knowledge and talent in one city or state, can collaborate with another firm working with a company in a different location. This helps them extend their reach — especially when it comes to surfacing passive candidates.

Partnership is also beneficial to industry-specific recruiters who have a client looking for talent outside their specialism. For example, a recruiter working for medical and healthcare clients might have a talent pool of doctors and nurses. But what if a client needs to fill an open role in finance?

Access to a wider network of trusted advisors, means the recruiter maintains the client relationship but works with another recruiter to source potential candidates.

The Software Needed

“The better the content inside your ATS, the better you’re going to be in targeting the right individuals.”
Jeff Kaye, Co-CEO, Kaye / Bassman

The quality and freshness of data on the best candidates can go a long way in giving recruiters a competitive edge over their rivals searching for the same talent. As does the reliability of the search function to surface candidates from your talent pool.

Another important part of any ATS is the integration with your CRM. In the past, an ATS was simply a home for the data recruiters needed to put to use on a phone call. Now, an ATS has to integrate with a range of communication channels – social media, text, voicemail, and email – which are all used for candidate outreach. Deeper integrations between an ATS and CRM – even email sequencing functionality – offer competitive advantages to recruiters within the current employment landscape and beyond.

Every day, PCRecruiter’s hybrid blend of ATS and CRM functionality helps thousands of recruiters like those at Kaye / Bassman make the right hires. See what PCRecruiter can do for you. Discover our tech.

On February 21, 2023, Main Sequence Technology, Inc was awarded a patent by the United States Patent Office. US Patent No. 11,586,760 B2, entitled “SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR ASSOCIATING MULTIPLE LOGINS TO A SINGLE RECORD IN A DATABASE,” relates to PCRecruiter’s unique method for handling the multiple ways through which the same jobseeker might access the job board.

Diagram from US Patent No. 11,586,760 B2

The patented method allows for one consolidated applicant record in PCRecruiter while reducing the chance of a duplicate. It also prevents anyone from seeing information in the record that wasn’t provided using that login.

The PCRecruiter Job Board has been leveraging this technology for over two years to great success. The typical use case for this solution is to handle the problem of people applying for jobs and using a different log-in on a subsequent visit.

For example, let’s say Joanne Jackson arrives at the job board and uses her LinkedIn account credentials as a password in creating her account. She enters her resume, contact info, and other details. Now suppose Joanne returns to the same job board a year later, but this time, forgetting that she had used LinkedIn on the same recruitment agency’s job board in the past, she uses her Facebook account as her signup authorization.

Candidate Flow Diagram — A diagram used during the development of this feature, describing how it affects applicant data flow.

Although PCRecruiter is able to identify her as the same person based on her name and email address, it would be a security risk to display the old information to a new visitor using different account credentials. After all, if her Facebook login were to become compromised, she wouldn’t want someone to be able to log into the job board with that account and see potentially sensitive information she had entered while using her LinkedIn account.

Instead, PCRecruiter’s patented tech allows both the new and old login details to be associated with the same record, while only allowing the applicant to view and update the information that was entered while using the same credentials they have logged in with.

Furthermore, this prevents scenarios where a candidate who exists in the database but did not self-register on the job board might be stopped or delayed during their apply process by a ‘password reset’ or login operation. Even if the email, name, or resume is already on file, PCRecruiter will allow them to apply without losing or compromising any of the stored data in their record.

On this day in 1998, Main Sequence Technology was incorporated, setting off on a path to bring better tools to recruiting, staffing, and HR pros everywhere. Since then, we’ve served thousands of customers globally, with billions of dollars in placements made.

PCRecruiter in 1998…

In “the before times,” in Northeast Ohio, four people were doing their own things at the dawn of the Internet age. Martin and Mike Snyder were doing logistics software for small trucking businesses, and Bill and Gretchen Kubicek were running one of the first ISP’s in the region.

The original PCRecruiter logo.

As oft-told in these stories, the four had been friends since their school days. One day, Bill called Mike to see if Mike (the brains of the trucking outfit) could help one of his Internet access customers with a networking issue. That customer happened to be an executive search firm, and their troubles happened to be with their recruiting software application (and not, as suspected, with Bill’s ISP.)

Martin, not knowing anything about recruiting, but knowing enough about the trucking business, sniffed an opportunity. He told the recruiting firm owner that Mike could do a better application in a weekend. One long weekend later, what once was a logistics application had been refactored into a recruiting application.

Co-founders Bill Kubicek and Michael Snyder at work on PCRecruiter, late 2000

The application that would eventually become PCRecruiter was born, and so the Snyder brothers took to finding recruiters to use it. After securing launch customers in different forms of recruiting, including staffing, third-party search, corporate, and a college career office, it became clear just how well suited the underlying data structure was to organizing organizations, people, and open roles in all kinds of recruiting situations. In those early days, the app was called Executive Bob, after that very first recruiter whose underperforming previous software had inspired its creation.

Meanwhile the Kubiceks, with Bill selling and Gretchen managing, made a rapid success of their ISP and made an nice early exit, selling to a major Japanese telecom. Bill had always taken as self-evident that the Internet was only good for two things: pornography, and finding a job. The former was out of the question, but with PCRecruiter, the opportunity seemed ripe.

The original Main Sequence office location. — The original Main Sequence office location – a converted Century Home.

On February 23, 1998 the Snyders and the Kubiceks incorporated as Main Sequence Technology Inc. First starting in the Kubiceks’ basement, amid piles of laundry and baby stuff (young Maggie Kubicek sat through software demos before she could walk), the company soon moved into its first office, a converted two-story Italianate home in downtown Willoughby, Ohio.

What is the main sequence you might ask? It’s an astronomical term relating to a distinctive band of stars, charted for mass and luminosity, which include the majority of all the stars in the universe. And like it’s parent company namesake, PCRecruiter was always intended to work for the vast majority of recruiters who would encounter it.

The original PCRecruiter desktop application for Windows. — The PCRecruiter application for Windows desktop received its final software update in 2008.

Using a Microsoft Access database engine, or the then-exotic Microsoft SQL Server RDBMS as its back-end, the original desktop software allowed recruiters to track contacts, resumes, and jobs, as well as perform basic CRM functions like activity logging and email generation in a time when many were still relying on file cabinets of paper resumes.

As the user base and the company grew, the software gained more advanced features like contact info parsing, bulk resume import, and the ability to dial phone numbers via Windows Dialer and early VOIP.

From the desktop to the web…

Early versions of PCRecruiter’s browser interface, known at the time as the ‘thin client’, featured a left-side menu, as CRT monitors of the time had a more television-like 4:3 aspect ratio.

With the growth of job boards like Monster (b. 1999) recruiters began to seek more direct connection to the internet for their candidates and clients and more ‘anywhere access’ to their own contacts. Main Sequence responded with the first version of its web interface in 2001, and even a simplified interface for early mobile devices like the Palm Pilot and Blackberry.

In 2002, enabled by Mike Snyder’s engineering skills and the Kubiceks’ knowledge of Internetworking, the company began offering PCRecruiter as on online service — one of the very first SaaS products available.

The PCRecruiter / Main Sequence home office.

By 2005 PCRecruiter was serving customers in over fifty countries. The software and the company continued to pick up steam, moving to larger headquarters in 2006 and adding a Hawaii office for support in the western US and Asia/Pacific time zones.

Throughout the early years of the millennium, PCRecruiter expanded with major capabilities like PCR for MS Outlook in 2010, the first iteration of the Open API in 2012, the PCRecruiter 9 redesign, and PCR Capture. Year by year, the capabilities of the company and the successes of the worldwide customer base continued to grow.

PCRecruiter in 2023…

Main Sequence has always been driven by continuous improvement. The ongoing challenge of building a better product to meet the changing needs of business owners, system administrators, recruiters, and candidates keeps us innovating and iterating our offerings . And it shows. By the end of 2022, we picked up a slew of accolades in the G2 Winter 2023 rankings.

The newest PCR Capture extension, available in Spring 2023.

Throughout our history, we’ve stood alongside recruiters in good times- and bad. When tested – during the dot com bust of 2000, the turmoil of 2001, the financial crisis in 2008, and the pandemic in 2020 – we responded flexibly to our customers and employees needs, always with eventual recovery in-mind.

If fact, the past year or two have been ones of incredible progress for PCRecruiter. We released the newest Pipeline, PCR Analytics, and our industry-leading Sequencing project.

On Feb 21, 2023 Main Sequence was issued US Patent # 11,586,760, entitled SYSTEM AND METHOD FOR ASSOCIATING MULTIPLE LOGINS TO A SINGLE RECORD IN A DATABASE.

This patented method addresses a common problem with Applicant Tracking Systems; when applicants apply for multiple jobs or the same job multiple times, duplicate records are created in a database, which recruiters hate for obvious reasons. The patented method allows PCRecruiter to present a unified record to the recruiter without the risk of erroneous duplicate-checking revealing information to applicants that they did not enter. It’s clever and it works well — another example of PCRecruiter meeting the real-world needs of our customers with industry-leading innovation.

Most exciting, we are currently building toward the tenth major platform iteration of PCRecruiter. The beta program and release to production will be the biggest redesign of PCRecruiter in our history.

The new version of PCRecruiter will offer more flexibility, more efficient workflows, broader device support, clearer data visualization, and greater growth and integration possibilities than anything that preceded it. We’re looking forward to sharing it with you.

An in-development prototype of PCRecruiter 10, going into beta testing in 2023.

Service by dedicated people, for dedicated people.

Data is the modern currency. While data enhancement is a key feature of PCRecruiter, there are many other important pieces in a winning ATS and CRM implementation, the biggest being people.

The people who create and service PCRecruiter include an award-winning support team and an enthusiastic team of developers. The other key players are the frontline recruiting professionals who make our software a critical part of their business and provide us with ideas and communications about how to make it better.

The value of independence.

Every business is different, yet time and time again, we meet business owners with the same priorities around their digital recruiting tools: the lowest lifecycle costs, the most reliable and respectful vendor relationship, and happy end-users. On each of those, PCRecruiter is tough to beat.

Main Sequence has never required outside investors: the founders remain at the helm and directly involved in the day-to-day operations. Consequently, the company operates exclusively on free cash flow. That means we make decisions for the long-term, rather than chasing short-lived trends. Our costs to operate the service are among the lowest in the industry.

Main Sequence makes business and design choices that bring value. Things could change — someday it may be in the best interest of the company and our customers to revise our structure or use outside funding — but what will never change is the absolute customer focus and dedication to offering THE most versatile recruiting application in the world.

Those have been the central drivers for these 25 years.

The value of flexibility.

System admins appreciate PCRecruiter’s vast array of configuration options. From screen layouts, process and pipeline modeling, and analytics design, through to data operations and user record management – PCRecruiter provides the flexibility needed to configure the best solution for their business.

Put simply, system admins can tailor almost everything to suit the end-user: views, terminology, workflows, sequences, integrations, and reporting – bringing functionality in line with user needs. The result? Happy recruiters!

Our open API and integrations also afford flexibility. From custom code and close vendor relationships to arms-length, third-party code entirely managed by our customers, PCR is often praised by developers as one of the easiest to connect with. Key integrations include:

Phone and text messaging via RingCentral
Email connections through Office365, Gmail, and SendGrid
Data enhancement via ZoomInfo and HireEZ
Data import and export via Zapier and others

The value of serving our customers’ customers.

For public users like applicants and contractors, the best recruiting system is an invisible one. Interfaces are like governments: the best ones are the least ones that still get the job done.

Our Job Board integration and configuration options are enterprise quality, which means public users on the front end, get a seamless user-experience, regardless of your organization’s size.

For applicants and contractors – anyone inside your ATS and CRM – we firmly believe in the principle that your data is your data. So we keep it secure. For recruiters, data may start out as public information, but overlaid with their efforts it becomes a private asset. So PCRecruiter treats it that way – your data isn’t shared with competitors or aggregated with the data of other users.

PCRecruiter into the future…

While it’s fun to look back at where we’ve come from, Main Sequence is most excited about the path we’re on. We are building our best product ever, and we see ever-increasing importance in the wider economy of the industry we serve. Talent has never been more important than it is today, and will be tomorrow.

Like other markets which are rapidly moving with AI and other innovations, the recruitment professionals who can navigate the challenges will be doing more business than ever before. We expect they’ll still need a high-performance ATS and CRM solution at their core.

Our track record has shown us to be a survivor and a champion. Where will PCRecruiter go next? Look for more chapters of this story in years to come!

It’s an important question facing tech buyers everywhere: open architecture or closed? Over the last decade or so, many software companies have seen the advantages of open standards. In that time, we’ve seen vendor APIs mature and compatibility increase between open systems. That said, there’s still ongoing demand – and a market – for proprietary software.

Key decision-making in this area is largely influenced by industry and application. For recruiters, there are pros and cons to both types of solution. However, when it comes to recruitment tech, open architecture is a practical and beneficial choice in a highly competitive industry.

In this blog post, we shine a light on the differences between open architecture vs closed. With this information, tech buyers in the recruitment space can make informed choices around bringing the best solution to their business.

What Is Open Architecture?

Open architecture is based on a set of open, publicly available technical standards. This makes it much easier for different software applications to exchange data, and work together.

Open Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) make it possible for vendors to work outside proprietary restrictions. This openness creates a broader and deeper community of vendors and therefore a wider range of options for upgrading, expanding, and maintaining systems.

For recruiters, the decision to purchase a customer relationship management (CRM) platform and Applicant Tracking System (ATS) which uses open architecture has a number of advantages.

Why Choose Open Architecture?

The real draw of software with an open architecture is that third-party developers can easily create add-ons to enhance the product. This means companies are not locked into a single vendor, and the software is much easier to scale and upgrade.

There are benefits both ways: developers gain access to a much wider market, and companies are not beholden to a single vendor. With so many third-party enhancements on offer, they can also enjoy greater choice, selecting from the best of what’s around to create the ideal solution for their needs.

With an open-architecture ATS and recruitment CRM systems, companies are able to choose their enhancement vendor(s) and the data is manipulated via API and automation processes. Due to much broader compatibility, this gives companies the flexibility to switch to a new vendor in the future if they want to. Furthermore, users of open-architecture systems are leveraging the major capital investments and development teams of multiple vendors at the same time, providing greater benefits at lower costs.

An image of an open door, evoking the "Open architecture vs Closed" subject matter.

What Is Closed Architecture?

As the name suggests, software with a closed architecture has tight restrictions imposed by the developer or vendor. Typically, any third-party add-ons or enhancements need official approval. In terms of integrations, these tend to be restricted to other software with similar architecture. In recruitment, a closed system is often one where the ATS vendor is also the enhancer or aggregator of the data.

Why Choose Closed Architecture?

It’s fair to say that, despite restrictions in compatibility with other software, an exceptional piece of proprietary ATS and CRM software might well be able to meet your recruitment needs. Because it’s a ready-made and out-of-the-box solution, the initial setup tends to be more straightforward when compared with configuring open-architecture software to make use of various third-party integrations.

By its very nature, closed architecture creates vendor lock-in. That might not be a problem if you’re willing to accept long-term contracts and potentially unpredictable rises in costs. You could view it as the price you have to pay for ongoing and long term security updates and ongoing support from a single vendor. You’ll also benefit from their product updates and security enhancements.

However, do be aware of the time and cost implications should you choose to switch providers in the future. Using systems with a closed architecture often means reduced compatibility. Consequently, there can be significant headaches around extracting your data and continuing with business-as-usual during a future switchover.

Open Architecture vs Closed Architecture

So what’s best for buyers of recruitment tech, and how can they make the right choice?

The truth is, the choice between open architecture vs closed is always considered in relative terms. Both these terms can also refer to the whole solution or just certain important domains. A truly open system is somewhat aspirational. At the same time, it’s possible to have a closed system that has integrations – albeit tightly controlled and usually less numerous.

In the recruitment sector, the trend toward open-architecture software has been partly driven by the increased demand for data enhancement. The data enhancement domain – or the ability to enrich name and entity records with updated, more accurate, and expanded information – relies on information sharing between online platforms.

PCRecruiter’s Enhanced API is highly developed. It’s also well-documented, with a long track record of successful third-party developer projects. In fact, our own internal products such as PCR Capture, Portal for Outlook, and our upcoming PCR 10 version rely on it. On top of that, it also has a number of powerful integrations with the likes of outbound recruiting platform hireEZ and the world’s most comprehensive B2B database Zoominfo.

Making the choice between open and closed architecture is an important consideration for recruitment tech buyers in the market for a new ATS and recruitment CRM system. Learn more about PCRecruiter’s Developer API.

It’s Valentine’s Day! A perfect time to talk about making new connections. Whether it’s for strengthening old bonds or hooking up with new partners, we’ve gotten you the perfect gift: brand-new API documentation.

Updated PCRecruiter API documentation. — The updated API portal has new search features and code samples.

The PCRecruiter Application Programming Interface (API) is the set definitions and protocols that allow outside developers to build and integrate applications that connect to the PCRecruiter database.

The API is used by our partner vendors, such as job boards, background check services, and phone systems, to securely connect to the recruitment databases on our servers. It also allows PCRecruiter users to custom-develop solutions specific to their unique needs.

In an effort to communicate more easily and effectively with our current and future partners, as well as our clients’ own hired programmers, we have fully updated our API documentation.

The new documentation is built on Stoplight, a global API platform that offers a number of enhancements for developers connecting to PCRecruiter.

New Tools for Easier Connections

With the updated API docs, we’re making it easier than ever for developers to connect to our services and to expand the marketplace of tools available to PCRecruiter users. The new platform has many improvements, including:

A more standardized interface that will be familiar to users of other API tools.
New Code Samples in multiple popular languages, including Shell, JavaScript, Node, Python, Go, C, Obj-C, OCaml, C#, Java, Http, Clojure, Kotlin, PHP, Powershell, R, Ruby, and Swift.
A new search feature to help locate the information you need more quickly.
Revised content to make it easier understand and contextualize the API and its endpoints.

The public PCRecruiter REST API is available for free to all customers and vendors. See https://www.pcrecruiter.net/site/features/api/ to get started, and find the newly updated documentation at https://www.pcrecruiter.net/apidocs_v2

As any proper Luddite will tell you, the machines are absolutely coming for our jobs. At times it seems practically inevitable. For the moment, we’re fortunately in that sweet spot where most AI is just smart enough to help us work more efficiently but not quite good enough to do the job better than we can. Recruiters are already taking notice of emerging AI tools like ChatGPT and finding ways to use them to their advantage.

I’ve been watching the rise of publicly-accessible AI tech for a few years now. I’ve experimented with each new toy as it comes along… Replika, Dall-E, Stable Diffusion… and now ChatGPT. I continue to be amazed at just how ‘human-like’, practical, and comprehensive the results can be. The speed at which these technologies are advancing is whiplash-inducing. In fact, I’ve had to revise this very blog post several times while writing it because of changing details and new enhancements. In the words of ‘fellow scholar’ Dr. Károly Zsolnai-Fehér, “What a time to be alive!”

What is a GPT?

PROMPT: "cinematic photograph, a seated humanoid robot holding a paper document in front of its face, wearing a business suit, sitting at a desk in casual office setting, robot eye is scanning the paper with a blue light beam, coffee mug, lens flares, movie still" (Generated with mage.space) — PROMPT: “cinematic photograph, a seated humanoid robot holding a paper document in front of its face, wearing a business suit, sitting at a desk in casual office setting, robot eye is scanning the paper with a blue light beam, coffee mug, lens flares, movie still” (Generated with mage.space)

Generative pre-trained transformers, or “GPTs”, are neural network models that have been trained on vast amounts of data. Over time, a model is constructed that can relate concepts and properties of those concepts to each other. Eventually, the tool can make original inferences based on the knowledge in its model. Neural networks are made to ‘learn’ in the same way that humans do, gleaning new connections from observations and experience.

It’s important to understand that the model doesn’t contain or copy any of the original information that it was trained on – its output isn’t a collage or a rearrangement of the source material. Instead, it stores the complex matrix it has built to explain how the different words, phrases, and combinations of words and phrases in the training data related to each other. In the same way that a human doesn’t need to memorize every individual car they have seen in order to describe a hypothetical new car in great detail, a GPT model doesn’t need to store the articles or websites it examines in order to compose new text based on the concepts they contained.

With great power comes great limitations…

Unlike a search engine, which stores and retrieves information, an AI model generates wholly new content from scratch based on a prompt from the user. This offers incredible possibilities, but it also creates some limitations. For example, the AI cannot provide information about anything that wasn’t relevant to the content it was trained on. ChatGPT, for example, was trained on data collected up to 2021, so it can’t write about anything happening in 2023.

PROMPT: "award-winning photograph, a seated humanoid robot wearing a business suit, the robot is holding an iPhone, the robot is holding a piece of white paper, sitting at a desk in casual office setting, chrome accents, coffee mug, photo by J.J. Abrams" (Generated with mage.space) — PROMPT: “award-winning photograph, a seated humanoid robot wearing a business suit, the robot is holding an iPhone, the robot is holding a piece of white paper, sitting at a desk in casual office setting, chrome accents, coffee mug, photo by J.J. Abrams” (Generated with mage.space)

The current big-name AI tools are also “generalists,” trained on vast but not highly specific troves of text. As more purpose-built models are trained on curated data sets such as resumes, job descriptions, interview questions, trade-specific documents, etc. they will become far more powerful in their application to niche recruitment tasks.

You’ll also want to be wary of false information – after all, the model cannot generally fact-check the original statements if makes. The AI is designed to give humans the output they asked for, and whether or not the output is factually accurate or logically sound is not isn’t part of its instructions (for now, at least).

As with any algorithm, the ‘garbage in, garbage out’ adage holds true. Low-quality prompts will yield low-quality results from the AI. Learning to craft a good prompt can take time and practice. It will also vary depending on the chat tool you’re using and may even change over a brief period. One thing I’ve learned in working on this post is that, as the technology rapidly evolves, what worked last week may not work this week.

Fortunately, dedicated professionals like Irina Shamaeva, Jacco Valkenburg, Jim Stroud, and others in the space are continually pushing on the tech and suggesting new methods and use cases.

ChatGPT: Not the only player in the game

The name making the most headlines in AI right now is ChatGPT, a project of OpenAI, which recently extended its partnership with Microsoft. (Given Microsoft’s ownership of LinkedIn, the effect of Microsoft leveraging ChatGPT in the recruiting and business networking sectors could be huge.) Other new players, like Perplexity (which combines AI chat with search engine citations) and Chatsonic have entered the field, while pre-existing services like our partners at Paiger are beginning to offer GPT-based tools as part of their feature set.

ChatGPT is still learning, both in terms of its AI model and in terms of its business model. Unlike some other AI tools, such as Google’s LaMDA and DeepMind’s forthcoming Sparrow, ChatGPT has been made free during its beta testing phase. It still goes offline often enough to be considered somewhat unreliable for day-to-day reliance, but when it is up and running it can be a powerful time saver for sourcing, recruiting, and hiring professionals. Let’s see how.

Streamlining Recruitment Tasks with AI

1. Drafting Emails

One of the things chat AI systems excel at is quickly writing original content. You can save loads of time drafting email follow-ups, cover letters, and other business correspondence by asking the AI to start it for you.

PROMPT: "cinematic photograph, rear view, the back of a seated humanoid robot wearing a business suit, typing on a laptop, sitting at a desk in casual office setting, lens flares, movie still aesthetic" (Generated with mage.space) — PROMPT: “cinematic photograph, rear view, the back of a seated humanoid robot wearing a business suit, typing on a laptop, sitting at a desk in casual office setting, lens flares, movie still aesthetic” (Generated with mage.space)

For example, you might give a prompt such as “compose an email that would be perfect for a wind farm mechanic, asking them about their interest in work opportunities in Texas, using a polite tone.” With a brief overview of the job and key points like the position name, requirements, and one or two interesting facts about the company, AI can draft a very professional sounding email in seconds.

You can also use it in a similar way for marketing a candidate. You might copy/paste the professional experience section of a resume into the chat and ask the AI to compose an email describing why, based on this experience, the candidate would be suitable for the role.

As always, it’s important to think of the AI as a well-informed but very inexperienced young assistant. It can be prone to uninspired and rote sounding content creation. Treat these emails as drafts for you, the experienced human recruitment professional, to refine and build upon.

2. Suggesting Searches

With its vast understanding of word and concept relationships, ChatGPT may be able to come up with strings for candidate sourcing that you hadn’t considered. You might try asking the bot to “Create a boolean search string that finds LinkedIn profiles of US-based wind farm engineers. The search should focus on senior level hiring prospects. The search should include various ways these engineers might describe their work or title, and include Spanish alternatives.”

In my experiments with ChatGPT, the output of this prompt was:

(“wind farm engineer” OR “wind turbine engineer” OR “wind energy engineer” OR “ingeniero de parques eólicos” OR “ingeniero de turbinas eólicas” OR “ingeniero de energía eólica”) AND (“senior” OR “lead” OR “principal” OR “nivel senior” OR “líder” OR “principal”) AND (“United States” OR “USA” OR “US” OR “Estados Unidos”) AND (title:(senior OR lead OR principal OR nivel senior OR líder OR principal) AND location:(United States OR USA OR US OR Estados Unidos))

Again, it’s important to double-check the bot’s work. Do you know if the Spanish phrases it selected are appropriate to the type of candidate you’re after? Did it put the parentheses and colons in the right places? If not, you could end up sourcing the wrong people.

3. Composing Interview Questions

The chatbot’s wide ranging training data means it can often help craft role-specific questions for candidates. ChatGPT is quite adept at answering a prompt like this:

“give me a list of interview questions for a wind farm engineer with three years of experience who is being considered for a management position”

PROMPT: "wide cinematic photo, standing female humanoid talking to a human business man, office meeting room, lens flares, sorayama robot, cinematic movie aesthetic, bokeh" (Generated with mage.space) — PROMPT: “wide cinematic photo, standing female humanoid talking to a human business man, office meeting room, lens flares, sorayama robot, cinematic movie aesthetic, bokeh” (Generated with mage.space)

The resulting answers are liable to be somewhat generic… “How do you ensure safety and compliance in your work?” If you just need the basics, this can save you a lot of time.

To go a bit deeper, you may want to try providing the AI with the details from the specific job description, then prompt with something like:

“given this list of responsibilities for a wind turbine engineer job, please craft five job-specific interview questions to help assess a candidate’s fit for the role”.

Following on that, you might then ask it to provide general ideas of what a good answer to each question may look like.

4. Drafting a Candidate Summaries

While PCRecruiter’s Candidate Presentations feature makes it easy to send resumes and information to clients and to receive and store their feedback, you might try using an AI chatbot to shortcut the composition of a candidate summary. Asking the AI to condense the resume into an introductory brief, saves both your time and your client’s.

Generating a usable summary is as simple as pasting the candidate’s resume text into the chat, along with a prompt like:

“summarize the following resume in two paragraphs, using a professional tone, and suggesting why this may be a good job candidate for an engineering management role.”

5. Simplifying and Rewriting Job Descriptions

In addition to writing completely original content, AI can be useful in rewriting content that already exists. This can be valuable for internal and external uses.

If you’re a recruiter just starting out, or one moving into a new and unfamiliar market, you may try pasting the client’s complex technical description into ChatGPT and prompting it with “rewrite this job description to make it suitable for a high school level reader.” Having the description without the technical jargon may make it easier to discuss with colleagues.

PROMPT: "cinematic photograph, a seated humanoid robot holding a paper document, wearing a business suit, sitting at a desk in casual office setting, robot eye is scanning the paper with a blue light beam, coffee mug, lens flares, movie still" (Generated with mage.space) — PROMPT: “cinematic photograph, a seated humanoid robot holding a paper document, wearing a business suit, sitting at a desk in casual office setting, robot eye is scanning the paper with a blue light beam, coffee mug, lens flares, movie still” (Generated with mage.space)

You may also find it helpful to give the AI your client’s job description and then ask it to create multiple variations of it for job advertisements and recruitment emails. You can then choose the most suitable version or put multiple versions into use and test which is the most effective.

For confidential searches, using the description provided by the client can not only reveal their identity, but can also pose issues for search engines detecting it as duplicate content. Rather than spending valuable time custom-writing your own descriptions, paste the client’s version into the AI and prompt it to “write a new version of the following job description that does not reveal the name or location of the employer, adding in alternate phrases where possible.”

Concluding in ChatGPT’s own words…

Rather than writing my own concluding statement here, I thought it would be more appropriate to ask ChatGPT to write one for me.

PROMPT: Compose a first-person conclusion for a blog post entitled “5 ways ChatGPT can enhance your recruiting workflow”, using a conversational but professional tone. Describe in a sentence or two why using ChatGPT and similar tools is a smart idea for recruiters, and express excitement at the future of artificial intelligence in the recruitment space.

“In conclusion, using ChatGPT to enhance your recruiting workflow can bring a multitude of benefits to the recruitment process. From automating repetitive tasks to generating personalized communication, ChatGPT can save recruiters time and help them focus on higher-level tasks like building relationships with candidates and hiring managers.

The future of artificial intelligence in the recruitment space is very exciting and I believe that utilizing ChatGPT is a smart idea for recruiters. It allows them to be more efficient and effective in their recruitment efforts, ultimately leading to better hires and a more successful business. I can’t wait to see what advancements will come in the future and how they will continue to transform the recruiting landscape.”

Not too shabby for a machine…

Andrew Rothman has been with PCRecruiter for 25 years, managing a variety of projects, including web and media design, video production, and vendor partnerships. He has a background in music, multimedia, and theater.

The last couple of years have seen sweeping changes in the job market. Call it the Great Resignation, the Great Change-Up, the Great Reshuffle – or the great something else – thousands of people have chosen to change career paths.

Dave Nerz - President of NPAworldwide — Dave Nerz – President of NPAworldwide

What’s not so great for recruiters right now is that previously passive candidates – people not actively seeking new roles – are now super-passive. That’s because they’ve found a role that they’re comfortable with and there’s risk associated with making a change.

Finding the right talent is tougher than ever before. Sometimes clients need to know the reality, especially when there’s a limited pool of candidates for an open role. So how can recruiters keep it real and push back on clients for a win-win outcome?

PCRecruiter got some thoughts on the matter from Dave Nerz, President of NPAworldwide, a global network of 550 specialist and generalist recruiters in multiple sectors operating in 42 countries. (We also spoke with Dave about Working From Home for another blog post last year.)

The Great Challenge

The opportunities to recruit someone who’s chosen to move outside the city to work remotely are reduced. The pool of talent is getting smaller.
Dave Nerz, President, NPAworldwide

A few years ago, sourcing and attracting the best and brightest passive talent was a struggle. As it stands, the job of a recruiter is even tougher.

The pandemic made tens of thousands of workers reevaluate their choices. For many different reasons – be it the chance to work from home, a change of lifestyle, or cost-cutting by no longer commuting – many people settled into new ways of living and working.

This increased satisfaction has decreased the size of the available talent pool. People are more risk-averse. Extracting passive talent from roles in which they’re now highly comfortable requires employers to up their offering. Recruiters need more resources – improved leverage – to attract the best talent and make the right hires.

To get it, recruiters sometimes have to push back on clients.

A Reality Check

The hiring managers and leadership of some mid-sized companies are not always in tune with what the current job market is all about.
Dave Nerz, President, NPAworldwide

Companies with in-house recruiters will have some awareness of the current employment market. Those relying on agencies tend to be less informed. Until it comes to the numbers. When recruiters surface ten prospective candidates for a role that in the past might have had a hundred, questions get asked. It’s a reality check. At this point, recruiters have to turn around and start educating employers. Their role becomes increasingly consultative.

The reality is that it’s taking recruiters longer to find the right talent, and there’s less of it to go around. They might find a dead-on hit, and extract them from their current position, only to be told by the hiring manager that they’d like to see a couple more candidates as well. In an ideal world, it would be great to have a group of potential applicants. In reality, time is of the essence. If employers don’t seize the talent when it’s available – someone else will. If recruiters focus on sourcing additional candidates, they stand to lose the one or two that they’ve already found.

It’s About Time

If they’re that good, they’ll be gone.
Dave Nerz, President, NPAworldwide

Competition for the best candidates in a shrinking talent pool means recruiters need to work smarter to get up to speed. Gone are the days of meetings over coffee or lunch. To extract the right candidates from their current roles and bring them in takes money, resources, and time. What used to be a window of three months to make the hire, is now more like three weeks.

A man on the phone. Photo by
Andrea Piacquadio

Employers also have to fiercely compete on their offers. Whether that’s a bigger signing bonus, more time off, the option to work from home, or something else – it all has to be negotiated within a limited timeframe. This is where speed is of the essence. It’s also when recruiters need to push back on clients to ensure they’re educated about the reality.

Some companies who reflect on the hiring process realize they need to take a more consultative approach to recruiting, knowing it will get them better long-term results. Others look at the problem and blame recruiters. To try to solve the issue, these companies hire multiple contingent recruiters to simultaneously source talent for a single role.

The trouble is, there’s only a limited talent pool. So having multiple recruiters set against each other in a race to find the best candidates doesn’t necessarily yield more prospects. All it does is make recruiters consider the value of their own time – and how it might be more productively spent working exclusively for other clients.

The Power Of Pushback

Pushing back on clients can pull some recruiters out of their comfort zone. But the benefits are clear. Being totally transparent and giving employers who get it a true picture of the job market means recruiters get the resources they need to get the job done, and make the right hires. In situations where recruiters get blamed for the lack of available talent, employers end up getting second-rate candidates – or worse – no candidates at all.

Catching the best candidates before they opt to go elsewhere requires close collaboration and fast-thinking. The right ATS and CRM can also help to speed up the hiring process. That doesn’t mean cutting corners. It means streamlining workflows – even automating some aspects of it – so that recruiters can get the job done faster and more efficiently.

PCRecruiter is an all-in-one ATS and CRM which saves recruiters time, so they can make the right hires faster. Discover our tech.

In the G2 Winter 2023 rankings, PCRecruiter appeared in seventeen new reports, achieving twelve new ranking badges and Top 10 slots in twenty-five different reports.

G2, the world’s largest and most trusted software marketplace, releases quarterly reports for a variety of software categories. Their rankings and awards are based entirely on independent reviews submitted by real users. PCRecruiter is ranked in the Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS), Candidate Relationship Management, Staffing, and Recruitment Marketing categories. PCRecruiter has appeared as a Top 10 recruiting software in the past, and the Winter 2023 reports continue the trend and then some!

PCRecruiter hits #1 in Recruitment Marketing Software Ranking

G2 considers a “Small Business” to be any company with 50 or fewer employees. According to IBISWorld, this encompasses most recruiting agencies, making G2’s “Small Business” grouping the most important one for PCRecruiter. Here’s how we fared in the 2023 Winter Report based on independent PCRecruiter reviews:

Recruitment Marketing – High Performer

Best ‘Usability’ (Ranked #1)
Best ‘Meets Requirements’ (Ranked #1)
Highest User Adoption
Top 5 in Customer Relationship
Top 10 in Implementation

Applicant Tracking Systems – Leader

Top 5 in Results Index
Top 5 in Customer Relationship
Top 10 in Usability

Staffing – High Performer

Top 10 in Usability
Top 10 in Results Index
Top 10 in Customer Relationship

Candidate Relationship Management – Leader

Top 5 in Customer Relationship
Top 5 in Results Index
Top 10 in Usability
Top 10 in Implementation

Top 10 Recruiting Software in Overall Rankings

When looking at the rankings for businesses of all sizes, PCRecruiter also appeared in several Top 10 ranks, including the results Indexes for Applicant Tracking Systems and Staffing software, and the Customer Relationship Indexes for Applicant Tracking Systems, Candidate Relationship Management, and Staffing software.

We are always particularly happy to see PCRecruiter reaching the top of the list for Customer Relationship, as we pride ourselves on how easy our customers say we are to do business with!

If you’re a PCRecruiter user, we would love to have your thoughts included in G2’s Spring 2023 rankings, particularly in light of new features like Sequencing and the many other exciting updates we’ve got planned for the new year. We invite you to submit your own review here.

About G2

G2 is the world’s largest and most trusted software marketplace. More than 60 million people annually — including employees at all of the FORTUNE 500 — use G2 to make smarter software decisions based on authentic peer reviews. Thousands of software and services companies of all sizes partner with G2 to build their reputation, manage their software spend, and grow their business – including Salesforce, HubSpot, Zoom, and Adobe. To learn more about where you go for software, visit www.g2.com and follow on Twitter and LinkedIn.

Everyone seems to be saying the same thing: where did 2022 go? It was the year in which the world of work slowly came to terms with the after effects of the global pandemic. Organizations relaunched in recovery mode, and recruiters faced up to new challenges from remote working to the so-called ‘Great Resignation’. A lot has changed – maybe more than at any other point in living memory. The recruitment landscape is a very different shape and size to what it was 3 years ago.

You may remember that back in the fall, we compiled a list of key hiring and recruitment trends for 2022. The truth is that with so much going on this year, there’s plenty more where that came from. So we’ve decided to welcome in 2023 by looking back – and gazing ahead – at 5 recruiting trends you might have missed.

1 Recruitment Podcasts

Staying up to date with the latest recruitment industry insight, topics, and trends is no easy feat – especially right now. The great thing about podcasts is that you can listen on the fly, in the car, on the way to work, or on your lunch break. The trouble is, if you can think of it, someone’s probably already made a podcast about it. With so many shows available, it can be difficult to find what you’re looking for. To help you get started, earlier in 2022 we put together a list of our top 6 recruitment podcasts.

2 Data Security

Recruiters handle high volumes of personal data every day. In fact, your data is probably your organization’s most valuable asset. Think about it. All that candidate and company data sitting in your ATS and CRM is a goldmine – not only for your competitors – but for hackers looking to extract personal information. The last thing any recruiter wants is a data breach, which can be costly for your company – particularly your reputation. As data privacy regulations around the world continue to tighten, data security becomes ever more critical to client and candidate trust. Find out what you need to know by reading our article on data security in recruitment.

3 Social Recruiting

Let’s be clear. The fundamentals of recruiting haven’t changed all that much over the years. But the ways in which candidates engage with potential employers, and employers reach out to candidates, have evolved. As a digital-first generation enters the job market, companies need to find the right spaces to engage with potential candidates. And that means social hiring – using social media platforms to connect with prospective candidates. However, recruiters need to be increasingly strategic about which social platforms they use to source the right candidates. Learn more by reading our guide on how to use social media in recruiting.

4 Automations

It’s not the most obvious move for a people business like recruitment, but introducing automations into the hiring process can help you hire faster. By making effective use of today’s technology, recruiters can free-up more time to focus on their core business. For example, in PCRecruiter, it’s possible to automate things like form letters to candidates, emails to clients to schedule interviews, and notifications that prompt administrators to take certain actions. The key to this is knowing what’s possible, and how to set up automatons which actually benefit recruiters in their daily work. Not sure where to start? Take a look at our blog post on 5 ways to use automation in recruitment.

5 Artificial Intelligence

Let’s be honest, in 2022 AI in recruitment was headline news, so you probably didn’t miss this one! But, we feel it’s an important one to keep on your radar. The reality is that AI is here, it’s been used by recruiters, and it’s not going away anytime soon. It’s fair to say that many of us are willing to welcome AI into certain aspects of our lives, from customer service chatbots to film recommendations. But when it comes to determining our suitability for an open role – that’s a different story. New York’s new regulation on the use of ‘Automated Employment Decision Tools’ comes into effect from 1st January 2023. It will be interesting to see the impact of this on the recruitment industry. Read our blog to learn more about the pitfalls and potential of using AI in recruitment.

Looking Ahead To 2023

As people, technology, and the global economies continue to pull in different directions, companies will continue to adopt and embrace technology-driven recruitment practices to compete for the best candidates, and ensure they get the right people into the right roles.

At PCRecruiter, we’re excited to discover where our sequencing tool will take recruiters who’ll be able to accelerate recruiting workflows, speed up the onboarding of new team members, and increase efficiency for current users.

Stay on top of your hiring game in 2023 and beyond with PCRecruiter’s Sequencing feature. Watch this short video to learn more:

Season’s Greetings from PCRecruiter

Main Sequence Technology wishes you a happy holiday and a bright and successful 2023!

2022 marked PCRecruiter’s 24^th year of service to the recruiting and staffing industry.

It’s been another year of growth and innovation. With all new features like Sequencing Automations, refreshed core features like Pipeline and Notifications, and our always-improving public API, PCRecruiter is better than ever and charging into 2023 with engaged high-end partners like HireEZ, ZoomInfo, and RingCentral.

2022 was also a year of growth for our development and support teams. Their always customer-focused performance encouraged so many positive independent reviews by enthusiastic customers that PCRecruiter ranked in G2‘s Top 10 on twenty-four different indexes for staffing, ATS, and recruitment software.

2023 will bring a major UI update and the continuous improvement across the board that PCRecruiter customers have enjoyed for decades.

To the entire PCRecruiter community of end-users, customers, partners, team members, and suppliers: Main Sequence Technology wishes you the finest holiday season and the most prosperous new year!

The work from home phenomenon divides opinion. Nowhere is that more keenly felt than in recruitment. Some employers and employees see it as a performance enhancing perk, whilst others view it as a barrier to productivity and career progression. So how can recruiters use it to their best advantage?

NPAworldwide is a global recruitment network of 550 members operating in 42 countries. It spans multiple sectors, and includes specialist and generalist recruiters.

For this blog post, PCRecruiter spoke to the President of NPAworldwide, Dave Nerz, to get his inside perspective on the work from home (WFH) trend.

WFH Wednesday

WFH provides two different working environments. Places to get different kinds of work done. It makes the day go faster – and it’s really helpful for me.
Dave Nerz, President, NPAworldwide

WFH was around long before the pandemic, but lockdowns and social distancing meant more people experienced it than ever before. At that time, WFH became a necessity rather than a ‘nice to have’ option. But like many forward-thinking organizations, NPAworldwide was already testing the water with WFH. They employed remote staff, and Dave Nerz had introduced WFH Wednesday. So when the pandemic hit, they were ready.

Employees were already set up at home. They had a space to work, and the right tools to get their work done, like a telephone, Internet services, office stationery, and computers. In fact, as a leader, Dave had been doing his own version of WFH for years. Every Wednesday afternoon, he’d set up in the local library to get things done without interruption. He’d switch off his phone and create a situation where he could focus on longer tasks like writing reports.

Right now, Dave splits his working day between the office in the morning and home in the afternoon. He gets the best of both worlds. Face-to-face meetings and in-person work happens in the office. At home, he can schedule longer video calls, and focus on more complicated time-consuming tasks. His team also benefits. For example, parents can work around their childcare duties, and still get the job done to the benefit of the organization.

Hybrid Working Arrangements

As an industry, we’re going to have to figure out how to make more people available to us that would otherwise not be able to fill the roles.
Dave Nerz, President, NPAworldwide

It’s fair to say that certain jobs don’t currently work in a hybrid or remote model. For example, there are roles in manufacturing and engineering which have to be done on site — although with new technology, even that is slowly changing. When roles can be done remotely or hybrid, it opens up a much broader talent pool. That’s important on a global scale. Why? Many sectors are facing a demographic drought. In terms of age, their demographic looks like an inverted pyramid: many people are retiring and there’s not enough young talent coming through.

An image of a man working at his laptop from home. Photo by Yasmina H.

Specifying a geographic location for roles which could be done remotely immediately shrinks the talent pool. Conversely, widening the search to a particular state — or even the entire country — adds depth and breadth. Hiring on home soil makes things like onboarding and communication easier. But there’s no doubt that in certain industries, such as software development, offshore is sometimes the only answer.

Timezones are also playing an increasingly important role. In the future, we’re likely to see a trend for employers searching for people who work on a certain slice of time, as opposed to being based in a particular city. In that respect, remote and hybrid working will help to close the skills gap.

Training For Success

WFH and remote working is going to help the industry solve some problems in the short term, while we figure out the long term.
Dave Nerz, President, NPAworldwide

As the boomer generation continues to retire, the skills gap widens. In the past, corporations had training programs which would give graduates the right skill sets to go out into an industry and launch their careers.

Today, a lot of that has gone. Post 9/11 and financial crises, many companies cut costs by axing their training programs, instead searching for ready-made talent. The problem is there’s often not enough of it to go around.

Bringing in talent from overseas can help. For recruiters and employers, geographic borders make relocating people — physical immigration — a complicated and time-consuming process. Virtual immigration opens up new possibilities. You can have trained talent from abroad work remotely in no time at all.

The key challenge for employers taking on remote talent is how to ensure new recruits can be successfully onboarded and work effectively without stepping into an office. In the physical environment, you have managers and peers to support their training and development. With WFH, those opportunities don’t arise naturally. They have to be scheduled in. This might make it more challenging for those people who are purely remote.

It also impacts career development. When someone’s remote-only, managers can see the end results, but they don’t necessarily have visibility over the process including the wins and the mistakes. Without seeing it, managers have to take a leap of faith based on results, which could affect an employee’s promotability. Remote working can also limit opportunities to discuss career advancement because there aren’t those live, face-to-face moments that you get from working in an office.

Recruitment In A Remote-First World

We’re going to have to select people on the basis of how they demand to work. In some cases, as opposed to an option, WFH becomes a demand.
Dave Nerz, President, NPAworldwide

There’s no question that some work is better done in-person. Remote-first isn’t suitable to every sector. Take automotive engineers, for example. They need to be inside the company to see what’s being done, how it’s done, and what their impact is likely to be.

Even with roles that can potentially be done remotely — such as marketing or recruitment — in-person meetings are still important. People need to get together. Whether that’s casual interaction, or scheduled crossover with other workers and teams, companies need to figure out new ways of working. And recruiters have to be on board with that in order to sell it to prospective candidates.

A woman working at home. Photo by Kelly Sikkema

At the same time, remote and hybrid working is a matter of taste. Different people work best in different ways. We all have different styles. This is something that employers and recruiters can tap into. The question is: what can they do to attract and retain the right talent as well as optimize their performance? The answer is to offer flexibility that benefits both parties.

Different demographics will have different demands. Couples with young children will have different needs than people approaching retirement. What it comes down to can be any number of factors, whether that’s style, convenience, or economics.

Being Effective From Anywhere

I don’t see work in the office as going away. For many businesses and industries, it’s not feasible. It doesn’t make sense.
Dave Nerz, President, NPAworldwide

The bottom line is simple. Employers need the best talent to fill their open roles. Where and how the work gets done most effectively comes down to personal choice. Whether working from home or in the office, it’s personal situations which determine effectiveness. This means managers have to think much more creatively about how things get done.

Recruiters also need to go beyond simply listing WFH, remote, or hybrid as part of a job posting, and consider the wider implications for their target audience. Being able to offer more flexible working arrangements which work in both company and the candidate’s interest can be a win-win — if you get it right.

Whether you’re a WFH, hybrid, or office-based recruiter, and no matter what type of recruitment you work in, the right ATS and CRM can streamline your day to day and help you make the right hires. Learn more about PCRecruiter.

In any industry, bringing on new starters is never a straightforward process – and recruitment is no different. You’ve sourced potential candidates. You’ve gone through the recruitment process. And you’ve made the hire. Now it’s time to onboard, train, and integrate your new recruiter.

Whether they’re new to recruiting or they’ve been doing it for years, your newly hired recruiters need to get up to speed with your firm’s ways of doing things. That includes workflows and software. Most specifically, they need ‘new recruiter’ training on your applicant tracking and candidate relationship management tools.

In this blog post, PCRecruiter’s Drew Rothman looks at key strategies for successful new recruiter training, whether they’re learning the software, the job, or even both things at the same time.

Give Them A Process

Each recruiter and every recruitment firm has their own unique way of doing things. Sure, they might use similar methods, but as part of your organization, new recruiters need to do things your way, at least in the beginning. If, further down the line, someone wants to adapt or improve on the processes, that should be welcomed.

When tackling new recruiter training you need to ensure they understand your business goals, the key performance indicators (KPIs), and the expectations for getting the job done. Standardized workflows allow you to easily track both candidate and recruiter progress. So when it comes to using a central repository of client and candidate data, you’ve got to ensure that everyone’s doing it the same way.

A sequencing tool can help new hires to learn both the software and the job of recruiting. Giving new recruiters a process to follow, combined with automations such as follow-up emails and text messages, makes it so much easier to get up and running in no time at all. Without a process, recruiters essentially have an open box of tools, but no guidance on how to use them properly.

Provide A Mentor

In some respects, recruitment has a lot in common with sales. The key difference is that instead of pushing a product, you’re selling candidates to companies with open roles, and open roles at companies to prospective candidates.

Mentoring a New Recruiter — Assigning a mentor to a new recruiter can help them get up to speed on both the market and the technology.

Knowing the niche is vital in establishing a recruiter’s credibility with both candidates and clients. It’s also essential when handling common pushbacks and comments from candidates in a specific area. Mentoring can help a new recruiter to learn the market they’ll be working in.

When it comes to mentoring, there are different schools of thought. It’s common to assign a buddy to provide support, help them in the right direction, and answer any questions. That said, some firms prefer to throw new recruiters in at the deep end and get them straight on the phone.

Teach them the Tools

There was a time when the two most valuable items in a recruiters tool kit were a phone and a list of telephone numbers. Today, there are still some sectors where this rings true. However, with the rise of online social media platforms, and messaging in all its forms, recruiters have to go where the candidates are. This might mean communicating across a variety of channels, like email or Twitter.

Recruiters who’ve been in the industry a long time, are more likely to be comfortable making calls and sending emails. On the other hand, younger generations who’ve grown up with text messaging and social media are likely to be less comfortable picking up the phone and talking to someone. In fact, recent graduates might never have cold-called anyone, ever.

That’s why training should be personalized to fill the skills gap, and support new recruiters in adapting to your ways of working. Scripting calls and shadowing experienced recruiters is one approach for phone-based recruiters. Meanwhile, video tutorials or face-to-face training on how to use other communication tools can help level-up skills.

The tools you use depend on the industry you’re recruiting in, and the type of candidates you’re hiring. These days, a phone call can feel intrusive to some, whereas a brief message, whether sent by text or on social media, can be read and responded to at the recipient’s leisure. A phone call demands a response right away. Video calls need scheduling and have become the norm in the wake of the global pandemic.

Whichever communication channel your recruiters are using, it’s fair to say that getting hold of candidates can be a challenge.

How Sequencing Helps with New Recruiter Training

With a sequencing tool, you can create a customizable workflow which prompts recruiters to take specific actions in a specific order. For example, say a candidate doesn’t respond to a phone call. After a certain amount of time, they might be prompted to send a text message notifying the candidate of the call. Sequencing can also include automations – like sending an acknowledgement email after a specific task is completed.

Sequencing helps new and existing recruiters follow a pre-defined process with little or no training. They can essentially work out of one screen with a clear, task-based workflow. This puts everything recruiters need to do to make a placement in one convenient spot.

With PCRecruiter’s sequencing tool, you can create a clear task-based workflow that your recruiters can step through effortlessly.

An easy task-based interface makes recruiting automation simple. — Using a tool like PCRecruiter’s Sequencing can make it easier for a new recruiter to get started by providing them with a clear, step-by-step approach to the day’s tasks.

You want people, not software, to run your recruiting business. Finding the right software can be a challenge. You’re going to have questions, but are you asking the right ones?

Whether your chosen vendor requires a one-off transaction or a subscription service, recruiting CRM software is a significant outlay for your firm. It’s also the beating heart of your business. Your chosen software needs to perform well every day, and allow recruiters to get on with what they do best.

Balancing the cost of your investment with the business value it brings is no easy task. There are multiple variables to consider, including your firm’s preferred workflows and unique approach to making hiring decisions. After all, you want people, not your software, to run your recruiting.

PCRecruiter’s Jim Lombardo and Chris Cyrus have over 30 years of recruitment solution sales and consulting experience between them. In this post, they’ll share their tips for what to ask your staffing or recruiting CRM software vendor to ensure you get the right solution for your business.

For those new to the business, let’s start with what recruitment software has to offer.

What Is a Recruiting CRM / ATS?

Recruitment software is used by placement firms and executive search pros to handle the administrative side of the recruiting process. It helps them to source, track, and manage talent from prospect to placement.

An end-to-end solution typically combines aspects of an applicant tracking system (ATS) with candidate and client relationship management (CRM) tools to support the entire recruitment lifecycle.

Recruiting software also provides related functionality that can help to speed up the process, such as:

Job postings
Workflow automation
Reusable forms
Boolean CV / resume search
Multi-function lists
Configurable reports
Recruitment analytics
Email and voice integrations

The Benefits of a Recruitment CRM / ATS

The right software can unlock significant business benefits. If you’re not already using an ATS/CRM at your recruiting agency, here are five ways it can add value:

Automation: Automate routine and repeatable administrative tasks, like sending notifications and communications.
Information Retention: Build a pool of current and past roles, candidates, and clients for instant access and faster future searches.
Communication: A single repository for logging all email, voice, and text activity makes it easier to track history and communicate more effectively.
Error Reduction: Ensure candidate and client information is correct and up to date with a single source of truth, reducing duplication and related mistakes.
Analytics: Use the available data to gain competitive insights into both candidate and recruiter performance. Easily identify areas for improvement.

Whether you’re just starting up your recruiting firm or considering a change of recruitment CRM, it’s important to ask the right questions to get the right solution and the best deal from your vendor.

Here are some key questions that Jim and Chris recommend:

What’s the pricing model, and how much will it cost?

Every recruitment firm has a unique budgets and unique needs. Paying for unused licenses or unnecessary functionality is not cost-effective. Ask how your potential vendor defines ‘users’, how they handle adding or dropping users, and what costs are involved in setup and training. As most software as a service (SaaS) software is offered on a subscription model, it’s important to know whether future updates are part of the package or an additional cost.

If you’re considering self-hosting, there’s also cost of hardware and maintenance to consider.

What kind of support do you offer?

With the implementation of any new software, there is always going to be a learning curve. The flatter this curve, the quicker recruiters can get back to the job of recruiting. With a training and support package from the get-go, it’s much easier to get up and running, and get back to business without a lengthy introduction.

Ask who your point of contact will be. Do you get an experienced trainer to help guide you through using the software and offer advice regarding best practices? It’s also useful to know what post-setup options are available, like a learning management system (LMS), videos, or documentation to help you further down the line. Ongoing personal support can also be invaluable. Don’t forget to ask what the hours for support are, where the support team is based, and whether support comes with additional fees.

How can I post and update jobs?

With all the heavy lifting going on within your software, it’s important that job postings can be easily shared with job boards and other external platforms, without having to copy and paste information from one location to another. This is especially important when you want job postings to be consistent across different locations, or you want to allow candidates to flow in from multiple places. How does the potential vendor put jobs out to the world?

Am I able to extract data to generate reports and analytics?

Forward-thinking recruiters are using data to speed up sourcing and selection, and accelerate the time to fill open roles. Data can also be useful for analyzing candidate and recruiter performance. To get the best value from your dataset, it’s vital that your recruiting software offers reports to reveal useful business insights, and enables you to continuously improve as an organization. Ask what reports and analytics they provide and whether you can generate your own or export to common formats.

How do I get legacy data in or out?

A woman on the phone — When shopping for staffing or recruiting software, have your questions ready and take plenty of notes on the demo.

If you’re moving from one staffing and recruiting software to another, another important consideration is the successful migration of your existing data. This process can take time to get right. Data from a spreadsheet can typically be imported by you as an end-user, but a full data migration of jobs, resumes, and record history can potentially take weeks. How does your prospective vendor ensure a smooth transition without impacting day-to-day business or creating costly downtime? What fees are involved in migrating the data? And if you decide to leave, what’s involved in getting your data out?

Is this going to work with my existing email?

Bringing in new software shouldn’t involve redefining your entire software stack (unless you want it to.) When it comes to email, altering email habits to accommodate a new system is both time-consuming and unnecessary. Whether you use Gmail, Outlook, or any other major email client and provider, make sure the software you choose can easily work with your existing account. Ask about integrations that would help you sync contacts, calendars, attachments, and forms between your email and recruitment CRM.

How does it track voice and SMS communications?

Recruiters spend a lot of time on the phone. Ideally, you want your staffing software to offer a single pane of glass over the entire recruitment process. That includes SMS and voice communications. So it’s a reasonable expectation that the system should allow you to sync with services for dialing out or sending a text messages easily. Find out what systems your vendor works with and to what degree, and ask about tracking of activity in general.

Does it enable me to enhance my existing talent pool?

The right staffing software will elevate your hiring game, and building your own private database of candidates and clients will pay dividends on future searches. To that end, what functionality does it have to enable you to broaden, and deepen, your existing talent pool? These days, there are a wealth of clever services out there to help you uncover best-fit passive talent. Does the software easily integrate with services such as seamless.AI, HireEz, or ZoomInfo’s TalentOS?

Will my data be secure?

It’s imperative to pay attention to the security of your private database. With plenty of high-profile cases of data breaches, there can be lasting reputational and financial damage if something goes wrong. Ask the vendor who can access your data, and what security protocols they have in place. Find out how frequently the data is backed up and how easily it can be retrieved if something goes wrong.

You’ll also want to verify whether the vendor themselves intend to makes use of your data. Will your data be used research, aggregation, or even resale? Is it comingled with data from other users?

PCRecruiter is ready to give you answers.

PCRecruiter has been helping recruiters source, track, and hire since 1998. Over the years, our offering has evolved alongside recruiters’ needs and advances in technology. We understand the wide range of business models and service requirements that recruiting pros need.

We’re proud to have served over tens of thousands of recruiters around the world through our ATS / CRM. We are both happy and qualified to answer the questions above and more.

Let us answer your questions and show you around our recruiting tech. Book a free demo today.

For some recruiters, self-hosting is still the most cost-effective and efficient way to manage their ATS and CRM. For others, SaaS makes the most sense. So how do you know what’s right for your recruitment firm? And is there a vendor who can offer you both? (Yes. PCRecruiter).

Whether you’ve been in recruitment for decades, or you’re just getting started, your Applicant Tracking System (ATS) and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) sit front and center of your business. Their value to your day-to-day activities is unquestionable.

If your current software license is due for renewal, you’re about to heavily invest in new hardware, or you’re building a recruiting business from the ground up, it’s a good time to reevaluate your options. But should you choose self-hosted or SaaS?

In this blog post from PCRecruiter, company co-founder Martin Snyder looks at the key differences between self-hosted and SaaS, and the advantages of each type of setup. Why? Because unlike other vendors, PCRecruiter still offers both options to ensure we can provide the best fit for a wide range of needs.

What Is Self-Hosting?

A self-hosted solution run by the user’s company on their own IT systems and servers or from a data center which is not owned by their software vendor. This is also known as an ‘on-premise’. In a self-hosted set-up, the software is purchased outright via a license, typically renewed on an regular basis.

Self-hosting works well for companies who already own or pay for the services required to facilitate it. So if you’ve already got a web and database server, storage infrastructure, technical and administrative support, and software maintenance services in place and working well, then all you need is the software. In this set-up, the software is a capital expense – a one-time purchase.

What Is SaaS?

Software as a Service (SaaS) is the more popular alternative to self-hosting. SaaS is delivered over the Internet and does not require the same level of installation or maintenance. It eliminates the need for you to self-manage complicated software and hardware installations. SaaS is sometimes referred to as on-demand software or web-based software. It’s also sometimes referred to as “hosted software” because SaaS is hosted by the vendor who manages updates, security, access, and availability. SaaS uses a subscription model, so you pay on a recurring basis, often monthly.

SaaS doesn’t require the expensive IT infrastructure needed to self-host. In most cases, SaaS can run from any device with a browser or sometimes via a dedicated app. SaaS eliminates the need to buy and maintain your own hardware and networking infrastructure. In this way, SaaS helps to keep the capital costs down for IT hardware and equipment. It also means that your software becomes an operating expense (OpEx).

Self-Hosted or SaaS

In many ways, recruiting is a very narrow economic process. But the definition of a ‘recruiter’ is very broad – from an independent headhunter working at home to the HR sourcer at an international corporation. The one thing they all have in common is that recruiters tend to be ‘people’ people, not ‘tech’ people. They need a solution that fits their day-to-day needs without adding an unnecessary layer of complexity.

In the distant past, the only option was for businesses to use a self-hosted or on-premise solution to meet their IT needs. It’s still the traditional way of setting up major IT infrastructure – and there’s nothing wrong with that. But as the saying goes: do what you’ve always done, and you’ll always get the same results. For some recruitment firms, this approach still works and they get great results. For others – particularly recruitment start-ups – SaaS offers a better solution.

Here are some key points to consider when comparing self-hosting with SaaS:

Continuous Delivery

There are many reasons to choose SaaS. If you lack the IT infrastructure to self-host, or if you’ve got any concerns whatsoever about the stability of your database, a SaaS vendor can take care of that for you. The other considerations are uptime and availability. If you’re not able to guarantee the stable and continuous delivery of your recruiters’ every day software tools and network, then SaaS is also a good option.

IT Resources

While major recruiting agencies may have lots of IT assets, smaller firms often have fewer resources. SaaS gives these companies access to a much more powerful software stack than they would otherwise manage themselves.

Smaller organizations also benefit from only needing a handful of user subscriptions. On the other hand, large enterprises can sometimes find self-hosting a more cost-effective way to add tens or hundreds of users (see Economic Models).

Data Security

Most recruiters would agree that their most prized asset is their database.

Self-hosting gives recruiters the reassurance that, with proper security in place, only they will have access to their data. There’s no need to be concerned about the vendor relationship and what could potentially happen with their data when it’s hosted by a third-party provider. Fears over a data breach, cyber threats, or even the sale of data are common concerns. Some less reputable ATS providers may even stipulate that if you import data into their SaaS, they own or can make use of the data. If you’re looking into any SaaS option, always ask the vendor for the specifics about who has access to and ownership of the database!

For every company around the world, there are ever-tightening regulations around data privacy. Recruitment is no exception. A data breach or cyberattack can be costly in terms of reputation and financial damage. Self-hosting gives you complete control over where the data is stored, who can connect to it, and even direct database access to the contents if needed.

Conversely, self-hosting means the entire security of your database rests upon your own network and IT capabilities, which could make you more vulnerable to issues rather than less. A reputable SaaS provider should have a highly secured hosting setup and regular security audits to ensure safety of the system, as well as be compliant with any applicable data protection regulations. This may offer you more peace of mind than managing things yourself.

Updates & New Features

With self-hosting, updating and getting new features can potentially be a time-consuming and costly process. It may impact business functionality, and generate downtime. SaaS is hosted by the vendor, so any updates and new features are handled centrally and automatically, and are therefore much quicker and easier to roll out.

The other aspect to consider is timing. With SaaS, updates and new features are rolled out on a continuous basis. With self-hosting, it’s more typical to receive less frequent updates because of the complexity and disruption to services. Digital SaaS updates put the control in the hands of the vendor. Self-hosting updates tend to happen on-demand, putting control in the hands of the owner.

Another factor of increasing importance is how well the software can connect to other tools in your recruitment software stack. While a SaaS vendor may be able to offer software integrations through their own application programming interfaces (API), technical or contractual requirements often limit these to the SaaS provider’s own domain or infrastructure. Choosing to self-host may mean giving up some of the more robust features that rely on specific hardware and software behind the scenes. If you are currently self-hosting and have pre-existing integrations that you want to continue using when making a switch, it’s vitally important to ensure you can keep those connections.

Economic Models

As with most business decisions, cost is a make-or-break factor. Your decision to self-host or subscribe to a SaaS depends on your preferred economic model. When you self-host, the software is purchased as a single product. It’s owned. In countries like the US, for tax purposes, the value of this asset is said to depreciate in value over time. SaaS, however, is handled like a rental or lease. This means it there’s no depreciation. It’s an expense, and it gets taken as you spend it.

Most SaaS vendors have three distinct fees: setup, user fees, and workload. For recruitment software vendors, workload equates with storage, updates, and data maintenance. The more storage you need, the higher the cost. SaaS user fees are generally per-user/per-month, whereas self-hosted configurations generally involve an initial startup fee, plus an update fee. This means that as the number of users increases, the cost per user decreases. There is a level where self-hosting can represent a huge saving when compared with SaaS user fees, but that tipping point tends to be at much larger organization sizes.

Which One Is Right For You?

Despite the increasing popularity and advantages of SaaS – it’s still not for everyone. For every recruitment firm, what’s most important is to balance innovation with necessity and cost with functionality.

Thankfully, with PCRecruiter you can take your pick. While the vast majority of our users go with the SaaS model, we still offer a self-hosted solution for those who require one. The software is substantially identical, with the exception of some of the more advanced features, making it possible to move your data from one model to the other if your business requirements change in the future.

If you’re not sure which makes sense for your company, our sales consultants are trained to help you compare the various options, and determine the right one for you. Get in touch with us today.

Post pandemic – and in response to the ‘Great Resignation’ – some recruiters quickly turned to innovative methods, in order to speed up the hiring process and fill open positions. Bringing in artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) to handle some of the key decision-making might have initially helped to streamline workflows, but it’s also had some unintentional consequences.

While many people might be happy to have AI make suggestions around which film to watch next, or to recommend other music they may enjoy, handing it responsibility for the selection process in their next job application can raise understandable concerns.

In this blog post, we take a closer look at the pitfalls and the potential of using AI in recruitment, and where it might add value rather than systemized bias.

Current Applications

There’s no denying that in the modern world, AI has a lot of great uses. Across a range of industries, it’s being increasingly used to streamline workflows and cut costs. In fact, in the recruitment world, AI — and more specifically machine learning — has been used in various forms for some time now.

Common applications include automated interviews, resume (or CV) screening, as well as administrative duties, such as identifying duplicate candidate records. But the truth is, there’s a lot we don’t know about how AI is being used in recruitment. And that’s a concern.

Potential Benefits

For the recruitment business, where AI can really shine is in crawling talent pools for potential candidates based on specific job criteria such as qualifications and experience. It can also learn broadly what kind of candidate is a good fit for a particular role. However, its real potential benefits come from automating some of the repetitive and time-consuming work which goes along with screening, assessing, and scheduling.

Even as far back as 2017, studies showed that hiring decision-makers saw the cost and time saving potential of AI, alongside its ability to deliver better candidate matches. Interestingly, 43% of decision makers also believed that it would remove human bias. And that’s exactly where AI has come unstuck: when it’s been used to replace human decision-making in an effort to speed up the hiring process.

Knowing The Pitfalls of AI in Recruitment

When we talk about AI in recruitment, we really mean machine learning — computer systems which can learn from statistical models and data sets. As Amazon discovered in 2015, using historical human data to inform AI decision models can come at a cost to both potential candidates and their future employers. Their experimental hiring tool which made use of machine learning was informed by ten years of resumes submitted to the company.

This illustration of a robot recruiter was generated entirely by AI.

The issue was that the computer system was essentially given a decade of data revealing male dominance in the tech industry and adapted its algorithms accordingly. The result? Resumes containing the word ‘women’ were automatically downgraded. When this ‘algorithmic bias’ was discovered, interventions were made to ensure the system became gender-neutral, but it left lingering concerns that future unintended discrimination might occur, raising important questions around how to ensure that recruitment AI is transparent and fair.

In fact, transparency over the use of AI in recruitment is one of the biggest challenges currently facing the industry. That’s where new legislation is playing a crucial role.

New Employment Laws

A game changer in terms of the use of AI in recruitment, New York City’s AI employment law restricts the use of ‘automated employment decision tools’ and requires recruiters to undergo an annual bias audit to alleviate potential bias in their systems.

Recruiters will also have to be transparent about where AI has been used in the recruitment process, and to even provide candidates with alternative options for processing their applications. Undisclosed or biased use of AI in the hiring process will also be subjected to penalty fines.

Taking effect from January, 1 2023, New York’s new law blazes the trail for further legislation to tackle the inherent bias and potential discrimination generated by machine learning algorithms.

Similar conversations are taking place in the European Union, where the AI Act is set to institute self-certification programs and government oversight. This law will create transparency requirements for AI systems that interact with people, and will attempt to ban a few “unacceptable” qualities of AI systems. Individuals or companies located within the European Union, placing an AI system on the market in the European Union, or using an AI system within the European Union would be subject to the regulation.

Future Possibilities

It’s easy to be dismissive of AI in recruitment. After all, it’s a people business. But there are some clear use cases where it can make trustworthy and time-saving improvements to the placement process. AI can also be trained to trawl records and match specific criteria. For more common roles requiring limited experience or technical skills there is perhaps wider scope for AI to assist with search and selection. The real danger arises when AI trained on imperfect data, and therefore inherently biased, is used for key decision-making.

Conceivably, AI could be used to handle the entire recruitment process — which perhaps less scrupulous recruiters might find appealing. But for most recruiters there’s a sense of professional pride, and a human aspect to hiring — building relationships with employers and candidates — which AI simply can’t replace.

As an example, there could be three equally well-qualified candidates in the running for an open position. Their education, qualifications and experience all fit the bill, but what about their cultural fit? A good recruiter understands the importance of aligning the employer’s value proposition with the right candidates. AI can easily miss the subtle verbal and non-verbal nuances which influence human-decision making. Humans can also see beyond the data. Especially when you’re looking for someone with transferable skills from outside a particular industry. Good recruiters know that instinct, as much as anything else, comes into play when making the right hire.

There’s also the candidate’s perspective to consider. They may have a (sometimes valid) suspicion of any technology used to influence the hiring process. For example, even though Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) have been around for decades, you can still find plenty of blog posts and guides for ‘how to beat the ATS’. Fears run even deeper with undisclosed uses of AI, particularly when it comes to diversity and inclusion in the workplace. As the Amazon experiment revealed, machine learning opens up the potential for discriminatory algorithms, and runs the inherent risk of excluding candidates you really wanted, over the ones it thinks you want.

Accelerate Hiring Without AI

Although there are some tasks and activities which can be comfortably replaced by AI, when it comes to key decision-making, sourcing the right talent and identifying the best-fit candidate is best left in the hands of humans. But how can you speed up the time to hire without using AI?

Recruitment automations can take care of repetitive, and repeatable everyday tasks, and give recruiters more time to spend time with candidates and employers. It’s particularly helpful for keeping all parties updated through emails, form letters, and notifications, cutting down the time needed to manually create correspondence.

PCRecruiter is an ATS / CRM hybrid which offers recruiters a huge range of opportunities to automate certain aspects of their recruitment process, making workflows more streamlined and cost-effective. Tailored to specific workflows, it’s a seamless, customizable and powerful tool for handling your end-to-end talent sourcing and.

Want to learn more about the benefits of using automation in recruitment? Read our blog post 5 Ways To Use Automation In Recruitment.

On October 26th, learn about background screening trends, the importance of screening, and how to get started with the Verified First background screening integration in PCRecruiter.

Over 80% of organizations use background screening, yet 39% of organizations do not screen for every job (Aptitude Research).

That’s why we’re hosting a FREE webinar with our friends at Verified First, Why & How: The Importance of Background Screening. On October 26th, we’ll explore background screening trends, the importance of screening, and how to get started with the Verified First background screening integration.

We’ll also explore:

Why you should run background checks on staff
What can happen when background checks aren’t properly run
How Verified First’s solution saves time, requires less paperwork, and simplifies the process

When: October 26th at 1:00 PM EDT

PCRecruiter is proud to include Verified First in our roster of PCRecruiter integrations and partners.

G2’s Fall 2022 report recognizes PCRecruiter with 7 new badges and multiple Top 10 Rankings in the ATS, Staffing, Recruiting, and Candidate Relationship software categories.

G2, the world’s largest and most trusted software marketplace, has released their Fall 2022 Reports today. In the latest report, PCRecruiter received four new Leader badges, three new High Performer badges, and was ranked Top 10 in ten reports. These recognitions are based entirely on independent reviews submitted by real PCRecruiter users.

We were particularly pleased to receive a Top 3 slot in the Small-Business Relationship Index for Applicant Tracking Systems, indicating that when it comes to ease of doing business with, quality of support, and likeliness to recommend, PCRecruiter is one of the best ATS software options for companies of 1-50 employees.

“Rankings on G2 reports are based on data provided to us by real software buyers,” said Sara Rossio, Chief Product Officer at G2. “Potential buyers know they can trust these insights when researching and selecting software because they’re rooted in vetted, verified, and authentic reviews.”

We are deeply appreciative of your kind words about our software and we look forward to continuing to build on this success. If you’re a PCRecruiter user, we would love to have your thoughts included in G2’s Winter 2023 rankings. Click here to submit your own review now.

About G2

Recruitment is most definitely a people business, so introducing automation into your recruiting process might not seem like an obvious move. That is, until you realize that by adding automation at various points in their workflow, recruiters can actually free up more time to focus on their core business – making placements.

In this post, we explore ways that forward-thinking recruiters use automations to drive efficiency in their recruitment workflows. We’ll see how the right applicant tracking system (ATS) can help you hire faster.

What is recruitment automation?

Recruitment automation is the use of technology to automate specific tasks within the recruitment process. It helps minimize the time to fill open roles, and reduces costs. This delivers a better overall experience for candidates, employers, and recruiters.

Automation covers both external and internal tasks. These can include things like notifications sent at specific stages of the hiring process or emails to candidates. Ultimately, the less time a recruiter spends logging information, the more time they have to spend working with clients and candidates.

Recruitment automation can also include more strategic tasks, such as email campaigns, which help keep clients and candidates informed and engaged. Examples of time-saving automations include:

Form letters to candidates
Notification prompts to administrators
Emails to clients regarding scheduled interviews

PCRecruiter’s own system for recruitment automation is essentially an open box. Wherever a communication is both repeated and repeatable, the opportunities for automations are endless. As recruiters spot more opportunities to refine workflows, there is less need for them to manually create and send correspondence.

The great thing about automating via the ATS is that recruiters don’t need to spend time jumping between multiple tools. Doing more things from a single hub reduces friction, speeding up the placement and hiring processes.

The automation building tool is part of recruitment automation in PCRecruiter. — PCRecruiter’s Automations make event-triggered recruitment automations easy for users to implement.

How to use automation in recruitment

Think more strategically about your own recruiting workflows. You’ll see almost any recruitment process presents potential for automation. Everything from the initial job posting to interview scheduling to following up post-hire is an opportunity to streamline.

For most recruiters, their bane is technology that interferes with their work or slows them down. That being so, the best approach to implementing automations is to identify opportunities in existing processes. Look for points where automation might help recruiters to be more efficient and productive. By automating repetitive and repeatable tasks, recruiters free-up more time to focus on their core activities.

Here are five ways to use automation in recruitment:

Applicant Tracking

Applicant tracking is the backbone of any recruiter’s day-to-day. A whiteboard or spreadsheet solution might cut it in the early days. However, when you start handling multiple placements and hundreds of candidates these tools become inefficient and unwieldy.

No matter how many candidates in your database, or how many employers you’re dealing with, an applicant tracking system (ATS) like PCRecruiter scales with you. Because the software tracks candidates from end to end, you’ll never lose track of potential hires along the way. Candidates you couldn’t place remain ready for next time a suitable role opens up.

PCRecruiter users can modify fields and forms to suit existing workflows — this includes adding custom automations. For example, triggering behaviors when records containing specific information, such as a location or industry, are entered.

Job Postings

When it comes to job postings, there’s an administrative burden on recruiters to make the information visible. Whether on recruitment websites or your own company’s careers page, it can become complicated to track and manage multiple postings. Automation can help you create once and publish anywhere.

The great thing about PCRecruiter’s integrated job board is that it can be implemented into practically any website. This saves duplication of effort and potential errors that come from managing a website’s job board separately. In addition, leveraging job feeds and integrations helps to advertise the opening on other sites, saving time and effort.

Social Recruiting

In a world where 70% of the workforce consists of passive talent and 82% of Americans have a social media profile, it makes sense to reach potential candidates via their favorite social hangouts. Recruiters can leverage the potential reach of both personal and professional networks via social recruiting. This is accomplished through a combination of posting links to new job postings, and strategic employer branding.

What if every time you published a new position, your marketing team received a notification with all the relevant details? What if the job could be posted to social networks automatically? This could then be easily incorporated in and around other content promoting your employer brand and its values. PCRecruiter’s built-in automation features as well as integrations with services like Paiger and Zapier make these workflows easy to implement.

Process Sequencing

Process sequencing plays a vital role in helping support reps respond to customer inquiries quickly and efficiently. It provides standardized workflows and even scripting.

The same approach can be applied to recruitment. Sequences provide the recruiter with a clear and standardized series of tasks. These can be customized to suit different roles or industries. This creates the potential to create and apply automations at specific stages of the process.

PCRecruiter’s own sequencing tool enables recruiters to create their own workflows, with manual or automatic tasks. Tasks can include phone calls, prompts to connect on LinkedIn, or an automatic email confirming review of a resume. More quickly completing tasks and leveraging automating steps means recruiters can make more placements with less effort.

When it comes to onboarding new recruiters (or helping to keep current ones more effective), sequencing simplifies training. Making every step a clear and straightforward task guides users and informs them what the result of each action will be.

For example, after marking a completing a call, a contact is moved to the next step. The prebuilt sequence defines what that step is. For instance, if you have to leave a voicemail, the next step could be an automatic SMS confirming the message. If the call was connected, the next step may be a follow-up email with a form to complete.

Personalized Communication

In most competitive industries, there’s an increasing customer expectation of regular, relevant, and anticipated communication. People want more personalized and hassle-free experiences, and they expect regular notifications and updates as a matter of course. Just think of all the notifications you received the last time you placed an online order; you’re told when it’s been received, when it’s shipped, that it’s with the carrier, and so on.

Automations don’t just streamline existing processes. They can also help recruiters to do more than they would have been able to otherwise. Leveraging relevant data makes communication with candidates and clients can more personal. You’ll improve engagement by using their name, roles applied for, and even other roles they might be interested in. This creates a closer relationship, even if the placement is unsuccessful, that can return value in future placement efforts. This kind of personalized communication could take many forms. PCRecruiter can handle a variety of notifications:

Text messages (SMS)
Email notifications
Pop-up notifications within PCR
Push notifications (via the mobile app)

Making strategic use of recruitment automations

Any attempt to save time and cost through automation works best when it adds value and efficiency to existing processes. Look to automate aspects of your recruitment process with that in mind.

At the end of the day, most recruiters are people people, not tech people. That’s why it’s important to make workflows as streamlined and intuitive as possible. The software solution needs to fit their way of working and not the other way around.

PCRecruiter’s training team on-boards users by taking time to understand their daily flow. They get to know what your process looks like and how it works. By mapping out the process, they can identify where the software can solve pain points. Recruiting is already a challenging role — why add another layer of unnecessary complexity?

Once set up, automations in PCRecruiter enable you to do what you would do without it, only much faster. To learn how you can make placements with less administrative hassle, book a free consultation today.

There’s no question that recent years have been uncertain times for almost every type of business. Even those employers who managed to successfully ride out the global pandemic are feeling the effects of an ever-changing recruitment market. In a number of sectors, there’s also a widening gap between the skills needed and the skills candidates can offer.

As we move into the latter part of 2022, what are some of the key hiring recruitment trends for the staffing industry, permanent placement recruiters, and HR professionals?

Working Remotely Is Here To Stay

A man working at home — “Candidates now expect remote or hybrid working models as the norm.”

We live in a world where flexible working – greater freedom in when and where we work – is now an integral part of the employment landscape, particularly in knowledge-based industries. In fact, 80% of people are likely to recommend remote working to a friend. To that end, potential hires expect absolute clarity around remote and hybrid practices within companies. And for recruiters, remote working has advantages on both sides of the hiring process.

On one hand, candidates now expect remote or hybrid working models as the norm. With proven benefits in terms of employee job satisfaction and morale, the best candidates can demand their ideal working conditions. Many people prefer remote working to cut travel costs, reduce their carbon footprint, and the time they spend commuting. For that reason, putting together a personalized package of flexible working arrangements can help to differentiate your offer – and even become a deal-closer – when the right candidate has multiple offers on the table.

On the other side of the coin, remote recruitment practices are enabling recruiters to make the right hire faster. From access to a deeper and wider talent pool to streamlining the early stages of the recruitment process, through to things like online interviews or screening, remote hiring offers recruiters a competitive advantage in terms of time-saved and reduced costs. Find more strategies for reducing your time to hire, by reading our blog post on 10 tips to help you hire faster.

It’s Still A Jobseekers Market

Artificial intelligence is growing stronger, as shown in this “photo of a recruiter talking to a candidate” generated by DALL•E

Never mind artificial intelligence (AI) and robots taking human jobs, according to a recent study by Korn Ferry, the biggest threat facing recruiters will actually be a shortage of suitably skilled humans. In fact, it’s predicted that by 2030 there will be a global talent shortage of around 85 million people. The competition for recruiting and retaining top talent is heating up.

With more open positions than candidates, the best talent has the most power in the current job market. As the demand for talent continues to outstrip supply, companies are adopting evermore proactive hiring strategies in an effort to optimize their talent pipelines. Developing an appealing employer brand, deploying proven marketing tactics, and engaging with potential candidates via social media are fast-becoming a necessity in many sectors.

For instance, being present on the right social media platform for your target audience is a way to build relationships with potential candidates, especially as a growing number of digital natives begin filling up the talent pool. Learn more about social recruiting, and how to implement it, with our blog post on how to use social media in recruiting.

Employer Branding Is A Key Differentiator

Employer Branding Stats — There’s ample evidence that a great
employer brand makes it easier to recruit
and it also impacts the business’ bottom
line in more than one way.

Whether you choose to leverage it or not, the second an employer makes a hire, they have an employer brand. Like a company’s “traditional” brand, it embodies your mission, vision, and core values. For many organizations, an effective employer brand helps them to connect with the right candidates, attract the best talent, and retain that talent once they’re inside the organization.

As with a company brand, you need consistency across every touchpoint, creating a candidate experience which leads to positive word of mouth, and clearly sets out your value proposition as an employer or recruiter. In addition, the right employer brand and candidate experience will continue to make your company an attractive proposition to potential candidates who didn’t quite make it this time around. The other benefit of employer branding is its impact on retention, with one study indicating that it could lead to a 28% reduction in staff turnover. Take a more in-depth look at employer branding with our blog post on the topic.

Hard-To-Fill Roles In Tech And Marketing

In part, the talent shortage is due to demographics, with the majority of the boomer generation expected to exit the global workforce by 2030. As work becomes increasingly tech-based, many businesses are facing up to the reality of a deficit of the right talent. According to a study by Korn Ferry, without an influx of skilled, high-tech workers, the US could potentially miss out on $162 billion worth of annual revenues.

Contrary to what you might think, despite the global reach of digital recruitment channels, from job posting sites and careers pages to social media, filling roles in tech and digital marketing is becoming increasingly challenging. This is largely due to the uptake of digital technologies in the wake of the global pandemic, and the trend for digital transformation – the adoption of new technologies to drive efficiencies. Put simply, technology is moving at such a fast pace, when it comes to front-end developers and software architects, there just isn’t enough expertise to go around.

The “MarTech Map”, courtesy of https://martechmap.com/

This shortage of talent is especially true of digital marketing and the expert use of ‘martech’ (marketing technology). Comparing Scott Brinker’s MarTech Map from 2011 and 2022 shows an increase from 150 solutions to over 9,000 in 2022. That’s 6,521% growth in just 11 years. No one can be expert in every digital marketing tool, and this illustrates the challenge facing recruiters looking to hire the finest and most up-to-date marketing minds. Whether they’re looking for a marketing automation specialist or a search engine optimization (SEO) strategist, it can be difficult to find the right talent because the technology is so new. Smart recruiters are even employing SEO techniques to improve the online visibility of their job postings.

Recruitment Trends Round-Up

Whether you’re competing for the best candidate in a shallow talent pool, exploring new channels for networking with potential hires, improving your overall candidate experience, or trying to fill open roles in a highly-specialized market, the right applicant tracking software (ATS) can help.

PCRecruiter has been helping people hire since 1998. The technology might have changed, but our dedication to providing intuitive and time-saving solutions for sourcing, tracking, and recruiting candidates remains the same.

Find out how PCRecruiter can help streamline your recruitment efforts, by booking a demo.

The latest PCRecruiter update adds Email Categories, letting recipients opt in or out of specific types of mass-email for more control over your email marketing.

A new update has been released on the PCRecruiter hosting servers this morning. In addition to the standard issue corrections and performance enhancements, this update also includes changes in preparation for the release of our Sequencing feature, which will be officially available in September. While most of the changes will go unseen for those not using Sequencing, there are some important changes that will affect those who are using our current Email Campaigns or legacy Bulk Mail feature.

Subscription Statuses

In earlier versions of PCRecruiter, an email address could have one of four statuses:

No Status – No opt-in or opt-out request has been recorded, therefore this address can be sent single or mass-email until otherwise specified.
Opt-Out Bulk – PCRecruiter can send email to this address on an individual basis, but the email will be skipped when sending any multi-recipient email, such as a Campaign or legacy Bulk Mail.
Opt-Out All – PCRecruiter cannot send email to this address.
Opt-In – This address has explicitly given permission to receive all email.

It’s important to note that the subscription status is linked to the email address itself and not to the Name record, as you might have multiple records with the same email address, or you may remove a name from the system and re-add it at a later date.

New: Subscription Categories

Because the Opt-Out/Opt-In feature in previous versions was either “all-in” or “all-out”, it could limit the ability to manage more nuanced marketing and communication.

The new update includes an Email Category designation that applies to the email’s opt-in/out status, as well as to the mass email sends, thereby allowing recipients to receive only the kinds of email they wish to receive.

For example, someone may wish to receive Billing emails, but opt out of Newsletters. By giving recipients the option to choose by category, they are less inclined to opt out of all email just to avoid receiving some email.

The pre-defined list of Email Categories consists of the following options:

Announcements, Appointments, Benefits, Billing, Business Development, Compliance, Corrections Recalls, Education Training, Follow Ups, Holiday Greetings, Marketing, Networking, Newsletters, Operations, Opportunities, Referrals, Requests, Shareholders, Surveys, Updates, and Other

By default, ALL Categories will be visible. To hide the Categories that you don’t intend to use, any administrator-level user in your database can navigate to SYSTEM > Email Setup > Bulk Email Categories. From there, they can uncheck the extraneous choices. This will hide that Category both for users sending email and for recipients editing their subscription options.

What does this change for PCR users?

The new Email Category dropdown supporting email subscriptions. — The new “Email Category” dropdown is required when sending email to a search result or Rollup list of recipients.

When users are sending any Campaign or Bulk Email, they will now be presented with an “Email Category” dropdown. The user must select the appropriate category based on the content of the email, so that the email is only sent to those who have not otherwise opted out of such communications.

Note that in the Campaigns email feature, the new “Email Category” dropdown is different from the existing “Category” field. The “Email Category” is based on the content of the letter and is used for opt-in/out purposes, whereas the “Category” field designates how that Campaign will be grouped when reviewing the Email area of the PCR Analytics.

What does this change for email recipients?

Any Form Letters which you are using for mass-email should have the [[Email Opt Out Link]] merge tag included in the footer, as well as your full contact information (see the Email Opt-in/Opt-out article in our Learning Center for complete setup instructions).

Subscription Checklist — Visit SYSTEM > Email Setup > Bulk Mail Categories to adjust which options are available.

With the new update, the “Update Subscription Preferences” popup includes a new “Subscription Preferences” link which will allow the recipient to check or uncheck the categories they’re interested in.

Clicking “Confirm” from the initial popup will only opt them out of the particular Category of email that they clicked the link from, but the “Subscription Preferences” panel includes an Unsubscribe All option.

For the moment, the option to add/remove an address from specific Email Categories is limited to this recipient-facing popup window, but we will be adding the option for system admins to add or remove emails from particular Categories in an upcoming version.

What does this change for PCRecruiter Administrators?

Admin-level users will see changes to the SYSTEM > Email Setup >Email Opt-In/Opt-Out List screen. There is a new “Categories Opted-In” column adjacent to the “Status” column.

Emails that have been opted into specific categories will have “Opt-In” in the Status column, and will show their selected Categories in the “Categories Opted-In” column.
Emails that have been opted out of all BULK mail will have “Opt-In” in the Status column, but will show no categories in the “Categories Opted-In” column.
Emails that have been opted out of ALL mail, bulk or otherwise, will have “Opt-Out” in the Status column and nothing in the “Categories Opted-In”.
If you are using our GDPR features, any existing emails that have been opted-in will appear with “Opt-In” in the Status column and will have ALL Categories opted-in by default.

Whichever type of recruitment you’re involved with, and whatever sector or niche you specialize in, having the right tools to handle your recruitment process can give you a competitive advantage and ensure you fill your open roles with top talent.

For any type of recruiter, from permanent placement through to internal HR departments, the right applicant tracking system / software (ATS) can help you manage large quantities of applicants and candidates and make your recruitment process more efficient and effective.

In this blog post, Stacy Racutt, PCRecruiter Training Manager, explores the basics behind applicant tracking software, and how the right solution can streamline workflows to enable you to make the right hires, faster.

Isometric cartoon of man holding an ATS (applicant tracking system) sign

What is an applicant tracking system (ATS)?

An applicant tracking system (ATS) is a type of software which enables recruiters and employers to track applicants and candidates through the recruiting and hiring process.

Functionality is typically broad, covering everything from a candidate database to email and SMS integrations which help to streamline and automate communication between candidates, employers, and recruitment professionals.

The right ATS can facilitate the standardization and improvement of processes and workflows to achieve the bottom line: finding the best candidate for the role.

How an ATS works

Once a company’s job descriptions have been created, they’re typically posted on a job board on a website. This gives active candidates a window into what’s available, allowing them to view open positions, and apply for suitable roles.

After completing and submitting an online application, often uploading their resume or curriculum vitae (CV), applicant information is then captured and added to a database on the ATS. Once a candidate is in the system, recruiters can then interact with, and track, the progress of candidates throughout the recruitment process.

With PCRecruiter (PCR), any activity around a specific candidate can be tracked across the full range of communication channels including emails, SMS, and calls. This helps recruiters build a clear history of their relationship with a candidate. With every communication in a single, centralized record, it’s easily accessible, and highly visible to recruiters and their managers.

Passive candidates take a slightly different path into the ATS. These people are not actively seeking a specific position, but may be open to the right opportunity. The PCR Capture tool enables employers and recruiters to parse candidate contact information from popular social media and professional websites such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and Indeed to create a record for them.

Why use an Applicant Tracking System?

From a candidate application on a job board through to the final interview, some system to track the sourcing and placement process is a recruiting necessity. However, for many smaller-scale search firms, or recruiters who are just starting out, it’s not uncommon for workflows to include manual processes, which are inefficient and vulnerable to human errors.

Over time, and with an ever-growing talent pool, it can become increasingly challenging to keep track of top talent and MPCs. They may lose out to competitors, have to settle for second best, or not make a placement at all. While sticky notes on a whiteboard or a series of Excel sheets might be a workable solution in the early days, the need for applicant tracking software quickly becomes obvious.

Digitally transformed recruitment

Isometric illustration of someone looking at a large resume on a screen

Digitization of manual recruitment processes usually leads to the use of spreadsheets to track candidate progress. If you’re dealing with a very small data set and a narrow set of needs, a spreadsheet can do the job, up to a point. There may be nothing inherently wrong with a spreadsheet, but it wasn’t designed with recruitment in mind, and it’s not a searchable database of resumes or CVs, or a convenient way to track a process over specific dates and times.

A spreadsheet was built for numbers and data, and there comes a point when it’s not the right tool for getting the job of recruitment done. On the other hand, digitalization represents a step on from simply transferring an existing paper-based system to a digital one. Digitalization of your recruitment process requires the use of cutting edge recruitment technology to add value and drive efficiencies to your day-to-day operations. Digitalization gives you the opportunity to improve your existing workflows by leveraging the potential of digital tools and their functionality.

For newer, scaling recruiters, the next logical step is to track and monitor candidates through an online recruitment platform. This acts like an ATS, but the information isn’t unique to them. Essentially, it grants access to a shared talent pool, which is being mined by multiple firms. It isn’t a private bank of contacts and resumes/CVs with a communication history that’s ready and waiting when it’s next needed for a potential hire.

History Matters

This history is really important. Why? If you have multiple recruiters in the same office, working in the same industry, it’s important they’re aware of each candidate’s history with your organization. Has anyone else interviewed them previously? Is someone else currently trying to place them elsewhere?

Without a reliable ATS, it can be hard to tell.

Having a complete history of a person, even including feedback from a client, on file and at hand, immediately provides a head start and avoids crossover with other recruiters going after the same talent.

Furthermore, all of your own notes and actions regarding a candidate can make them easier to identify for future searches. Searching across the open web or paid candidate sources may only turn up those who are actively on the market, or may only provide partial information, whereas your private talent pool may contain that perfect candidate that has been in your roster all along, and who may not be accessible to anyone else.

And this is to say nothing of the benefits of keeping your job openings and client information on file in the same database with your candidates, allowing you to efficiently cross-reference, promote, and communicate.

How an ATS benefits recruiters and employers

There’s no question that in a highly competitive job market, making effective use of the right ATS can give employers and recruiters the edge on their rivals when trying to acquire the best candidates. Here are five reasons to invest in an ATS:

Speed-up search by building a pool of talent which contains historical data, and personal details, which can come into play at any given moment in a future placement.

Centralize all communication, including calls, SMS, and email in one repository so that everything you know about a candidate is available with a just few clicks.

Greater visibility over your processes can help you refine and evolve workflows by creating automations, finding spots where you can drive efficiencies by eliminating repetitive, routine tasks.

Save time by creating re-usable templates for things like resumes, forms, and questionnaires. Upload online job postings quickly and efficiently to multiple sites.

Quickly identify passive candidates through your ever-growing, searchable library of candidate records, including all your previous interactions with them.

Choosing the right ATS

When a spreadsheet of contact information is no longer meeting your recruitment needs, and is actually slowing you down, an ATS gives you a lot more capability, versatility, and functionality. The right ATS allows you to do more with your data.

PCRecruiter is a fully customizable ATS and CRM designed to meet your specific recruitment needs, and works with your existing processes, evolving as you do. Pick the core and premium functionality that’s right for you, and discover new ways to speed up your placement process, from scheduling call plans to capturing data from online sources.

See PCRecruiter in action. Book a demo today.

Top talent tends not to stick around too long, so when it comes to securing the right person for the right role, the best recruiters need to be quick off the mark. As a recruitment professional, how can you hire faster without dropping your hiring standards? In the latest blog from PCRecruiter, we share ten tips for faster, more efficient recruiting.

When it’s time to hire, time is always of the essence. Not only is faster hiring an effective way to reduce your cost-per-hire, it can give you a better chance of securing top talent before they get snapped up by a competitor. No matter which industry you’re recruiting for, the time-to-hire metric is likely to be one of your most valuable performance indicators.

So how can you reduce the friction and increases the velocity of your hiring process, without working at twice the speed and suffering from recruiter burning out in the process? Like a professional athlete, making minor adjustments in your training and approach can make all the difference when you hit the field of play.

Why hire faster?

The plain and simple reason why you should hire faster is that the best candidates have a short shelf life. Once you’ve uncovered a promising individual, there’s only limited time to act, and even then you may already be too late. The reason? Many employers and recruiters are using ever more inventive and time-efficient tactics to get the right candidates quicker through the door.

The so-called ‘The Great Resignation’ – where millions of US workers voluntarily left their jobs – means that when it comes to the job market, the supply of vacant positions is now outweighed by demand. In addition, there’s also a notable trend amongst millennials (those born between roughly 1980 and 1996) to change jobs more frequently than other generations. A recent Gallup poll revealed that 60% of millennials are open to a new job opportunity.

The last 10 months of 2021—since March—saw the largest exodus of employees on record. — The last 10 months of 2021 saw the largest exodus of employees on record. The orange line in this chart represents job quit numbers in 2021.

How can you hire faster?

With the terrain of the general recruitment landscape mapped out, what can you do as a recruiter to navigate it quicker and more effectively? Here are our top ten tips for hiring faster.

Select the right Applicant Tracking System (ATS) and CRM

It pays to invest in the right ATS and recruitment CRM. After all, they’re the most important tools in your day-to-day and the key to structuring your hiring process more effectively. With the right, configurable solution in place for managing talent and applicant flow, you can continuously optimize every stage of the recruiting process.

Refine, standardize, and automate your recruiting process

When you need to take a quicker route somewhere, things like maps, traffic reports, satellite navigation, and local knowledge can all come into play. And the candidate journey is no different. By taking the time to analyze their journey, it’s possible to identify and remove bottlenecks, find places where automations can save you valuable time.

Choose the right tools for your recruitment tech stack

With so many integrations and point solutions out there, your recruitment tech stack can quickly become unwieldy. Jumping between tools, tabs, or apps, often creates unnecessary friction which slows down the entire process. Whilst it might not yet be possible to use a single tool for every aspect of the hiring workflow, some integrated solutions come pretty close to minimizing the need for multiple tools (which may nor may not work effectively together).

Take a data-driven approach

In a world where almost every industry is harnessing the business benefits of ‘Big Data’, the right analytics can improve and accelerate recruitment decision-making at every level. Leveraging insights around the time it takes to fill a specific type of role or complete a particular stage of the recruitment process will help you to identity potential time-saving alternatives.

Fill a talent pool in advance

The beauty of deploying the right ATS is that you can create a talent pool in anticipation of the future recruitment. Based on business needs and goals, this database is vital for smoothing and streamlining your search when it’s the right time to hire. It’s a ready-made source of candidates to whom you can reach out at the appropriate time.

Hire faster by sourcing faster

One way to accelerate your time to hire is by improving your sourcing efforts before the hiring begins. There are a range of strategies you can deploy, including utilizing social media, referrals, talent databases, and monitoring internal talent. Research by LinkedIn revealed that referrals are the number one way people discover a new job.

Deliver a better candidate experience

As with your company brand, you need to ensure potential candidates have a consistent and positive experience at every touchpoint. That means everything from your careers page to your communication during the recruitment process needs to be aligned with your brand voice, and appealing to your audience, to reduce the likelihood of candidates dropping off.

Improve job postings

Another absolutely critical candidate touchpoint is your job posting itself. If you’re going to get the best match for the role, you need to make sure it’s honest, engaging, and targeted at your ideal candidate. Focus on what the role offers first, before you go into the details.

Providing lists of essential and desirable qualifications and experience helps you to slightly broaden the net. Focusing on your target talent, you might get fewer people interested, but those candidates are more likely to be a better match – reducing the number of applications to sift.

Streamline assessment

Whatever kind of assessment you use to screen candidates, bear in mind that it can add on days to your hiring process. Be selective about which ones you actually need to use in order to make the hire. An ATS system with the ability to create customized filters might be another way to speed up the selection process.

Shorten the interview process

Do you really need three rounds of interviews? One simple way to reduce the time to hire is to optimize the interview process and automate interview scheduling. By conducting fewer interviews or reducing the time between them, you can dramatically accelerate your talent acquisition.

Hire faster but don’t rush it

Hire slow, fire fast. That’s how it goes, right? The temptation to rush through a hire without going through the proper process and due diligence can easily lead to you selecting the wrong candidate: someone who’s not a good fit for a company’s culture; a person who’s going to onboard and then up and away after weeks or months.

All that time and money wasted on sourcing, interviewing, and onboarding the wrong person (or people) could have been better spent on improving the efficiency and effectiveness of your hiring process, ensuring your efforts to secure a placement are rewarded with the right person for the role.

Hiring faster shouldn’t equate to a drop in your hiring standards. In fact, a faster, more efficient hiring process should lead to better hiring results. PCRecruiter has been helping recruiters secure the best talent since 1998. Find out how our software streamlines the hiring process from end-to-end, bringing automations and configurations that can ramp-up your speed and efficiency. Discover our tech.

Over 50% of recruitment leaders are investing in employer branding. What’s the appeal, and how can it benefit your business? In the latest blog post from PCRecruiter, we explore the importance of employer branding and how it can make your hiring more effective, and benefit your bottom line.

Whatever business you’re in, your brand is your reputation – not just to your customers or clients, investors and other stakeholders, but to the people who make up your organization. Without them, there is no business.

That’s why getting the right talent through the door to fill the right roles in your organization is so vital for your business success. After all, you don’t want to waste time and money on acquiring and onboarding the wrong people for your organization.

However, in a competitive job market where you need to be quick on the hire to secure the best people for your business, attracting the right talent is easier said than done. That’s where employer branding can help. In this blog post, we explore the importance of employer branding and how it can make a difference to the effectiveness of your hiring process.

What is employer branding?

Employer branding is the perception of your business amongst your prospective workforce and your current employees.

Like your business brand, which defines your value proposition of your products or services within a particular market, your employer brand defines your value proposition as a place to work, develop a career, and grow as a person within the employment market.

Your employer brand embodies the essence of your enterprise, representing your people, policies, and values. In the same way that a consumer brand is designed to create attract customers, create familiarity, earn trust, and build loyalty, your employer brand is more than just your approach to managing people and business, it runs much deeper. Employer branding helps define and communicate your organization’s unique cultural and ethical standpoint, as reflected by your employees and your business actions.

Whether you’re looking to hire a part-time cleaner, or an experienced CEO, it may seem counterintuitive to focus on your offering, rather than theirs. But those prospective hires not only need to know that their skills, experience, and talent are a good fit for the role and your business, but also what they’re getting in exchange by becoming an employee.

Why is employer branding important?

Your employer brand is important because it helps to communicate what kind of employment experience you offer prospective candidates, what kind of experience they can expect when they come to work for you, and why they should consider working for you in the long term.

Effective employer branding communicates a positive message about working for your organization, encourages engagement, and creates a buzz around your company as a desirable place to work. Think of it as marketing for your role as an employer to existing and future employees.

If that sounds like an additional layer of complication over what your HR department or recruitment team does, it’s worth remembering that you already have an employer brand. It’s up to you to shape perceptions and the way it works best for your hiring efforts.

A recent study by LinkedIn revealed that the number one obstacle for candidates looking for a job is not knowing what it’s like to work at the company. So guess what 75% of those candidates look for before they put in an application? Employer brands.

How can employer branding benefit your business?

The bottom line of effective employer branding is that it boosts your bottom line. So let’s dive a little deeper into that.

First impressions count. So getting employer branding right brings the right candidates knocking on the door, and if you’ve been actively pursuing the right hire, it welcomes them inside. That’s important because candidates have a world of openings to choose from.

To make your organization stand out in a competitive market, you need to make your offering more appealing to them. With over 50% of recruitment leaders investing in and deploying a proactive employer branding strategy, the competition for the best candidates is heating up. Standing by and doing nothing isn’t an option unless you want to get lost in the pack.

By more closely aligning your employer brand with prospective hires, it can significantly boost your recruitment efforts. LinkedIn’s study revealed that an effective employer brand results in:

28% reduction in turnover
50% more qualified candidates
50% reduction in your cost per hire
1-2 times faster hires.

There’s also a positive impact on engagement and retention. An effective employer brand makes it easier for recruiters to introduce your organization to prospects. And it’s only as good as the people that work for you. In fact, it’s the message that they put out about your organization that does the most employer branding work for you.

With the right organizational culture in place, you can begin to grow that positive messaging and become a trusted employer, someone that people enjoy working for, and one that they’re happy to champion to others.

How the right recruitment software can help

The right recruitment software won’t do your employer branding for you, but it can be a valuable tool for delivering the right message at the right time to prospective candidates.

Communication is a key to acquiring the right talent. You need to ensure a cohesive experience of your employer brand at every touchpoint of the hiring process, and you also need clear oversight and control over the entire recruitment process.

PCRecruiter provides scalable CRM and ATS functionality with a host of features designed to make communication with candidates quicker and easier, from seamless integrations for SMS and Email campaigns to automations for identifying the best candidates.

See what PCRecruiter can do for your recruitment.

Every day, recruitment organizations handle huge volumes of sensitive data in file types that are common targets for ransomware. Data security may not be at the forefront of what you do, but it’s critical for maintaining client and customer trust and your business reputation. Find out how the right applicant tracking software can handle your data security needs.

When it comes to data security, all recruiters need the right level of training and awareness. But the right applicant tracking system (ATS) should be able to handle data security, freeing up recruitment professionals to focus on their core business.

Your applicant tracking system (ATS) is the gateway to a goldmine of personal and enterprise data. And with recent and ongoing developments in data privacy regulations, such as General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a data breach can be costly, inflicting irreparable damage to your client’s and candidate’s trust and your company’s reputation.

Whether your sensitive data is held in a public cloud, private cloud, or on premises, recruitment firms and HR professionals have an obligation to ensure data security and compliance with data privacy law and regulations. So how can you protect company, client, and candidate data from the threat of cyberattacks, unauthorized access, or even accidental exposure?

Let’s take a closer look at data security in recruitment, and how you can mitigate the risk by taking the right preventative measures.

What is data security?

Data security involves protecting digital information from corruption and unauthorized access wherever it resides, in transit, at rest, or at the end of its lifecycle when it’s no longer required. Digital data security can be enacted in a number of ways, including encryption, masking, and tokenization. It also requires additional measures to mitigate data breaches, including backup copies and secure storage.

Why is data security important?

Research shows that in 2020 there were nearly 30,000 cybersecurity incidents worldwide, with 3,236 in the public sector and 2,935 in the information industry. In the same year, there were over 300 million reported ransomware attacks – where attackers threaten to permanently prevent access to a victim’s data unless a ransom is paid.

Unsurprisingly, two of the most targeted file types are database file extensions (like .db) and SQL (Structured Query Language) which is the standard language for manipulating database, and relational database management systems. Both of these file types are commonly used by every type of recruitment professional, from recruitment agencies to HR departments. But with the right ATS in place, there’s no undue cause for alarm.

What are the different types of data security?

Organizations of every size have a raft of data security measures at their disposal. The right security solution, as part of a wider internal security strategy, will take account of the risk, compliance regulations, and sensitivity of specific datasets to deploy the right level of security control. This helps to mitigate the risks in data handling and storage.

Recruitment is one example of an industry that deals with a constant flow of incoming and outgoing flow of personal and organizational data. And like other industries, there are common data security measures that can be put in place for reducing risk and avoiding a breach. These include:

Encryption
Backups and recovery
Secure storage
Authentication
Access controls

An ATS that’s compliant and secure

As a provider of recruitment CRM / ATS hybrid, PCRecruiter handles large volumes of sensitive data every day – between 8,000 and 9,000 separate databases ranging from 100MB to 7TB in size. So for us, data security is business critical and a core part of what we do.

Our ISO certified data center has a rigorous security process for entry, 24/7 staffing and caged equipment. Whilst we can offer bespoke levels of security encryption (including asymmetrical encryption for organizations who wish to encrypt their own data) all of our data undergoes industry standard encryption. And anything leaving one of our data centers is automatically encrypted, such as quarterly backups, which are removed and stored securely in a vault. Plus, we back up to two separate geographic locations in case of a natural disaster or security incident in one location.

Our software is regularly scheduled for pen testing (ethical hacking) to evaluate the robustness of its security features. In addition, developers go through extensive training in data security. For third-party developers wishing to utilize our application programming interface (API), we provide access tokens which restrict access to specific functionality.

Alongside these security measures, we offer opt-in security settings for recruiters. These include the following Two-Factor Authentication (2FA) settings:

Invalid password lock out
Email authentication
TOPTP (time-based one-time password)

Peace of mind with PCRecruiter

Since 1997, Main Sequence – the company behind PCRecruiter – has built a strong reputation for being one of the world’s most trusted and successful developers of recruitment, sourcing, and applicant tracking software. PCRecruiter is a software as a service (SaaS) built on its own operating system and platform with cybersecurity baked in. It provides thousands of recruiters around the world with data security they both need and trust.

Find out more about our commitment to the highest standards in data protection and adherence to compliance regulations in our blog post PCRecruiter is ready for the GDPR.

PCRecruiter announces integration with hireEZ

PCRecruiter is now integrated directly with hireEZ, the #1 AI-powered outbound recruiting platform. In addition to making outbound recruiting easy, hireEZ helps PCRecruiter users keep their own private talent pool updated with the latest information about their candidates.

PCRecruiter is now integrated directly with hireEZ, the #1 AI-powered outbound recruiting platform. In addition to making outbound recruiting easy, this partnership helps PCRecruiter users keep their own private talent pool updated with the latest information about their candidates.

Unleash access to 800M+ candidates from 45+ open web platforms, get market insights and DE&I information to build data-driven recruiting strategies and maximize the value of your existing PCRecruiter database.

hireEZ Sourcing gives you the talent market visibility you need to proactively target the right candidates at the right time and build a scalable, data-driven recruiting approach.

Keep your database fresh and growing.

Use the new ‘Enrich with hireEZ’ option in the Action menu on your Name records in PCRecruiter with your API key from hireEZ to quickly turn your aging data into actionable data.
Export candidates from your hireEZ projects directly to your PCRecruiter database.
Allow hireEZ to source your PCRecruiter data for target candidates, and to offer metrics and insights on your talent pool.

Ready to get started?
Visit https://hireez.com

For more information on using this new integration, see the hireEZ page in our Learning Center.

Review PCRecruiter – Get a Gift Card!

PCRecruiter was recently awarded a “Top Rated” badge in the Recruitment Agency software category on TrustRadius. We also made top-billing this year on G2 and other review sites, ranking as one of the Top 10 Staffing software options based on independent reviews from our users.

You can share your opinion of PCRecruiter and, in many cases, you’ll receive a gift card from the review site for your time. These gift card incentives are in limited supply, so we invite you to post your review of PCRecruiter by following any of these links soon: Capterra, G2, TrustRadius, and SoftwareReviews.

Sequencing will let you create automated workflows for all sorts of purposes in PCRecruiter. Sign up for this free bi-weekly Tuesday webinar series to learn more.

The new Sequencing tool is coming to PCRecruiter in 2022. Our webinar series on this powerful upcoming feature begins this week and continues bi-weekly on Tuesdays at 2 EST through July 12. PCRecruiter’s Training Manager and Associate Software Designer, Stacy Racutt, will show off what this feature is capable of.

Session 1 – June 14
In this high-level overview, you’ll learn what the Sequencing tool is and what it can do.
Session 2 – June 28
In the second session, Stacy will show you how to set up a Sequence for Business Development.
Session 3 – July 12
In the third session, you’ll learn how to create a Sequence to use for sourcing Candidates.
Session 4 – July 19
In the final session, you’ll see how to complete Tasks and view results of the Sequences shown in the previous sessions.

NOTE: A recording of this webinar series can be found here.

What is Sequencing?

Sequenced Tasks — Sequencing will allow you to create automated workflows for easier recruiting and user on-boarding.

With Sequencing, you’ll be able to define automated workflows for all sorts of purposes, helping you to more easily manage your day and make on-boarding new recruiters easier than ever. Sequencing will make it possible for users to execute ‘drip campaigns,’ call plans, and much more.

Sequences are user-defined chains of sequential or branching event plans that can include:

Calls
Emails
LinkedIn interactions
Text messages
and more…

Once a Sequence is created, timed and triggered tasks like email sends will happen automatically. For user-interaction tasks, PCRecruiter automatically presents the next work item to be completed, and makes it a breeze to log each step along the way.

Decades of working alongside top firms around the world has given PCRecruiter insight into what recruiting technology works and what doesn’t.

Every recruitment organization is different, with its own style, strategy, and approach to making hires happen. Whilst there’s no magic formula for success, there are some common traits which help recruitment firms gain a competitive edge.

Decades of working along side top recruitment firms from around the world, across a wide range of industries and markets, has given PCRecruiter a clear insight into what works and what doesn’t. It comes down to the right investment, recruiting technology, and autonomy.

Many traits are common sense and largely controllable: owners who are engaged and work hard, choosing markets that are hot, and making sufficient investment into their businesses.

Some are not as intuitive or controllable: personal charisma of key players, odd-couple leadership teams, and generalization versus specialization in key markets and roles.

So what sets top-performing recruitment organizations apart from their competitors?

➀ The right investment

Investment is not just about spending money, especially as spending money in itself doesn’t automatically result in success. Cultural investment is crucial for any organization to be effective. From investing in the right leadership team to sourcing people who are the best fit for both the position advertised and your company values, successful organizations are built on a solid workforce culture. But that doesn’t necessarily mean focusing entirely on employee contentment. Research by Gallup suggests a key driver in employee retention and business success is to create high levels of engagement, where employees are treated as stakeholders in the company’s future.

No matter the size of your business, success is dependent on a number of moving parts, all of which have a powerful role to play in delivering your core business. And like any complex organization, good performance depends on many variables. Yet a strong pattern does emerge: recruitment firms that continuously optimize and refine their workflows, and who make training and development a central activity, seem to perform better. This is true even across large businesses with many sets of tools and team members.

Sometimes the right solution might involve throwing dollars at vendors of technology and professional services, but without the involvement of leadership and effective non-dollar cultural and educational investments, no technology or technique on its own will automatically provide a competitive edge.

➁ The right recruiting technology

Technology is increasingly becoming a key differentiator for recruitment firms looking to take the edge on their competitors. As organizations seek to drive efficiency and cost-savings through programs of digital transformation, they look to cutting-edge recruiting technology to provide their teams with ways of working smarter and more effectively. In a world of ‘Big Data’, recruiters are faced with ever-growing volumes of data and databases. At the same time, services and industries are niching down, catering to very specific market audiences with very defined knowledge, expertise, and skills.

While a growing number of recruiting software solutions provide increased levels of automation for repetitive or easily automated tasks, this doesn’t signal a need for fewer recruiters. What it does is free-up recruiters to focus more on their core business: recruiting. For that reason, recruiters wholly dependent on manual processes are likely to experience a growing and inevitable disadvantage, even as the middle of the pack dramatically thins out.

➂ The right autonomy

We’re heading into the era of Autonomous Business Processes (ABP):

In the early stages, this includes auto-generation of repeatable documents, such as fee agreements, offer letters, and onboarding/contracting pieces.
In more mature stages, it includes servicing tasks and supports within the organization, including the routing, visualization, and reporting of task and disposition items to department entities, managers, and team-members.

These developments are now rapidly pairing with voice, email, text, and virtual meeting spaces. COVID massively accelerated virtual workplaces, and those changes will not unwind. The result is a tendency toward socialized and digitalized networking, less risky experimentation and creativity, and more ‘work as a lifestyle’ as teams put themselves and their tools together.

Autonomous organizations can be highly effective because their business processes tend to run without the day-to-day or hour-to-hour involvement at C-suite level. This frees up business owners and leaders to spend more time on strategic decision-making because the workflows in the organization are fine-tuned to deliver and repeat key performances needed for its economic model and to handle exceptions however they occur.

Final thoughts

In terms of technological choices, recruiters who have proven their ability to adapt and continuously improve are the likely to outperform their competitors, for the simple reason that they’re able to operate more efficiently and cost-effectively.

Successful solutions can come from global recruitment giants or single-person startups. What matters is education and iteration to continuously grow and drive results. Top-performing firms recognize that investing in the right recruitment software solutions is essential in the tooth and claw evolutionary battle of business competition.

Martin Snyder leads regulatory and organizational compliance for Main Sequence Technology. As a co-founder and principal of Main Sequence, he helps provide executive and policy leadership as an active manager of the business. Mr. Snyder has a background in sales, recruiting technology design/implementation, SMB tech, and consumer finance.

Podcasts are a great way to get the latest recruitment industry insights, topics, and trends. Listen anywhere, on-the-go for actionable tips you can take with you the next time you step into the office. Need help getting started? Read PCRecruiter’s list of six top recruitment podcasts.

There’s no better way to stay up to date with the latest recruitment industry trends, than by listening to your favorite recruitment podcast. On your daily commute or whilst relaxing at home, listen whenever, wherever to get your daily dose of insight into the recruitment industry.

Whether you’re looking for an in-depth interview with a recruitment industry leader, tips and tricks you can take into the office with you the next day, or a beginner’s guide to the fundamentals of recruitment, the right podcast can take you deep inside the world of hiring.

But if you’re new to podcasts, new to recruitment, or searching for something that fits your recruitment niche, it can be difficult to know where to start. So, here at PCRecruiter, we’ve compiled our shortlist of top recruitment podcasts.

Read on to get listening!

Recruitment Podcasts

Talk Talent To Me

https://talktalenttome.com/

Drawing on a deep talent pool of recruitment leadership, Talk Talent To Me takes listeners on a rollercoaster ride through talent acquisition. Covering everything from strategies, metrics, and techniques through to current industry trends, it features top talent leaders on the front line of modern recruitment. The show is hosted, produced, and edited by Hired’s Content Marketing Manager, Rob Stevenson. We like the depth and breadth of talent interviewed, from VP’s of Global Talent, to CHROs.

The Recruiter Startup Podcast

https://anchor.fm/recruiter-startup-school

With over a decade in the industry, Dualta Doherty has a hands-on approach to setting up and successfully running a recruitment business. Each episode, the founder of Dualta Doherty & Partners and this very podcast, is joined by recruitment agency leaders from around the world to talk about what it takes to start up, scale up, and operate at the highest level of recruitment. We enjoy hearing about the successes and challenges of recruitment industry leaders, and the valuable insights into setting up on your own.

Recruitment On The Go

https://soundcloud.com/recruitmentonthego

Everything you ever wanted to know about recruitment in daily, bite size pieces. Hosts Caitie and Mingus give you the latest lowdown on recruitment trends, top tips and tricks, plus all the tools and resources you need to maintain a competitive edge in the recruitment industry. Ideal for recruiters, HR specialists, and talent acquisition managers alike, each episode offers inspiration and insight, wherever you happen to be. We listen out for the actionable recruitment tips provided in each episode.

Recruiting Future

https://recruitingfuture.com/purpose/

The self-styled ‘calm voice of recruitment continuity’ offers insight, inspiration, and inclusivity in the fast-paced, ever-evolving world of recruitment. With a particular focus on the future of talent acquisition, each episode covers a different aspect of the industry, from technology, and automation to diversity and inclusion. With an eye on the future of work, guests are typically recruitment thought leaders and pioneers from the wider business world, who share ideas and experiences designed to inspire listeners and drive change. We like the focus on giving a platform to new and diverse voices in recruitment.

The RecruitingDaily Podcast

https://recruitingdaily.com/podcasts/recruitingdaily-podcast/

Going behind the scenes of the world’s most influential talent acquisition teams, the RecruitingDaily podcast is a one-stop shop for the latest insights into recruiting, sourcing, and talent acquisition. Each episode drills down deep into a complicated topic, breaking it down into understandable chunks in order to help recruiters take their game to the next level. We enjoy the sheer variety of content, from equity audits to using virtual meetings to streamline recruitment processes.

The Elite Recruiter Podcast

https://pod.co/the-elite-recruiter-podcast

Benjamin Mena’s show covers a broad range of recruitment-related content, taking listeners on a journey through money, marketing, sales, leadership, and placement. Along the way, you’ll pick up tips, tools, and tricks from some of the best in the business. Hear the stories of top recruitment professionals, how they got to where they are now and the mindset that got them there. We like the Elite Recruiter Podcast for its vibrant and insightful look at the industry.

So you’ve reached the end of our list, only to find your favorite recruitment podcast is missing? Get in touch with PCRecruiter and let us know why we should give it a listen! And for even more podcasts, check out our Top 5 HR Podcasts blog post as well!

App Specific Passwords for Gmail

Changes to Google’s security policies at the end of May could affect your ability to send/receive @Gmail address mail from PCRecruiter. Setting up an app specific password will help to keeps your Google account login secure and in sync with PCRecruiter.

Creating App Specific Passwords for your Gmail account improves your security and may be imperative for PCRecruiter users who have an @gmail.com account linked to the database for incoming or outgoing mail.

Secure your Gmail with app specific passwords As of June 2022, Google no longer supports the use of your primary Gmail username and password when connecting from third-party apps and devices. These changes imposed by Google are part of a strategy to strengthen account and application security.

One of Google’s alternative options is App Specific Passwords, which are additional passwords for your Gmail account that you designate for use by one specific site or app. Creating separate passwords, rather than using your main Google password across multiple apps and sites, isolates any security risks to one site or service. If that App Specific Password should ever be compromised, it can be disabled without interrupting or exposing any other services associated with your Gmail login.

How does this affect PCRecruiter users?

This new policy will only affect users of @gmail.com addresses. It is not currently being applied to Google Workspace or Google Cloud Identity accounts. If you are using Google’s email servers but have your own domain name associated with the account, you may continue to use your existing password, but we do recommend switching to a more secure method for security’s sake.

In regards to our recruiting software, PCRecruiter, this policy change should only impact your ability to send or receive email within PCRecruiter if you are using an @gmail address with a standard Google password.

Google Sign In Button Example

You will find Sign in with Google buttons on PCR’s Outgoing Mail (SMTP) screens. These are the preferred method of connecting your Gmail account to PCRecruiter. If you see a button like the one shown here and use it to authenticate with your Google Account, an App Specific Password is not necessary.

Setting up the App Specific password option is a viable method of upgrading your security with PCRecruiter or any other services you may be using your plain Gmail password on when no Sign in with Google method is available. For those using IMAP to read or write activities for incoming mail, App Specific passwords are required at this time. See Google’s info on creating these app-specific passwords here.

If you need further assistance, contact PCRecruiter Support.

PCRecruiter Previews: Pipeline, Sequencing, and PCR 10

The PCRecruiter development team has been hard at work for the past several months on some very big updates, and we’d like to show you what’s in store. In a recent online presentation to some of our business partners, we reviewed some of our recently released features and previewed some of the exciting changes in the works. We now invite all of our users to see this presentation, which offers a taste of the great things to come in PCRecruiter.

The PCRecruiter development team has been hard at work for the past several months on some very big updates, and we’d like to show you what’s in store.

In a recent online presentation to some of our business partners, PCRecruiter’s Training Manager and Business Process Analyst, Stacy Racutt, reviewed some of our recently released features and previewed some of the exciting changes in the works. We now invite all of our users to see her presentation, which offers a taste of just some of the great things to come in PCRecruiter. And if you aren’t yet using PCR for your recruiting or staffing business, contact our sales consultants to learn about these exciting new features and more.

You’ll find a menu icon at the lower right corner of the video player which you can use to jump to specific chapters. You can also use the dots in the player’s timeline to jump to your desired topic.

So, what’s new?

This video presentation covers a few items which are already available to you in the current SaaS version of PCRecruiter. These include the improvements to Feedback collection and Automations with PCR Notifications, which were released in April 2022, and our integration with ZoomInfo TalentOS, which was released in October 2021.

The presentation also reveals details about three key current development projects:

New Pipeline

Applicant Pipeline — The completely re-envisioned Pipeline is more efficient, flexible, and intuitive.

This video shows off the new Pipeline, which has been in development and testing for nearly a year. The completely re-envisioned Pipeline offers a quicker, more intuitive, and more efficient way to manage your applicant workflow. The updated Pipeline includes:

Slide-in details panel for reviewing, editing, and paging through applicants without leaving the screen.
A clearer view of your Pipeline, with configurable, color-coded columns for each step.
Multiple Pipeline configurations to manage different processes, job types, or market verticals.
Schedule interviews and send confirmation emails in one simple step.
Right-click functionality for faster navigation.
Pins for bookmarking key candidates.

The new Pipeline is already in daily use at nearly a hundred offices, and we are now opening the invitation to all of our users. Once it has been activated, existing positions in your database will remain on the legacy Pipeline, and all new positions will take advantage of the updated version.

If you would like information about activating the new Pipeline for your PCRecruiter account, please contact us using this form.

To learn more about the Pipeline, sign up for the webinar on May 31.

Sequencing

Coming soon to PCRecruiter, the new Sequencing tool will allow you to create incredibly versatile automated workflows. These user-defined chains of sequential or branching event plans will not only make it easier to manage your day, but will also make on-boarding your team’s newest PCRecruiter users a breeze.

Once you have configured your steps, including calls, emails, LinkedIn interactions, text messages, and so on, your users will be able to work through all of their assigned tasks from a unified panel. As users complete each task, PCRecruiter automatically presents the next work item to be completed, and makes it a breeze to log each step along the way.

Sequencing will make it possible for users to execute ‘drip campaigns,’ call plans, and much more.

To learn more about Sequencing, sign up for the three-part webinar series beginning on June 14.

PCR 10

PCRecruiter 10 Prototype — This design prototype shows one possible configuration of your custom Name record screens in PCR 10.

In this presentation, we’ve also revealed some of the working designs for our next major version, PCR 10. Although no specific release date has been set for this version, our development team is already building and testing screens using the new frameworks and systems it will rely on.

PCR 10 will introduce a totally new, modernized interface for PCRecruiter. More than just a stylistic update, this revision will include tons of fresh functionality including:

More customization options to help you maximize your screen real estate.
More right-click functionality to save time.
More straightforward navigation to help you get more done with fewer clicks and fewer screens.

We will be making more announcements about the rollout of PCR 10 as it moves closer to the beta testing phase.

Review PCRecruiter – Get a Gift Card!

Last week, PCRecruiter was awarded a “Top Rated” badge in the Recruitment Agency software category on TrustRadius. We also made top-billing this year on G2 and other review sites, ranking as one of the Top 10 Staffing software options based on independent reviews from our users.

We love podcasts – they make commutes and grocery shopping fun. There are so many great HR podcasts available, covering every topic under the sun, so we’ve compiled a list of a few favorites which will keep you inspired.

We’re really keen on podcasts here at PCRecruiter. Why? Because they can make boring commutes or grocery shopping much more interesting!

There are a variety of HR podcasts available – covering topics from employee perks to corporate branding, and everything in between. We’ve prepared a list of some of our favorites and hopefully these shows will help you stay on top of changes in the industry and gain a little inspiration from those leading those changes. Here they are in no particular order:

HR Podcasts

Emotion At Work

https://emotionatwork.co.uk/podcast/

Started in 2017, the Emotion at Work podcast is led by Phil Willcox and dives into the full spectrum of professional emotions that people experience at work. Phil’s belief is that emotions should be at the center of everything we do as they are so impactful throughout our lives – especially in our jobs. The episodes are released monthly and are a true deep dive into the chosen topic.

Phil speaks with industry professionals about a variety of themes, including emotion control, emotion expression, digital body language, shame, and other pressing social issues in the workplace. Phil and his guests share their personal stories and aim to build a greater knowledge of emotion among the listenership. The podcast, and its themes, are built on the vision of Phil’s company and look to educate and train people in emotion in any organization.

Talent Magnet

https://www.talentmagnet.com/podcast

Every week, Mike Sipple, the co-founder and CEO of Talent Magnet Institute, has discussions with thought leaders, industry executives, and a variety of HR professionals to better understand the sector. The topics they cover include business, relationships, community, and life in general. It’s a brilliantly varied podcast that taps into each guest’s personal experiences and how those have shaped their successes as well as their failures.

Founded in 2001, Talent Magnet was built with the objective of transforming business leaders and their organizations into ‘talent magnets’. They’ve become a trusted name in talent and aim to develop the skills of their clients, making them better leaders, and making their teams better because of it. With that goal in mind, they want the culture of quality leadership to work as a ‘talent magnet’ so that businesses that commit to improvement attract the talent they need.

#WorkTrends

https://talentculture.com/worktrends-podcast/

#WorkTrends, hosted by Meghan M. Biro of Talent Culture, is a podcast series and Twitter chat that revolves around current HR news and features experts from around the industry. With over 400 total episodes, there is a serious back catalog for new listeners to tap into.

Some of #WorkTrends’ most recent episodes show just how varied the topics can be so matter what part of HR you’re interested in they’ll be something that grabs your attention. Seriously, check out their last few installments:

The Everywhere Workplace – Prioritizing Employee Experience
The Urgency Epidemic – Prioritization & Productivity
Building a Courageous Work Culture: Why it Matters
Myth Busting Common Video Interview Concerns
Military Hiring – Diversity, Inclusion & Business Success

The Recruitment Hackers

https://www.therecruitmenthackers.com/podcast

The Recruitment Hackers is a community of talent acquisition professionals whose mission is to promote best practices, tools, and industry trends. They’ve grown into a network of experts and a part of that connectivity is through The Recruitment Hackers podcast.

The weekly content deals with a wide range of themes, including recruitment automation, optimizing the candidate experience, and harnessing culture to attract the appropriate kind of people. The podcast prides itself on offering real-life examples of companies that are recruiting successfully as well as proven strategies to grow your talent pool. Best of all, they don’t get caught up in trends and make an effort to point out the gimmicks that are springing up in the recruitment space.

Chad and Cheese

https://www.chadcheese.com/

Of all the podcasts on this list, we think it’s safe to say that this one has the best name. Branding themselves as the snarkiest industry experts out there Chad Sowash and friend-of-PCRecruiter Joel Cheesman have built a platform with a number of different podcasts that cover European HR trends, HR startup critiques, and interviews with other recruitment pros to name a few.

Their particular style might not be for everyone’s taste but they definitely aren’t afraid to be open and honest about their views. It’s clear that whether you like them or not, they have a genuine wealth of knowledge and experience, over 40 years between them, and that makes this podcast well worth listening to – just get used to their lack of filter(!).

These podcasts are just a small selection of a huge range of available insight that is out there in audio form. We hope you check the suggestions out, and get as much from them as we have.

Do you have any HR podcasts or recruitment industry podcast favorites? Comment below and let us know what they are.

Feedback & Notifications (Update 9.8.9)

PCRecruiter’s new update, v. 9.8.9, comes with new Feedback organization and in-app Notifications features that will help keep you and your team informed and in touch. Plus, we have added brand new free webinars to our schedule for Spring/Summer 2022.

PCRecruiter’s new update, v. 9.8.9, comes with two major upgrades that will help keep you and your team informed and in touch. As always, this update also includes dozens of behind-the-scenes fixes and enhancements. Plus, we have added brand new free webinars to our schedule for Spring/Summer 2022.

What’s New in PCRecruiter 9.8.9

PCR Notifications

The brand new PCR Notifications give you configurable real-time alerts that you can use to communicate with your team and monitor key events in your recruitment process. These notifications appear at the bottom right corner of your PCRecruiter screen, where they remain visible for 5 seconds if none of the links contained in them are clicked on. If no action is taken on a notification, it is moved to the PCR Notifications sidebar, accessed via a numbered badge on your user icon at the top right corner of the screen. Notifications remain in the sidebar for up to seven days, or until the links in them are clicked on.

Send PCR Notifications to Co-Workers

A new Send PCR Notification option appears in the Action menu at the top of all Name, Company, and Position records in your database. By clicking on this option, you can send a PCR Notification including a live link to the current record, plus a brief message you define, to one or more users in your database. You’ll find this feature helpful for coordinating with other PCR users and calling their attention to important records instantly.

Trigger PCR Notifications via Automations

PCR Notifications can also be sent using Automations, whether triggered by specific Pipeline step or Rollup stage changes, Candidate Presentations being viewed or responded to, or from the general Automations feature released in late 2021. When building any Automation that previously included Email, Text, or PCRecruiter mobile app Push notifications, you’ll now find a PCR Notification option as well.

To support more useful PCR Notifications, this update comes with new date-based Automation triggers to use:

Start Date: You can now trigger Automations based on the Start Date from your contract or permanent placements. You can set the PCR Notification or other Action to occur on the Start Date, or a chosen number of days before or after the date. This can be useful in reminding users that their placed candidate is starting their job the next day, or prompting the user to make a check-in call seven days after the job has begun.
Activity Date: Like the Start Date, you can now trigger a PCR Notification or other action a number of days after a specific type of Activity has been written. This can be great for follow-up call reminders. In fact, you can now trigger Automations based on Activities with a specific Result as well – e.g. sending a PCR Notification based on phone call Activities where a voicemail was left, but not for those where there was no answer.
Field Date: You can also trigger Automations based on the date in practically any Standard or Custom field. For example, trigger a PCR Notification when a candidate’s License is expiring, or remind the user to review each open Position 30 days after the ‘Date Posted’.

These Automation triggers aren’t exclusive to PCR Notifications. For example, you could use the Field Date trigger with a ‘Date of Birth’ field to send automatic birthday greetings to clients and candidates, automatically add Names to a calling Rollup List a year after they’ve completed a specific form, or automatically send a Form Letter to a candidate the day before their interview.

There was one other minor addition to the Automations in this update. The ‘When an applicant applies to a Position, send Notification to Someone’ canned automation included the option to send an SMS (via our RingCentral integration), but lacked the option to target the Candidate’s phone number. We’ve added this into the new version, so that you can automatically prompt candidates to opt in to bulk texts or simply thank them for applying.

The possibilities for automating your process with PCRecruiter are growing all the time. We look forward to hearing about your own creative uses for Automations and PCR Notifications!

For more details and instructions, see https://learning.pcrecruiter.net/site/pcr-notifications

Feedback

The other major change in this update is the brand new Feedback area, which you’ll find in the Navigation menu at the top of all Names, Companies, Positions, as well as in the Detail panel on the updated Pipeline (currently in final beta – ask your PCRecruiter representative for details).

The new Feedback screen consolidates and organizes feedback from users and external contacts into an easily viewed list, with filter and search options to help you find exactly what you’re looking for.

Feedback can be entered by internal users from the ‘Add Feedback’ panel on the left side of the Feedback screen, collected via Candidate Presentations, or via emailed links using the brand new ‘Feedback Form Letters.’

Note that any existing feedback collected using Candidate Presentations as well as feedback formerly located in the Interview Feedback on your Pipeline steps or interview records will now appear in the Feedback screen.

We have a ton of great updates on the way in 2022! Watch your own PCR Notifications for announcements of new features and more.

For more details and instructions, see https://learning.pcrecruiter.net/site/feedback

New Webinars Announced

These brand new sessions planned for Spring / Summer 2022 will all be taking place at 2 PM Eastern on Tuesdays.

PCRecruiter Job Board Overview – April 19
REGISTER NOW
PCRecruiter’s Drew Rothman will walk through how the PCR Job Board is set up and what its capabilities are. This will be a useful session for those who aren’t currently using the Job Board and want to know more, or who are using the older ‘Candidate Web Extensions’ and considering an upgrade.

Contractor Features – May 3
REGISTER NOW
In this session, you’ll learn more about how PCRecruiter facilitates your contract or contract-to-perm process. In this session we’ll discuss expense tracking with the ability to upload receipts and clock-in/out via the PCRecruiter mobile app. We’ll also discuss hours approval and reporting.

Searching in PCRecruiter – May 17
REGISTER NOW
In this session, some of PCR’s top trainers will discuss different methods of searching for names, companies, and jobs within your database.

New PCRecruiter Pipeline – May 31
REGISTER NOW
This session will cover the all-new PCRecruiter pipeline (coming soon) and how to set up and navigate all of the great features it has to offer. A great orientation for those moving from the older version or for those new to PCRecruiter in general.

PCRecruiter Sequencing Features
Part 1 – June 14 REGISTER NOW
Part 2 – June 28 REGISTER NOW
Part 3 – July 12 REGISTER NOW
The brand new sequencing features (coming soon) in PCRecruiter will help you automate marketing, communication, and other processes. Learn all about what they can do in this session, to be presented in a three part series.

PCRecruiter Customer Demo – July 26
REGISTER NOW
How do PCRecruiter users work in the system? In this session, we’ll be talking with a PCRecruiter user about their particular configuration and how they’ve made PCRecruiter work for them.

Review PCRecruiter – Get a Gift Card!

PCRecruiter continues to receive top-billing on G2 and other review sites, ranking as one of the Top 10 Staffing software options based on independent reviews from users. The Spring 2022 reports from G2 rank us once again as a Leader and High Performer across multiple categories.

We want your voice to be heard when the next round reports come out, so we encourage you to post a review of PCRecruiter at this link. You’ll be eligible to receive a gift card from G2 in thanks for your thoughts. If you’d prefer to put your review incentive towards a charitable cause, we’ve also partnered with G2 in support of Girls Who Code. If you visit this link to submit your review, G2 will donate $10 to help close the gender gap in technology.

And if you’ve already posted a review on G2, you are welcome to review us on Capterra, SoftwareReviews, or TrustRadius! We appreciate all of the kind words and helpful feedback we read on these sites.

PCRecruiter is honored to be one very few recruiting software options to place on TrustRadius’ 2022 “Most Loved Awards”. This is a particularly special Valentine’s Day present, as we know our award is based solely on the glowing comments from verified, independent reviews written by professionals in recruitment, staffing, and human resources.

TrustRadius serves over 1 million B2B technology buyers per month with verified reviews and ratings to make informed purchasing decisions. Each year, TrustRadius analyzes every review collected on tens of thousands of products across hundreds of categories, looking for how often users mentioned something they absolutely love about these products. By comparing love-related keywords against the total number of reviews for each product, they come up with a listing of the top 100 “Most Loved Software” offerings on their site.

PCRecruiter is honored to be one very few recruiting software options to place on TrustRadius’ 2022 Most Loved Awards. This is a particularly special Valentine’s Day present, as we know our award is based solely on the glowing comments from verified, independent reviews written by professionals in recruitment, staffing, and human resources.

“Buyers have many options to choose from when it comes to recruitment agency software. Recruiting in today’s employment market can be a headache, but the right software can help ease that pain. PCRecruiter is one of the most loved software products of 2022,” said Megan Headley, VP of Research at TrustRadius. “PCRecruiter earned a Most Loved award based directly on feedback from their customers. Reviewers highlighted the time savings the product provided, the simple integrations with other software products, and the reporting features offered.”

Some of the comments have included:

“PCRecruiter always seems to be ahead of the game, innovative and talks with the customers on how to improve the logic and workflow and adapting it to the entire recruiting, hiring and placement process.”

“The technical support is terrific and frankly the main reason I won’t even consider switching to another platform. I love that if I have a question and can’t find the answer quickly within their learning management system, I can call or chat with them and get an immediate response.”

“For presenting candidates to clients, PCRecruiter has had rave reviews from my clients. It’s easy to look through a candidate’s profile and provide feedback.”

“PCR has been instrumental in our growth and success and all 14 of our offices use it. The system is deep with solutions to keeping track of candidates, clients, business opportunities, jobs and so much more. It also integrates with a number of other applications that we use daily. We would not be able to function without PCR as the backbone of our recruiting systems.”

This announcement comes on the heels of PCRecruiter making the Top 50 HR Software list on G2 for 2022.

PCRecruiter has been named to G2’s Top 50 HR Software List in the annual ‘Best Software Awards’. This PCRecruiter’s first time appearing on one of G2’s Best Software lists, earning its place this year thanks to high marks for customer service and adaptability in the recruiting, staffing, and HR space.

PCRecruiter has been consistently highly-rated on G2, the world’s largest and most trusted software marketplace. G2 helps more than 60 million people every year make smarter software decisions based on authentic peer reviews, and is the definitive online destination to discover, review and manage the technology that businesses need to reach their potential.

This year, PCRecruiter has been named to G2’s Top 50 HR Software List. The annual Best Software List ranks the world’s best software companies and products based on authentic, timely reviews from real users.

This PCRecruiter’s first time appearing on one of G2’s Best Software lists, earning its place this year thanks to high marks for customer service and adaptability in the recruiting, staffing, and HR space.

“G2 has been a great partner in spreading the word about PCRecruiter,” said Bill Kubicek, PCRecruiter co-founder and VP of Sales and Marketing. “We’re honored to have been included in the ‘Best’ this year, particularly because we know that standing is based on the reviews of satisfied recruiting and staffing pros.”

“As we continue to accelerate rapid growth, our online marketplace boasts 100,000+ software and services companies in 2,000+ categories and over 1.5 million trusted user reviews. Simply put, G2 is where you go for software,” said Godard Abel, co-founder and CEO, G2. “Our annual Best Software List aims to guide buyers on their purchasing decisions, knowing they can trust in the credibility and objectivity of our scoring algorithms. We applaud those companies named to our 2022 list, as they’ve earned the satisfaction among their customers as well as an impressive market presence.”

The top 100 software sellers are ranked based on a combination of Satisfaction and Market Presence scores for each seller, and the top 100 products are ranked based on reviews across all categories they are a part of. To be included in one of G2’s Software Sellers or Software Products “Best Of” lists, a software seller or product must receive at least 50 approved and published reviews during the 2021 calendar year. Scores reflect only data from reviews submitted during this evaluation period.

To learn more, view G2’s 2022 Best Software List and read more about G2’s methodology. To schedule a demonstration, contact us today.

Our free series of bi-weekly Thursday afternoon webinars continues into February and March 2022! Stay up to date on PCRecruiter’s latest features and plans.

The bi-weekly series of free PCRecruiter webinars continues into February and March, 2022. If you missed any of the previous sessions on topics including Profile Forms, Contractor Features, and our Open API, check out our webinar archive.

The five upcoming sessions below are already on the calendar and we are continuing to plan more for the spring and beyond. If you can’t make it to the live session, don’t worry – a recording will be sent to all registrants afterward.

What’s next for PCRecruiter?

Thursday, February 10 at 1:00 PM EST / 10:00 AM PST

PCRecruiter is constantly moving forward, and 2022 is going to be a *big* year for updates and changes. Want to know where the roadmap will be taking us? Join this session with our Manager of Professional Services and one of our lead developers to get the inside scoop. Register now.

PCRecruiter Globalised Features

Thursday, February 24 at 8:00 AM EST / 1:00 PM GMT

PCRecruiter’s ability to support alternate languages, currencies, and compliance requirements like GDPR allows it to be used in dozens of countries. In this session, we’ll be discussing the functions of PCRecruiter that are of specific interest to our non-US clientele. Register now.

PCRecruiter Orientation

Thursday, March 10 @ 1:00 PM Eastern

Whether you’re a new PCRecruiter user or a potential user interested in understanding the system, this session with one of our consultants will show you the basics. You’ll learn the underlying concepts of PCRecruiter’s data organization and how to perform simple tasks like creating and viewing records Register Now

PCRecruiter Partners

Thursday, March 24 @ 1:00 PM Eastern

One of PCRecruiter’s great strengths is the roster of vendors and services that it can interact with. In this session, you’ll get a high-level review of the various partnerships, job posting services, and other technologies that work with your PCRecruiter database. Register Now

“Money” Automations

Thursday, April 7 @ 1:00 PM Eastern

PCRecruiter’s automated tasks give you time saving, money-saving shortcuts. Our training team will show you tips to optimize your workflow and to receive notifications when “big money” moves like placements or other specific events occur in your database. Register Now

Our series of bi-weekly Thursday afternoon webinars continues in 2022! Stay up to date on PCRecruiter’s latest features and plans.

The PCRecruiter team is continuing the series of bi-weekly webinars that began in 2021. If you missed any of those sessions, check out our webinar archive. The currently scheduled sessions can be found below, and more are on the way for March and beyond. Stay tuned!

Meet an Owner

Thursday, January 13 at 1:00 PM EST / 10:00 AM PST

PCRecruiter is unique in the ATS/CRM market given that the original founders still directly own and operate the company on a day-to-day basis. In this open session, you’ll get an opportunity to hear directly from the folks in charge. Register now.

Introduction to the PCRecruiter API

Thursday, January 27 at 1:00 PM EST / 10:00 AM PST

The API (application programming interface) allows external software to ‘talk’ to the PCRecruiter database securely. It facilitates many of our integrations with outside vendors, as well as our own systems like PCR Capture and PCR for Outlook/Gmail. In this session, our technical experts will talk about the basics of the API and how it functions. This session will be valuable to anyone considering their own custom development projects with PCRecruiter. Register now.

What’s next for PCRecruiter?

Thursday, February 10 at 1:00 PM EST / 10:00 AM PST

PCRecruiter Globalised Features

Thursday, February 24 at 8:00 AM EST / 1:00 PM GMT

Happy New Year 2022

Wishing all of you a happy, healthy, and successful 2022 from the entire PCRecruiter team. Happy New Year!

In commemorating our 23rd full year of service to the recruiting and staffing industry, innovating private databases for recruitment pros around the world, we hope that you too are reflecting on a strong year with anticipation that next year will be even stronger.

PCRecruiter is rolling, with major new capabilities deploying in 2022. We look forward to doing our part in helping you to reach for your best year ever.

Happy New Year from PCRecruiter!

G2, the largest software marketplace and review platform, has published its Winter 2021 reports. PCRecruiter was again ranked #1 in Customer Relationship and a Leader in multiple categories. G2 publishes these quarterly reports ranking applicant tracking software, staffing software, and recruiting agency software based on data from multiple sources.

The Winter 2022 reports from G2, the largest software marketplace and review platform, are in! These quarterly reports are based on independent user reviews and satisfaction scores, as well as other data sources and indicators of market leadership. PCRecruiter has once again been revealed as one of the applicant tracking, staffing, and recruiting agency software industry’s top choices.

Still the Best in Customer Relationship

Among businesses from 1-50 employees, PCRecruiter has once again been ranked the #1 Applicant Tracking System in regards to quality of support, earning the ‘Best Relationship’ badge. In the mid-market range (companies with 51,000 -100,000 employees) PCRecruiter was ranked in the Easiest To Do Business With. Our team always works hard toward customer satisfaction, and we’re always glad to see the reviews that tell us we’re achieving that goal.

PCRecruiter Remains a Leader

G2 ranks software as a Leader based on substantial Satisfaction scores and Market Presence. PCR has once again placed in this group, both for the 1-50 employee range ATS market for the ATS and the among Candidate Relationship Management categories overall. We also ranked as a High Performer in both the Staffing and Recruitment Marketing categories.

And, as with the Fall 2021 reports, PCRecruiter remained the vendor with Highest User Adoption for the Recruitment Marketing category.

Post Your Review!

We want your voice to be included in G2’s Spring 2022 reports! You can post a review of PCRecruiter at this link to be eligible for a gift card from G2 in thanks, or you can post via this link to donate $10 to “Girls Who Code”, helping to close the gender gap in tech.

Times change and recruiters can’t just rely on a spreadsheet of contacts, quick thinking, or a ‘roll-up list’ in LinkedIn to get ahead in an industry which never slows down. An Applicant Tracking System (ATS) offers recruiters a custom built technology that can support them in their work to deliver great candidates to great employers. To show how that pairing is made easy by an ATS we want to show you 5 key benefits of the software.

Times change and recruiters can’t just rely on a spreadsheet of contacts, quick thinking, or a ‘roll-up list’ in LinkedIn to get ahead in an industry which never slows down.

An Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) offers recruiters a custom built technology that can support them in their work to deliver great candidates to great employers. To show how that pairing is made easy by an ATS we want to show you 5 key benefits of the software.

Repeatability

What do you do with the other candidates that you didn’t put forward for your latest role?

You’ve cultivated 10 of the brightest marketers for a recent commercial role and you’ve placed 1 of them straight into the job (nice work by the way!) But now you’re left with 9 additional shining stars… So what do you do with them?

Well, with an ATS you can easily transpose your broader inventory of existing candidates into new roles. Simply put, an ATS helps you put the right people in the right places – so you have them all, ready to go, as soon as a new opportunity lands (or you go out and create it!)

Richer Data

We all love to drop in on LinkedIn and check out candidate history. But all too often, the details given barely scratch the surface. What about everything they don’t write about – things like their ambitions, their home life, their lifelong, unflinching love of the Chicago Cubs –?

With an Applicant Tracking System you can save all that rich, personal data on your candidates in one place – to give you a true, more three-dimensional profile to take forward.

Specialist Database

Feel like pursuing a niche? As you build up multiple candidates for a new position you’ll realize you’ve actually farmed up a good herd of industry specific talent. You can make and save great contacts within that industry and then propel your dedicated flock toward them in a move that’s guaranteed to land in the right spot.

Success Support

Customer service and success support are absolutely critical when implementing any kind of software. After all, if you can’t use it, what’s the point in having it?

An ATS is only going to deliver the benefits you need if it’s configured to your requirements. We only come to understand that by listening to what you really need. We’ve been in business for over 20 years and have adapted our levels of service over time; while understanding that every recruiter is different.

Automation & Efficiency

We’ve grouped these two together because automation feeds into and supports efficiency. A lot of recruiters are still using databases and pulling out information themselves. A properly configured ATS can scan your emails, set reminders, notify contractors – and much more besides.

On top of that, call recording and dialing history features help to automatically fill out the CRM component of your system. No-one likes having to backfill an activity log, and with an ATS you don’t need to.

The bottom line is that recruiters want to save time by increasing speed. They have to compete to get the best employers and candidates on their books and Applicant Tracking Systems support that goal to a tee.

At PCR we support everyone – from one user offices up to massive multinationals – in exactly the same way; with expert support at every step.

Want to go bigger and better in recruitment? Contact PCRecruiter today.

Reports & Profiles (Update 9.8.7)

This week’s update to PCRecruiter comes jam-packed with improvements to Profile Forms and Reports, as well as improvements to Quick Find and Candidate Presentations. We’ve also got new webinars and other announcements to share.

This week’s update includes big upgrades to PCRecruiter’s Standard and Custom Reports, as well as over twenty improvements to Profile Forms. We’ve also updated the Quick Find, Candidate Presentations, and Opt-Out/In features with helpful new capabilities.

What’s New in PCRecruiter 9.8.7

Improved Reports

We’ve revised our Standard and Custom Reports with new styling, charts, and other improvements to help you analyze and present your data more effectively.

View your reports in PDF form for easy printing and downloading direct from the browser.
Export all standard and custom reports to .XLS, Google Sheets, and Microsoft Office 365.
NOTE: Access to the new Export features are governed by the “Export Reports” permission on the Security section of the User Record. If you do not see an Export option following this update, your database administrator will need to open SYSTEM > Users > Manage Users and give your username access to them in the Security area under Reports.
A new ‘Share’ option opens a blank email with an .XLS file of the current report already attached, making it faster than ever to send your metrics to others.
Exported spreadsheets now include pie and bar charts for most standard reports. These charts are automatically inserted on additional tabs in the exported report.
The Report Options, found in the Action menu on the main Reports menu screen, now includes options to select portrait/landscape layout, to hide empty columns on PDF exports, and to replace the PCRecruiter logos with your own branding.
A new ‘Generated Reports’ option has been added to the Auditing Reports section. This report gives database administrators a security audit that lists which reports have been run by which users in a selected time period.

Profile Form Enhancements

Profiles — PCR’s searchable, configurable, multipurpose form utility — have received a over two dozen improvements, big and small, in this update, including the ability to automatically link candidates to jobs using emailed forms, separately control views for printing and emailing forms, and so much more.

If you’re not already familiar with these flexible custom forms, sign up for the All About Profiles webinar on Thursday, December 2. Here are the key improvements you’ll find in this release:

Viewing / Editing Profiles

The Action dropdown on profiles in the Attachments screen includes a new ‘Copy’ option. This will make a duplicate of the selected form under the same record, which can be helpful if you want to use the existing content in a form as a starting point for an alternate version.
When a completed profile is opened in Edit mode from the Attachments area on a record, a new icon and label in the upper right corner will indicate who completed form. This can be an internal PCRecruiter user, or an external contact that the form was emailed to. Note that this addition does not appear on the form when printed or emailed and is only for the user’s reference.
All ‘Electronic Signature’ answers in profiles will be embedded with a UTC date-time stamp, giving you an unalterable visual record of when the form was signed.
Users of the optional PCRecruiter Analytics will find a new “Saves” stat in the Details on their Email Campaigns. If the emailed form contains profile links, the Analytics will indicate which recipients completed the form and will provide a link to view the resulting attachment.

Sending Profiles

If a profile is emailed from a Pipeline or from a Position Form Letter, PCRecruiter will attach that person to the Pipeline for that position. This allows you to invite people to apply to positions by emailing them a profile. If the profile has any Knockout / Success automation plans associated with it, they will be triggered just as if the candidate were applying via the PCRecruiter Job Board, making emailed profiles useable as self-qualification questionnaires within the Pipeline.
If a profile is emailed from a Pipeline or from a Position Form Letter, PCRecruiter will list that job’s title along with the form in the Attachments on the name record.
The ‘Attach’ profile feature found under Send Options on the Compose Email screen has been changed from a dropdown to a search popup, making it easier to find your desired form.
When sending a profile link from a non-form letter, the automatically prepended link to the form has been restyled to appear more cleanly on modern email clients and mobile screens. In addition, if the profile has “Form Letter Clickable Text” defined on its Settings screen, this text will be used in place of the default link text on these emails.
Profiles can now be time-limited using the ‘Expiration’ panel on the profile setup screen. This new option lets you prevent a recipient from submitting or re-submitting a form within a specific number of days from the sending of the email.
The ‘Automations’ panel on the profile setup screen now includes options to receive notification emails when the form is edited (previous versions only allowed for notifications for newly submitted forms).
The ‘Automations’ panel on the profile setup screen now includes the option to email the name to whom the profile is attached. These ‘receipt’ emails can include a PDF of the completed form.
You may now send any Form Letter in place of the default notification email when a profile is added or edited. When creating the form letter, you can add the merge tag [[Profile Action]] which will insert the word “Added” or “Updated” into the text depending on whether the profile was a fresh submission or an edit to an existing form.

Designing & Configuring Profiles

A new ‘After Submit Display Message’ box appears on the ‘Automations’ panel when creating a profile. This box allows you to specify the text that appears on the screen after the profile has been saved. This box accepts HTML or plain text.
When linking a profile answer to a database field, PCR will now automatically limit the length of the answer to the available field length, preventing the form from putting in more information into the answer than the associated field will be able to store.
There are now three separate HTML templates in the ‘Custom HTML’ panel on the profile setup screen. The ‘Default HTML Layout’ will be used for all purposes if no other layouts are entered. If an Internal Layout is created, it will be visible to the PCRecruiter User while the Default Layout will be visible to any external recipients of an emailed profile link. If a Print Layout is created, it will be applied to the read-only “View” link for the profile and for any PDF version of the form. With this new function, a web designer can create separate views for the PCRecruiter user, the form recipient, and the printed final version, including different styling, answer displays, scripting, and images.
In addition to configuring custom HTML Layouts by placing each question and answer with [[Q1]] or [[A1]] etc. tags, the new update allows for inserting [[Profile]] as a tag. This gives the ability to use the standard PCRecruiter table-based profile form, but to easily apply CSS, HTML, and Javascript around it for branding purposes.
The profile editing screen now returns to the same editing panel (Settings, Automations, Expiration, Questions, Custom HTML) after saving.

Creating Profile Questions

The ‘Required / Not Required’ dropdown now includes new options for making a field required only for external or internal use. This can be helpful if the same form is being completed by users and by external contacts, but the list of required answers would be different for the two respondents.
When using the ‘Link To Field’ feature to connect a profile answer to a database record field, you’ll now be able to create Read Only or Write Only links. Read Only fields are useful for showing the recipient the value from their record without allowing it to be changed, while Write Only fields are useful for getting updated information without revealing the old value from the record.
The optional ‘Placeholder’ option lets you put text inside of inputs and text box answers that appears prior to the user typing in their answer. This can be used for providing instructional text or labeling.
Answers for multiple-choice questions can now be dynamically loaded based on a database query rather than only a directly-entered list of options. This is accomplished by entering an SQL SELECT statement into the answer box. For assistance with this feature, contact PCRecruiter support.

Candidate Write-Ups in Candidate Presentations

The Candidate Presentations feature has a new ‘Candidate Write-Up’ section that can be added to your presentation templates. This feature lets you add a formatted custom introduction or summary about the candidate to the presentation in addition to the other fields and documents. If the Name record already has any text stored in the ‘Summary’ area, you can use the ‘Insert Candidate Summary’ button in the editing toolbar to import that text into the Write-Up to save time.

We’ve also added a CC: field to the outgoing email screen for Presentations so that other contacts, in or out of the database, can be included on the email.

Quick Find Enhancements

The Quick Find is located at the top right corner of the PCRecruiter screen. Terms entered into this box are searched against the name, email, title, company name, and phone fields on Name, Company, and Position records, making it easy to locate any of the main record types with a few keystrokes without going to the full search form.

In version 9.8.7, we’ve updated the Quick Find to return results based on similar terms to those you’ve entered. This can be helpful if you’re not exactly sure of the spelling that was used on the record or if the record you’re seeking contains a spelling error. The Quick Find will bring back additional results that would match the keyword if any two characters were changed. For example, a search for “Len Jackman” may also return “Helen Jackson”, “Ben Jacks”, and “Lenja Manfred” or names associated with the “Allen Jackman Inc.” company.

The Quick Find also has been revised to display up to 30 matching Names, Companies, and Positions for each search. You can scroll through the results with the paging arrows at the left or right sides of the row.

Email Subscription Status Icons

The PCRecruiter Opt-In/Out feature logs which email addresses should be skipped when sending a bulk email and which should be blocked from email entirely. While the list of records to be opted in/out is stored under the SYSTEM > Email Setup area, it is possible to give the users the ability to manage subscription status directly from the Name records.

The ‘Allow Users to Edit Candidate Email Subscriptions’ switch can currently be changed from the SYSTEM > Region > International Settings panel. In previous editions, this added a link below the ‘Email Address’ label on the record. As of PCRecruiter v9.8.7, the subscription status appears as an icon inside of the email field, next to the Email and Form Letter buttons. The icons are as follows:

= No Status = Opted In = Opted Out = Opted Out of Bulk Email Only

Clicking on the icon will allow the user to change that email address’s status on the opt in/out list.

PCRecruiter Webinars

We’ve announced a fresh series of bi-weekly Thursday webinars on a variety of topics including Profiles, recent updates, Contractor Features, the API, and beyond. You can sign up for these free sessions at https://learning.pcrecruiter.net/site/webinars. More sessions are expected throughout 2022.

Review PCRecruiter – Get a Gift Card!

In case you missed it, PCRecruiter was ranked the #1 ATS in customer relationship and had the highest user adoption in the recruitment marketing space according to the Fall 2021 report from G2. We want your voice to be heard when the next round reports come out, so we encourage you to post a review of PCRecruiter at this link. You’ll be eligible to receive a gift card from G2 in thanks for your thoughts.

We’ve also partnered with G2 in support of Girls Who Code. If you visit this link to submit your review, G2 will donate $10 to help close the gender gap in technology.

We’re launching a series of Thursday afternoon webinars to help you stay up to date on PCRecruiter’s latest features.

As a busy recruitment professional, we understand that staying on top of the latest changes or digging deeper into the features of your CRM/ATS can sometimes take a back seat to other business priorities.

To make sure you’re getting the most out of your software investment, our training and technical experts are offering a free series of webinars covering a variety of capabilities and integrations.

The first few sessions are listed below. Whether these tools are new to PCRecruiter, or just new to you, you’ll find these sessions informative.

Watch for an update to the PCRecruiter ASP shortly after the Thanksgiving holiday, featuring improvements to reports, profiles, and candidate presentations!

Verified First

Thursday, November 18th at 12:00 PM EST / 9:00 AM PST

Long-time PCR partner Verified First is North America’s premiere background and drug screening company. Verified First streamlines the hiring process for organizations of all sizes, helping you to easily validate and verify potential hires without leaving PCRecruiter. This ‘demo/webinar’ with Verified First’s Dakota Bruneau covers how this integration improves your time-to-hire when screening candidates, while complying with FCRA and EEOC laws.

All About Profile Forms

Thursday, December 2 at 1:00 PM EST / 10:00 AM PST

Go in-depth on Profile Forms, PCR’s flexible, customizable, keyword-searchable forms. We’ll cover the basics and all of the latest features. A great session for Profile novices and experts alike.

Recent PCRecruiter Updates

Thursday, December 16 at 1:00 PM EST / 10:00 AM PST

With new features and improvements being added all the time, it can be tough to keep up! This session covers recent PCRecruiter updates including automations, mapping, and more.

Contractor Features

Thursday, December 30 at 1:00 PM EST / 10:00 AM PST

Learn about how PCRecruiter facilitates your contract or contract-to-perm process. This session covers time sheet collection, including the PCR app, as well as hours approval and reporting.

More webinars are planned for early 2022. See https://learning.pcrecruiter.net/site/webinars for complete details on our upcoming sessions.

Announcing two webinar/demos with PCRecruiter partner vendors: marketing automation system Interseller on Wednesday, October 27 and background screening service Verified First on Thursday, November 18.

One of the greatest strengths of PCRecruiter is its easy interoperability with other leading vendors. We are constantly adding new integrations, thanks to PCR’s easily-used Open API and our desire to be the central hub of your recruitment operation.

In the next few weeks, we invite you to join us for two free webinar/demo sessions. On October 27, we’ll be introducing our brand new partner Interseller. On November 11, we’ll be reconnecting with Verified First, a valued partner since 2017. These sessions will be recorded, so even if you can’t make it, please register to receive a recording afterward!

Interseller: Automation, Workflows, and More

Wednesday, October 27th at 2PM EST / 11AM PST

Interseller is a recruitment marketing automation tool. This system helps you source prospect email addresses and create email sequences to send to them. Once they’ve responded, you can instantly syncing their contact details back to your PCRecruiter database. This connection helps internal and external recruiting teams save time on searching for accurate contact information, doing manual follow ups, and updating their PCR records.

PCRecruiter’s Michael Werner will be co-hosting a webinar with Dan Mochel from Interseller to see what the platform is capable of and how it can make you a more effective recruiter.

To schedule your own private demo of Interseller, click here.

Verified First: Fast & Thorough Background Screening

Thursday, November 18th at 12PM EST / 11AM PST

PCRecruiter is offering a webinar with our long-time partner, Verified First. As North America’s premiere background and drug screening company, Verified First streamlines the hiring process for organizations of all sizes. This partnership helps you easily validate and verify potential hires without leaving PCRecruiter, and as a result you’ll improve your time-to-hire when screening candidates, while complying with FCRA and EEOC laws.

On November 18, Verified First will be hosting a “deminar” that will highlight best practices for background screening. Experts from Verified First will show you just how easy it is to screen candidates right from your PCRecruiter screen.

Key takeaways:

Learn how background screening with the right company truly does optimize the cost per hire.
Get an exclusive, behind the scenes look into the best background screening company around.
Discover how to make the best recruiting and hiring decisions — and how to avoid the bad ones.
Explore the PCRecruiter platform with an expert.

Automation, ZoomInfo, & Dialing (Update 9.8.6)

A substantial update is coming to all PCRecruiter SaaS customers this week, featuring some powerful new recruitment Automation capabilities, a time-saving new connection between PCR web and the PCR apps for iOS and Android, and strong new integration with ZoomInfo. We’ve also got an October 27 webinar planned with our new partner Interseller which you can register for today.

We’ve also got an October 27 webinar planned with our new partner Interseller which you can register for today.

New Automation Builder

PCRecruiter has long offered productivity-enhancing automation features for Rollup Lists, Pipelines, Profiles, and the Job Board. With the features released in this update, the possibilities for recruitment workflow automation are expanded to include a new range of triggers, actions, and sequences.

With new trigger/action configuration panel now found under SYSTEM > Database Setup, any PCRecruiter admin user has the power to build endless custom behaviors with no code knowledge required.

Action triggers include common tasks like creating a new job and making a placement. You can also trigger automations when a contractor is coming off of an assignment or has not submitted their hours. You can trigger based on active applicants or passive candidates applying on your Job Board, or trigger actions based on practically any changes to fields or the entry of a new Activity.

When one of these events has occurred, PCR can automatically send a form letter, trigger a notification popup in the free PCRecruiter app (iOS / Android), or add and remove records from Rollup Lists. If you have RingCentral, PCR can send a text message for you.

You can start from any of the canned automations included or build your own from scratch to help keep your team informed and your database organized. We are looking forward to lots of creativity from our customers when putting these new recruitment automation tools to work!

Visit the Learning Center for Automations instructions.

ZoomInfo Integration

We’ve partnered with ZoomInfo, the world’s most comprehensive B2B database, to allow anyone with ZoomInfo Elite or ZoomInfo Recruiter account to enhance their PCRecruiter records with the latest contact details from ZoomInfo’s constantly updating database.

You’ll find a shortcut to ZoomInfo Recruiter in the menu above the Name search, allowing you to jump directly into your ZoomInfo account to research and source contacts, and also an ‘Update with ZoomInfo’ option in the Action menu on your Name records. This will open a sidebar that will feel familiar to users of our free PCR Capture plugin. In just a couple of clicks, your PCRecruiter records can be augmented and maintained. This is an excellent way to connect to the large array of data sources that feed ZoomInfo.

For more about this integration, see the ZoomInfo article in our Learning Center.

PCRecruiter App Dialing & SMS

We’ve created a new interaction between the PCRecruiter browser interface and the free PCRecruiter app (iOS / Android). With this new update, you’ll be able to pass outbound phone dials or text messages to your mobile device from the PCR screen. Not only does this save time, but more importantly it makes it easier and more automatic to log Activity records about your communications as you make them. Many of our customers use their mobile devices as their primary business communication channel, and this feature is designed to make that choice easier than ever!

For more detail on setting up this dialing connection, see the Learning Center.

PCRecruiter + Interseller Webinar

Automation, Workflows, and More: The PCRecruiter + Interseller Integration
Wednesday, October 27th at 2PM EST / 11AM PST

Interseller is a marketing automation tool that can help you source prospects emails and create email sequences to send to them, syncing their contact details back to your PCRecruiter database. PCRecruiter’s Michael Werner will be co-hosting a webinar with Dan Mochel from Interseller to see what the platform is capable of and how it can make you a more effective recruiter. To schedule your own private demo of Interseller, click here.

Review PCRecruiter – Get a Gift Card!

In case you missed it, PCRecruiter was ranked the #1 ATS in customer relationship and had the highest user adoption in the recruitment marketing space according to the Fall 2021 report from G2. We want your voice to be heard when the Winter 2021 reports come out, so we encourage you to post a review of PCRecruiter at this link. You’ll be eligible to receive a gift card from G2 in thanks for your thoughts.

We’ve also partnered with G2 in support of Girls Who Code. If you visit this link to submit your review, G2 will donate $10 to help close the gender gap in technology.

G2, the largest software marketplace and review platform, has published its Fall 2021 report. PCRecruiter was ranked #1 in Customer Relationship and a Leader in multiple categories. G2 publishes these quarterly reports ranking applicant tracking software, staffing software, and recruiting agency software based on data from multiple sources.

G2, the largest software marketplace and review platform, publishes quarterly reports that rank applicant tracking software, staffing software, and recruiting agency software. These reports are based on multiple data sources, including perceived market presence, satisfaction scores from independent user reviews, and indicators of market leadership.

With G2’s newest detailed breakdowns just released for Fall 2021, PCRecruiter has once again been revealed as one of the recruitment software industry’s top options for recruiting and staffing professionals in organizations of all sizes.

PCRecruiter is #1 ATS in Customer Relationship

The Fall 2021 reports indicate that, for businesses from 1-50 employees, PCRecruiter is a Leader among Staffing and ATS solutions. In fact, PCRecruiter is the #1 ranked Applicant Tracking System in this market in regards to quality of support, ease of doing business with, and likeliness to recommend.

Even among larger companies (51-1k employees), PCRecruiter ranked in the Top 10 easiest vendors to do business with. We know we go the extra mile to make our customers happy and successful, but it’s always nice to see it supported by the data!

PCR is Leading The Way

PCRecruiter received high marks across the industry, ranking as a Leader among Candidate Relationship Management and Applicant Tracking vendors, and as a High Performer in both the Staffing and Recruitment Marketing categories for businesses of all sizes.

In the Recruitment Marketing category, PCRecruiter earned the Highest User Adoption badge. This is perhaps one of the most important metrics we’re proud of — after all, even the greatest features and highest quality data can’t be of any value if your team isn’t using the software. The time and personal attention we put into getting new customers up to speed, and the system’s incredible configurability have put it at the top of the category in G2’s Implementation Index.

We want your voice to be heard!

We appreciate the kind words and accolades from our users that went into these rankings. If you’d like to have your opinion counted in the Winter 2021 report from G2, we encourage you to post a review of PCRecruiter at this link. Not only will this help people learn about PCRecruiter, but you’ll also be eligible for a gift card from G2 in thanks.

We have released a patch on our SaaS PCRecruiter network which includes a necessary update to our PCRecruiter Launcher. The Launcher is a small desktop app that allows PCRecruiter to connect with your computer’s local OS for interactions like alarm popups, attachment handling, and so on. When you log into PCRecruiter you should be prompted to install the latest version.

When you log into PCRecruiter you should be prompted to install the latest version. If you are not prompted, you may download the Windows installer here or download the Mac installer here. If the installation is skipped, some features may not perform as expected.

Here is what you can expect to see:

There is a newer version of the PCRecruiter Launcher — Click “Yes” on the PCRecruiter Loader

Update Launcher — Click “Yes” to begin the PCRecruiter Launcher Setup.

PCRecruiter Launcher Setup — Click “Next” to begin the installation.

PCRecruiter Launcher EULA — Check the “I accept” box and click “Next”.

Ready to Install — Click “Install” to proceed.

Launcher Setup Type — Choose the “Typical” installation option.

User Account Control — You may see a message like this. If so, select “Yes”.

After the installer has completed, which should take only a moment or two, click “Finish”

Following this installation, you may continue to use PCRecruiter as usual.

PCRecruiter + Zapier plus 2FA

PCRecruiter is now connected with the Zapier integration platform, enabling connections with hundreds of third-party apps. In addition, PCRecruiter is also introducing optional 2FA login security.

PCRecruiter + Zapier

We are thrilled to announce PCRecruiter’s integration with Zapier, the leading Integration Platform (IPaaS). Integrating with Zapier means that recruiting and staffing professionals can seamlessly automate tasks and customize workflows between PCRecruiter and other systems without the need for deep technical knowledge or custom code development. This integration allows users to create links between PCRecruiter and the thousands of applications in the Zapier catalog with just a few clicks.

With the Zapier integration, you’ll be able to:

Trigger actions in another app when a new Placement is made.
Trigger actions in another app when a Name or Position is added to a particular Rollup list.
Signal PCRecruiter to create a Name, Company, or Position when triggered by another app.
Signal PCRecruiter to update a Name when triggered by another app.
Signal PCRecruiter to write a Name or Position activity when triggered by another app.

With the Zapier integration enabled, you’ll be able to do things like copy Names to Google Sheets, turn Placements into Monday items, or post job info to your social networks – there are virtually endless possibilities.

This integration is offered at no extra cost from PCRecruiter. See https://learning.pcrecruiter.net/site/zapier/ to get started.

Two-Factor Authentication

Adding a second layer of security to your private recruitment database can give you peace of mind. To that end, we now offer two-factor authentication in our SaaS platform, the PCRecruiter mobile app, PCRecruiter for Outlook, and PCRecruiter for Gmail. Once this feature has been configured for any login, the user will be prompted to supply a numeric code after entering their username and password. The code can be received via their registered email, a push notification to the PCRecruiter mobile app, or via a compatible Authenticator App such as those by Google and LastPass.

To get started, see the Learning Center document at https://learning.pcrecruiter.net/site/two-factor-authentication/

Review PCRecruiter — Get a Gift Card

Thanks to reviewers like you, PCRecruiter continues be ranked as one of the top recruiting software, recruitment CRM, and ATS solutions on the market. The Summer 2021 reports from G2 have PCRecruiter once again in the ‘Leader’ quadrant and showing some of the highest customer satisfaction ratings in the industry. We appreciate your kudos and we look forward to continuing to satisfy your needs.

If you’d like to have your voice included, and get rewarded with a gift card for your time, you may do so at Software Reviews, G2, and Capterra.

Notes & Analytics Updates (Update 9.8.5)

PCRecruiter 9.8.5 includes workflow enhancements in the Notes area and new charts for PCR Analytics, as well as a ‘Last Modified’ field for Company and Position records.

The latest update to PCRecruiter arrives on our SaaS recruitment platform this week, with user-requested adjustments to the Notes area, fresh charts in the PCR Analytics, and an additional field for Positions and Companies. In addition to the visible changes to PCRecruiter, extensive platform and API changes to support upcoming interface and automation improvements are included with this update.

Notes Updates

In our April 2021 update we revealed a new Notes Widget with a grid view, bookmarking feature, and keyword search. With valuable feedback from our users, we’ve further refined this interface with:

The ‘Add Note’ panel is now collapsed by default to allow more viewing area.
Once expanded, the Add panel can be resized by dragging the edge to create more entry space. The width you set will be remembered even after the panel is collapsed and re-opened later.
A new Expand All button allows all Notes boxes on the record to be viewed at their full-length in a single click. The Collapse button does the reverse.
Editing notes is now accomplished by simply clicking on the note. When you click outside of that note it will automatically save.
A right-click menu gives you quick access to Delete and Copy functions.

Analytics Details & Drill-Downs

The PCR Analytics, our optional graphic tool for analyzing and reporting on KPIs and other metrics, has been updated with a new ‘Detailed Goals’ chart with a breakdown of data by user. There is also a new drill-down available for the Key Metrics and Metrics sections that displays the individual records that make up your reported stats. The records associated with these items can be easily added to a Rollup List for further reporting, searching, emailing, and organizing.

Last Modified Field

Although Name records have long had a ‘Last Modified’ field, showing the date when the record had last been re-saved, this field was not available for Company and Position records. This update adds the same functionality to the other two primary record types.

Review PCRecruiter — Get a Gift Card

If you’d like to have your voice included, and get rewarded with a gift card for your time, you may do so at Software Reviews, G2, and Capterra.

Enhanced Notes & Maps (Update 9.8.4)

In our latest update, we’ve added a new feature for placing candidate addresses on an interactive map, as well as completely redesigned the Notes screen for Name, Company, and Position records.

PCRecruiter will be updated this Wednesday to version 9.8.4, which contains a brand new Map feature as well as a major redesign to our Notes screen and widget. These updates are a precursor to some very exciting new improvements you’ll be seeing in PCRecruiter over the next few months. Keep your eyes out for the quick guide popups when you log into the system for the latest info, and watch our blog and social networks for posts like this one.

Contact Mapping

A new ‘Map Results’ icon has been added to the Name Search Results screen. After selecting one or more contacts returned by any name search, clicking this icon will plot their home addresses on an interactive map. This can be very useful for those who do contract recruiting and want to easily identify candidates located near the job site.

Clicking on any pin in the map displays the record’s contact card for access to the resume, email, phone, and other interactions.

Although this feature is offered at no additional cost, it may require an update to your database to activate and is therefore currently ‘off’ by default for current clients. If you would like to have the Map function enabled on your database, contact your PCRecruiter consultant.

Note: The Maps are currently US only, but will be expanding to international clients in an upcoming release.

Notes Redesigned

Notes are keyword-searchable candidate, client, or position information that doesn’t correspond to an event with a particular date or time (those would be Activities.) This update includes a major improvement to the way you’ll enter and view Notes that offers better visibility and organization. The new interface also saves time by putting the ability to edit Notes directly into the primary record view rather than only via the full Notes panel.

The new Notes Widget includes an open area for entering and editing Notes on the left, and individual boxes for each exist Note to the right. Your notes are viewable in a grid or list layout, depending on your screen space needs. The notes are sorted by date, but you can bookmark your key information to keep it always at the top of the list. There’s even a keyword search box for quickly finding the notes you’re after in any record.

This change in the Notes screen applies to both the widget in your custom record layout and the full Notes panel on your records. In addition, this new change has been extended to Notes on your Company and Position records, creating a consistent experience across all three record types.

Review PCRecruiter — Get a Gift Card

Thanks to reviewers like you, PCRecruiter continues be ranked as one of the top recruiting software, recruitment CRM, and ATS solutions on the market. The Spring 2021 reports from G2 have PCRecruiter once again in the ‘Leader’ quadrant and showing some of the highest customer satisfaction ratings in the industry. We appreciate your kudos and we look forward to continuing to satisfy your needs.

If you’d like to have your voice included, and get rewarded with a gift card for your time, you may do so at Software Reviews, G2, and Capterra.

Happy Holidays & Happy New Year from PCRecruiter

Happy Holidays and New Year from PCRecruiter! This message goes out from us to you, with our best wishes for a successful 2021.

We are grateful for your friendship and partnership throughout what has been, to say the least, an unusual year. Despite the challenges of 2020, the PCRecruiter team has remained steadfast in our commitment to our clients and uninterrupted in our efforts to bring you higher value.

Consequently, PCRecruiter has continued to rank as a leader on recruiting software recommendation and review sites like G2, Capterra, and SoftwareReviews. We deeply appreciate it.

This year we made many great improvements to PCRecruiter, including a redesigned look with multiple color choices, a time-saving new Gmail integration, the addition of contractor hours collection into our mobile app, and updates to our Candidate Presentations and automation plans.

In addition to making PCRecruiter a more reliable and flexible recruitment CRM than ever through enhanced design, development, and delivery, we also made it easier than ever to master with the launch of our Learning Management System.

2021 is already shaping up to be a landmark year for PCR, featuring some of the most exciting improvements and advanced functionality we’ve ever released. You’ll be seeing bold new interfaces, powerful new integrations, and continued enhancement of the key features you rely on.

To the PCRecruiter community around the globe, we extend our best wishes for a bright, healthy, and successful new year filled with peace, strength, and abundant prosperity!

Sincerely,
The PCRecruiter Team

Mobile Timesheets

PCRecruiter’s newly updated mobile app adds contractor hours submission features for standardized, comprehensive, accurate records of your contractors’ time and expenses while on the job.

Collecting Contractor Hours Just Got Easier

Version 2.0 of the PCRecruiter app for iOS and Android is out this week. In addition to giving recruiters convenient mobile access to contacts and positions, the new version adds brand new time tracking tools for contractors, giving you standardized, comprehensive, accurate records of your contractors’ time spent on the job.

With the new version, your contract placements get a secure and simple way to clock in and clock out, including logging their breaks and tracking their expenses with integrated receipt scanning. Convenient push notifications in the app let you send a nudge to those contractors who need a reminder to submit their hours, and location services integration helps you verify their workplaces.

More Time Making Placements; Less Time Chasing Timesheets

The PCRecruiter app helps you not only collect more accurate and prompt timesheet data from the contractors you place, but it also makes it easier to approve and report on those submitted work hours without worrying about lost or late submissions.

As always, PCRecruiter users can check the status of timesheets for contractors currently on assignment. You’ll know whose timesheets have been submitted, whose are ready for approval, and which ones have been approved. You can also remind contractors and managers of hours that need to be approved via templated emails or text messages. After approval, PCRecruiter’s exports to PayChex, QuickBooks, or Excel make invoicing easier.

With these new updates, PCRecruiter helps you spend less time and effort on managing timesheets while offering your contractors a convenient, easily understood way to submit their hours. Talk to one of our consultants about version 2.0 of our mobile app and all of our contractor timesheet features today.

Review PCRecruiter — Get a $25 Amazon Gift Card

Thank you to those who have already submitted their reviews of PCRecruiter at G2! They have very few gift cards left to share with verified reviewers, so please post your review of PCRecruiter at this link soon.

Thanks to reviewers like you, PCRecruiter was listed in the Leader segments for the Staffing and Applicant Tracking Software market spaces and as a Momentum Leader in the CRM space and High Performer in CRM and ATS spaces on G2’s Fall report. We look forward to seeing your opinions counted in the next round of reports from G2 this winter.

To make sure you’re getting the most out of PCRecruiter, our training and technical experts are offering a new series of free webinars in November.

The PCRecruiter team wants to help you build more productive relationships with your clients and MPCs (Most Placeable Candidates) while effectively tracking performance for your team. To make sure you’re getting the most out of PCRecruiter, our training and technical experts are following up the release of our new Learning Management System with a new series of free webinars.

The PCRecruiter Tutors series will cover helpful topics and new developments that can make you a more successful recruitment, staffing, or HR professional.

As always, personal training sessions with our team can be scheduled by emailing support@mainsequence.net

Upcoming Sessions

ALL SESSIONS on TUESDAYS at 1:00 PM Eastern
Recordings of all sessions will be available to all registrants.

NOVEMBER 3
“PCRecruiter for Gmail”

Learn about all that the PCRecruiter add-on for G Suite has to offer. If you’re a Gmail user and haven’t taken advantage of this free utility yet, this session is for you!

NOVEMBER 10
“Configuring & Sending Candidate Presentations”

Learn about the most powerful tool for submitting Candidates to Clients. We will dive into the available settings as well as the easy sending process for users. We will then take a look at it from the Client side, how the Resume will look to them, and how they can easily submit feedback.

NOVEMBER 17
“Configuring & Viewing the Analytics”

This webinar will focus on configuring the PCRecruiter Analytics and viewing them. Please note that the Analytics is an add-on feature which may not be available on your particular account. The Analytics are highly configurable and dependent on your specific use of Activities and Pipeline records.

NOVEMBER 24
“PCRecruiter Database Cleanup”

Join the team to learn the most effective ways to clean up your PCRecruiter database and rid yourself of old or incomplete data. We will discuss merging duplicates, running an inactive candidate report and more!

DECEMBER 1
“Using Rollup Lists”

Attend this PCRecruiter webinar to master working with Rollup Lists. We will cover setting up and using Rollup Stages, Quick Comments, Ranking, Planning and more!

PCRecruiter Tutors Sessions

Previous sessions in this series can be viewed at https://learning.pcrecruiter.net/site/webinars, including topics like:

Adding and Managing Records
Activities, Scheduling, and Tracking User Activity
Bulk Emailing and Email Campaigns
Customizing Layouts and Copying Settings
Importing Spreadsheets
PCR Capture
Reporting
Searching and Creating Rollup Lists
Setting Up and Using RingCentral
Using the Pipeline
Using the PCR Portal for MS Outlook
Working with Resumes

The PCRecruiter LMS

The award-winning PCRecruiter service team announces a new addition to our portfolio of training services and resources: The PCRecruiter Learning Management System. The PCRecruiter LMS will connect our users with the educational tools they need to get the best results out of the system. Now available to all users.

The award-winning PCRecruiter service team is always ready to help customers meet their goals in recruiting and staffing. Recognizing that even the most well-honed tools require well-honed skills, this week we’re excited to add a brand new element to our portfolio of training services and resources: The PCRecruiter Learning Management System.

The PCRecruiter LMS connects our users with the educational tools they need to get the best results out of the system and helps managers achieve learning goals for their teams. The courses offered in the LMS will help you advance your skills and your career through more effective understanding and use of PCRecruiter.

The LMS platform covers basic, advanced, and admin-level skills.
The growing list of topics range from “new user” fundamentals to more advanced courses in searching, reporting, and database management.
Most lessons include instructional videos and interactive step-by-step tutorials that let the user walk through the procedures as they learn.
Courses include regular checkpoints and conclude with short assessments to help measure mastery of the material.
Passing assessments leads to digital certificates that recognize achievements along the way.

The PCRecruiter LMS is now available to all current users at no added charge! Watch your inbox for an invitation email in the coming week. Our support team will be adding new courses and updating existing ones continually, and we also plan to offer a webinar on using the LMS in the near future.

We hope the PCRecruiter LMS will become a regular part of your team’s professional development and that it will contribute to your continued success.

If you have any questions, contact lms@mainsequence.net

Review PCRecruiter — Get a $25 Amazon Gift Card

The new Fall reports from G2 are out, and PCRecruiter continues to stand proudly in the Leader segments for the Staffing and Applicant Tracking Software market spaces, particularly when it comes to companies with 50 or fewer employees. PCRecruiter also ranked as a Momentum Leader in the CRM space and High Performer in CRM and ATS spaces. These rankings are based entirely on independent reviews from recruiting and staffing professionals like you, and we deeply appreciate your comments and feedback.

We want to see your opinion counted in the next round of reports from G2 this winter. We encourage you to post your review of PCRecruiter at this link. G2 is offering a limited number of $25 Amazon gift cards for verified reviews from our users, so we suggest you post yours soon!

PCRecruiter is pleased to announce “The Recovery is ON! Here’s What to Do NOW!” – a free webinar from Mike Gionta of The Recruiter U. This event will take place via Zoom on Wednesday, October 7 @ 12:00 PM Eastern. Reserve your space now to hear about taking advantage of a re-opening economy.

PCRecruiter is pleased to announce The Recovery is ON! Here’s What to Do NOW! – a free webinar from our partner The Recruiter U. This event will take place via Zoom on Wednesday, October 7 @ 12:00 PM Eastern. Reserve your space in advance.

Are you positioned for the recovery?

The Recruiter U has been measuring effort and results with over fifty clients for nearly five months. They’re confident that the recovery is well underway, based on predictive indicators that are all positive. Curious about what those key metrics are? Learn about them in this complimentary webinar presented by Mike Gionta, founder of The Recruiter U, and sponsored by PCRecruiter.

Mike has been in the trenches with clients the past few weeks and knows what is working. The Recruiter U’s clients are getting retainers, making placements and even hiring new recruiters right now. Why? They’re seeing results and preparing for “the bounce!”

“We are clear on what a path out looks like for recruiters,” says Mike. “Our coaching team has been through a combined eight recessions in this industry and, yes, this one is different… actually they are all different! Getting out follows similar actions.”

In this complimentary training he’ll share:

A 90-day Path Forward to be positioned to thrive as the virus continues to subside.
3 Specific Strategies you can you use to get business now.
What you can do now to take advantage as we re-open the economy.
How to Manage & Motivate your recruiting team.
Planning Strategies for a historic 2021.

Take some time out of your afternoon on October 7 at 12:00 Eastern for this informative session.

Get $10 – Review PCRecruiter before October

SourceForge wants to hear what you think of PCRecruiter. They are offering a $10 gift card to the first ten users who submit a review of PCRecruiter by October! Use this link to submit your brief review of PCRecruiter before the month ends. We appreciate you telling the world about PCR!

Jobs on Facebook is a great way for businesses to attract qualified talent where they’re already spending their time — on Facebook and on mobile. We are pleased to announce a new time-saving option for posting to Jobs on Facebook directly from PCRecruiter. The Jobs on Facebook integration is offered at no additional cost.

Increase Visibility for your Jobs

When posted, Jobs may appear in multiple places on Facebook, including your business’ Company Page, via Notifications, in Groups, in Marketplace, and the News Feed. The job will also be visible in Facebook’s site-wide job search engine at FB.com/jobs.

Applicants Direct to PCRecruiter

When a jobseeker clicks on the Apply Now button, a form opens that pre-populates the candidate’s information for a fast and simple apply experience. The application may contain the job history and other existing information available in the candidate’s Facebook profile, which they can edit prior to submission.

Applicants from Jobs on Facebook are added to your PCRecruiter database as new Name records in your Default Company and are automatically linked to the Pipeline for the job(s) they’ve applied to.

Any employment or education entries shared in the applicant’s Facebook application will be added to the History section of their Name record, and a resume document will be generated from their contact information and history details.

All names generated via Jobs on Facebook will be populated with “Facebook” in the EEO Source and Referrer fields.

To get started posting your jobs to Facebook, read these instructions or contact your PCRecruiter representative.

Review PCRecruiter, Get a $20 Gift Card

We have so many more new features to reveal in the coming months! If updates like these are helping you be more successful, please take a minute to share your opinion with G2 or Capterra. Both of these sites are offering gift card incentives for your review right now, but it’s is a first-come-first-serve limited offer so please write yours soon!

Announcing PCRecruiter for Gmail

Announcing PCRecruiter for Gmail, which joins PCRecruiter for Outlook in the arsenal of tools to help you access and enter data more quickly and accurately. Whether you’re a solo recruiter or part of a team, you’ll work more effectively without wasting a second on switching screens or running searches. You’ll create contacts more quickly, without errors or duplications, and be ready to respond more promptly to any email you receive.

We know how important it is for executive search and placement professionals to maintain efficient communication and record keeping. This week we’re giving you a new way to combine the most versatile staffing and recruitment software on the market with your inbox.

Announcing PCRecruiter for Gmail, which joins PCRecruiter for Outlook in the arsenal of tools to help you access and enter data more quickly and accurately.

Whether you’re a solo recruiter or part of a team, you’ll work more effectively without wasting a second on switching screens or running searches. You’ll create contacts more quickly, without errors or duplications, and be ready to respond more promptly to any email you receive.

Making Gmail a robust recruitment CRM

With PCRecruiter for Gmail, you’ll be able to:

Automatically see contact details, activities, notes, and attachments for your email correspondents along side their email.
Create new records to your database, quickly parsing contact info from the resume header or email signature.
Update existing records with a fresh resume or contact info.
Add correspondents to Rollup Lists.
Associate correspondents with Position Pipelines.
Launch a phone call with your dialer of choice, such as RingCentral or PCR for Google Voice.
Add email attachments to contact records.
Write new Notes and Activities.
Search for Contacts in PCRecruiter.

PCRecruiter for Gmail makes it easy to take action, whether you need to enhance information, import an attachment, add contacts to lists for an email campaign, or pipelining candidates for trackable presentation and feedback from your clients.

Ready to get started? Install the G Suite Add-On and read the setup instructions in our Learning Center.

Review PCRecruiter, Get a $20 Gift Card

We hope you are as excited about this new Gmail integration as we are! We have so many more new features to reveal in the coming months! If updates like these are helping you be more successful, please take a minute to share your opinion with G2 or Capterra. Both of these sites are offering gift card incentives for your review right now, but it’s is a first-come-first-serve limited offer so please write yours soon!

G2, the largest software marketplace and review platform, has published its Summer 2020 report. Once again, PCRecruiter received high marks. G2 publishes these quarterly reports ranking applicant tracking software, staffing software, and recruiting agency software based on data from multiple sources.

G2, the largest software marketplace and review platform, has published its Summer 2020 report. Once again, PCRecruiter received high marks.

G2 publishes these quarterly reports ranking applicant tracking software, staffing software, and recruiting agency software based on data from multiple sources. They use factors such as perceived market presence, satisfaction scores from independent user reviews, and indicators of market leadership to create detailed breakdowns.

PCRecruiter is a Leader & High Performer

The Summer 2020 reports show PCRecruiter as a Leader among ATS options in both the overall and small-business (50 or fewer employees) categories. Leaders have both high ratings on G2 as well as a substantial market presence score.

PCRecruiter was also ranked a High Performer in the overall and small-business Staffing categories. This is based on our high customer satisfaction scores, which remain consistently high. We ranked particularly well in areas of customer support and ease of doing business with. In fact, PCRecruiter was ranked top-of-the-list for Easiest to Do Business With among all Staffing vendors for mid-market (51 – 1k employees) companies.

Add Your Opinions

We appreciate the kind words and accolades from our users that went into these rankings. If you’d like to have your opinion counted in the Fall 2020 report from G2, we encourage you to post a review of PCRecruiter at this link. Not only will this help people learn about PCRecruiter, we’ve partnered with G2 Gives to donate $10 on your behalf to Direct Relief. This highly-regarded non-profit provides humanitarian aid to people affected by poverty or emergencies.

PCRecruiter update v.9.7.38, released today on our hosting servers, includes new time-saving functions such as improved email notification options for our Candidate Presentations, an Export option for Auditing Metrics, and auto-copying of the street address from company records to the new jobs you create for them. Also in this blog post, find out how you can get a gift card or support a charity just by reviewing PCRecruiter.

Today we’ve released PCRecruiter 9.7.38 on our hosting servers. This update resolves a variety of customer-reported issues and also contains a few new enhancements. Here are the changes you’ll find in this version:

Candidate Presentation Notifications

When you’re setting up a new template for Candidate Presentations, you’ll now have the ability to designate conditional email contacts for the notifications, including:

The email address of the user sending the presentation.
The email address of the user (if any) who is associated with the candidate being presented.
The email address of the user who owns the relevant position (if any).

In previous versions of PCRecruiter, any email addresses to be notified were explicitly entered as part of the template setup and did not change based on the parties involved in the individual presentation. If you’d like more information about using this feature to present candidates to your clients and hiring authorities, contact one of our support representatives.

Export Auditing Metrics

The Metrics report, which is found under Reports > Auditing, can now be exported as a CSV file for sharing or further analysis in Excel. This report allows administrators to view a count of Activities completed per User in the selected date range. More advanced metrics analysis tools for individual recruiters or recruitment teams are available via our PCRecruiter Analytics feature.

Address Copies into Position from Company

When a user adds a new position to any company or organization in PCRecruiter, the city, state/province, postal code, and country are automatically copied from that company into the job record. Starting with PCRecruiter 9.7.38, the street address (Address 1, Address 2 fields) will also be copied. These fields will be filled in even if they are not visible on your position record layout. If you’d like to add them to your screen, you can customize your position record layout.

Share your opinion, get a reward!

The Spring reports from G2 (the world’s largest tech marketplace) have come out, and based on your reviews PCRecruiter proudly stands as a Leader among Staffing software options for small businesses and as a High Performer for the overall Staffing category. We’re also were placed in the Leader group in the Candidate Relationship Management category based on our high level of user-adoption, and as a Leader among ATS packages. We sincerely appreciate your praise and we look forward to sharing some exciting new features with you in the coming weeks.

Independent review websites like G2 want to know what you think of PCRecruiter and some of them are offering limited-time incentives for your opinions.

The folks at Capterra are offering a $10 gift card to the first 100 reviewers who use this link to submit a review of PCRecruiter.
Software Suggest is also offering a $10 gift card for reviews submitted to their website via this link.
Our partnership G2 Gives continues on! G2 is donating $10 on your behalf to our selected charity, Direct Relief, a highly-regarded non-profit that provides humanitarian aid to people affected by poverty or emergencies. All you need to do is post a review of PCRecruiter at this link to help us reach our $1k goal.

PCRecruiter 9.7.37 – Presentations & Themes Updates

PCRecruiter’s latest update includes two brand new color themes, an option for larger fonts, plus time-saving improvements to our Candidate Presentations and automation plan features.

Our development team is working diligently on a number of projects, and in the PCRecruiter update released this morning we’ve added some new features and made improvements both on the face of the software and behind the scenes. Here’s what you’ll find…

Candidate Presentations

Our Candidate Presentations feature, which you’ll find in the overview video above, allows you to send convenient, branded candidate data packages to hiring authorities. Not only do these Presentations help you communicate more efficiently, but with instant email notifications when your client has opened a Presentation or given Feedback, you’ll always be ready to reach out the moment you’re needed.

This update includes several workflow enhancements requested by our Candidate Presentations users, making it an even faster way to get feedback from your hiring authorities. As always, we invite your suggestions on this and other areas of PCRecruiter in our Ideas & Requests forum.

The Feedback box can now be moved, minimized, and re-sized so that recipients can more easily reference resumes and other presented data while entering their feedback.
When a Candidate Presentation contains multiple candidates, the recipient’s name and email will be retained across all Feedback boxes once it’s been entered, saving data entry time.
The Star Rating feature can be made optional or hidden entirely when a Presentation is being sent.
A new toggle has been added to the menu of candidate names when sending a Presentation which allows the user to Show or Hide the names in the list.
Candidate Presentations are now auto-labeled with the first and Last name of the candidate and a ### placeholder. The ### will be converted to a sequential number when the Presentation is sent, simplifying the process of sending of Presentations while making it easy to tell them apart within a single candidate record.
The Theme selection dropdown now displays the Primary and Secondary colors of the Presentation Themes for easier identification.
The ‘Action’ button on Presentation lists now includes options to review the sent email and to delete the Presentation entirely.
The Candidate Presentation creation and editing screens have been updated to match the users’ currently selected PCRecruiter Theme.
A ‘Preview’ button has been added to the Template editing screen, making it possible to preview changes using placeholder data.

Themes Updates

We’ve added two new brand Theme options to the ‘Change My Theme’ panel, accessible from the small gear icon at the top right corner of your PCRecruiter screen. The new Light Blue theme offers a bright alternative to our default Light Mode, while the Victoria theme brings lavender and mauve into the mix just in time for Spring.

In addition, this panel now contains a Default Font Size / Large Font Size dropdown menu, which increases the type size for any of the selected themes.

Automation Plan Scheduled Actions

PCRecruiter’s Automation Plans are a time-saving way to trigger emails, write Activities, add records to Rollup Lists and perform other tasks based on movements in the Pipeline, changes in Rollup Stage, Job Board applications, and Profile completions. In our latest update, a new Scheduled Action option appears on each item. This new feature makes Automations more flexible and useful than ever.

By default, checked tasks are performed immediately when the trigger occurs. With Scheduled Actions you may now add a delay into the process. For example, if you often sorting through candidates on Friday afternoons you may want to defer the associated automated emails until the next Monday, or you may wish to trigger a Status change after 7 days from a particular event.

The options include Number of Days (wait X days before running the automation), Day of the Week (run the automation on the next occurring Tuesday), and Hour of Day (run the automation at next 8 AM). You may combine these for more complex selections, such as “wait five days and then send this email at 7:00 AM on the soonest Monday.”

Merging Placed Candidates

One other minor change you may encounter is in the Merge screen. On occasion, a candidate that is already in your database as a Placed record may get re-added to the database with a new resume or email address via the Job Board or an import. If you attempt to merge a duplicate Name record that has a Placement with a non-placed record, you’ll see a new checkbox: “Retain Company Association and Status value from non-master record.” This checkbox allows you to keep all of the data from the newly added record as the ‘Master,’ without losing the older record’s connection to the Company or its ‘Placed’ value in the Status field.

Review PCRecruiter and Support Direct Relief

We have partnered with G2 Gives, who will be donating $10 on your behalf to our selected charity, Direct Relief. All you need to do is post a review of PCRecruiter at this link. It costs you nothing but a moment or two of your day.

Direct Relief is a venerable US-based non-profit that provides humanitarian aid in all 50 states and more than 80 countries for people affected by poverty or emergencies. They do so without regard to politics, religion, or ability to pay, and they get exceedingly high marks for how efficiently they use donations and how transparent their organization is.

By reviewing PCR at the provided link, you’ll not only help people researching recruiting and staffing software find out about more about PCR, but you’ll help us reach our $1000 donation goal. That money will go to Direct Relief’s services for outbreaks, disasters, and emergencies, plus support for community health and medicine around the world.

We hope you’ll help us in supporting this critically needed organization as we all look forward to better days ahead.

In addition to G2 Gives, we always appreciate receiving your reviews on Capterra.

Join us for a series of complimentary Tuesday/Thursday webinars at 1 PM EDT. Now is the time to sharpen your PCRecruiter skills!

As any craftsman knows, it’s important to keep your skills as sharp as your tools. Sharpen your PCRecruiter skills with these complimentary half-hour sessions!

Our training and technical experts will cover popular topics so you can build relationships with your clients and MPCs (Most Placeable Candidates) more efficiently and track performance more effectively.

As always, personal training sessions with our team can be scheduled by emailing support@mainsequence.net

PCRecruiter Tutors Sessions

You missed the live sessions, but a recording can be viewed in our Learning Center via the links below!

PCRecruiter 9.7.36 – New Styling & Themes

A bold re-imagining of the PCRecruiter UI begins with this week’s update. The refreshed styling, alternate color themes, and nav enhancements are just the beginning of a faster, more efficient, modernized PCR.

This week’s update, releasing on Wednesday, brings design revisions to PCRecruiter that improve the look, feel, and function of the system. The interface modernization you’ll find in this update is merely the first step toward a completely revised PCRecruiter UI that will be rolled out through 2020.

New Styling

You’ll see new styling that helps put the focus on your data, with clearer headings, new color highlights, revised MyPCR graphics, and fewer icons.

We’ve also taken the existing Name, Company, and Position highlight colors and extended them into Rollups, Search Results, and navigation menus. These highlights help users make more focused clicks and ease learning of the system.

Nav Improvements

The new update includes a new option to snap your Action menus to the left or right of the screen, reducing ‘mouse travel’ and making your navigation more efficient. We’ve also clarified the top/bottom frame-scaling controls, making it easier to adjust the window heights to your needs on the fly.

Color Themes

By popular demand, this release also includes user-selectable color themes. The initial round of themes include Dark Mode, Grey, and Ocean Blue, plus an alternate ‘Condensed’ Dark Mode that uses a narrower font for maximizing space on smaller screens.

More light and dark color palettes are in development and scheduled for release later this year.

We look forward to sharing even bigger changes with you! Watch for future announcement banners when you log into PCRecruiter and follow us on our social networks linked below. As always, we want to hear our users’ ideas on future updates to PCRecruiter, so please visit the Ideas and Requests Forum in our helpdesk to comment or to upvote the ideas that you like best.

Reminder: Webinar with Verified First on April 8

PCRecruiter is proud to partner with a variety of top-tier vendors, including LogicMelon, Resume Library, SenseHQ, and more. One of our long-time partners, Verified First, will be hosting a webinar on February 18 at 11 Eastern to show how their background and drug screening system works with PCR. We invite you to sign up for this informative session at https://verifiedfirst.com/2020webinar-pcrecruiter/

Review PCR and get a $10 gift card.

Get a $10 gift card for sharing your review of PCRecruiter with Capterra! Click here to get started. Limited to the first 100 reviews only!

Verified First, a provider of custom background and drug screening solutions, will host a webinar about its partnership with PCRecruiter on Feb. 18, 2020 at 11 EST. Details at verifiedfirst.com/2020webinar-pcrecruiter/

PCRecruiter’s ongoing partnership with Verified First, the premier background and drug screening company in North America, streamlines the hiring process for organizations of all sizes with the ability to validate and verify potential hires right from PCRecruiter. The interface is intuitive and designed to encourage users to comply with FCRA and EEOC laws that govern background screenings, significantly improving time-to-hire when screening candidates.

On April 8 at 11 AM ET, Verified First will be hosting a webinar to highlight best practices for background screening and to show exactly how easy it is to screen candidates.

Join this webinar to learn about:

Why your organization needs to run background checks
What can happen when background checks aren’t properly run
How the partnership saves time, requires less paperwork, and simplifies the process

To sign up for this webinar, visit https://verifiedfirst.com/2020webinar-pcrecruiter/

Happy New Year, in short and long strokes.

At our annual holiday gathering, each of us painted our own version of the same snowy night scene. The result was a series of paintings as unique as each of our clients…

There are two kinds of people: those who like to read and those for whom this very sentence is TL;DR*

PCRecruiter strives to work for all types, so we offer our New Year greeting to you in two ways:

If you don’t like to read…

The PCRecruiter team wishes you prosperity in 2020. We had a good year, and we expect next year to be even better. We are grateful for your choice of PCRecruiter, and we are continually working to bring you higher value. If you stop reading now, you will miss nothing but details.

and now the wordy version…

A blank canvas — At our company’s annual holiday gathering, each of us painted our own version of the same snowy night scene. The resulting works of art are featured in the video above.

PCRecruiter’s customer base includes a sizable number of elite salespeople, and they tend to thrive in any economy or market. From the search business, to staffing, to HR and NGO, people who must close deals to secure talent have relied on PCRecruiter for years. We are looking forward to supporting many more closed deals in 2020.

In 2019, the PCRecruiter team improved across the board in design, development, delivery, and servicing capabilities. Consequently, the current version of PCRecruiter is the best, most reliable software in our history.

We made improvements in key areas; adding comments, filters, and workflow improvements to Rollup Lists, which leverage candidate presentation and email campaign tools and associated analytics into a top-shelf recruitment platform. We added Rollups and Activities into the PCR Mobile App, and made many other interface improvements.

We also released major updates to our Job Board this year. PCRecruiter job advertising and distribution features serve tens of thousands of job openings to a growing list of websites and partners, and this activity can now be integrated with PCR Analytics via Google.

The Ideas & Requests forum on our support portal was productive in 2019, leading to improvements for attachments and preferences, plus new filtering and search tools in the Recycle Bin.

We also worked on partnerships with third-party vendors, including our integration with the Sense communication platform and several major job boards. We carefully monitor all channels for customer suggestions and ideas to improve PCRecruiter.

This year we updated our coding infrastructure and development practices to support the latest frameworks. This will allow us to deliver extensive new functionality and to re-imagine the most widely used PCRecruiter screens in 2020.

Online review sites have become critical to buyer behavior, and PCRecruiter is among the most highly rated offerings on software recommendation and review sites. Your public comments help support our ability to serve you better and for longer. We certainly appreciate every one of your reviews and encourage you to write one on G2 or Capterra if you have not done so.

To the PCRecruiter community around the globe, we extend our best wishes for a new year filled with peace, strength, and abundant prosperity!

* TL;DR = “too long, didn’t read”

G2, the world’s leading B2B software and services review platform, has released their Fall 2019 quarterly reports. These reports are based on independent reviews from users in the staffing and recruiting industry. PCRecruiter has once again received high marks and is ranked in leadership positions on G2’s Grid reports.

PCRecruiter ranked in the Top Ten for multiple factors on both the Staffing and ATS Categories. In particular, we ranked well above the industry averages for customer service, ease of doing business, implementation speed, and more.

Small staffing businesses ranked PCRecruiter as one of the Top Three vendors in regards to customer relations, and PCR was given a Top Five slot for implementation and user adoption in the Candidate Relationship Management category.

Overall, PCRecruiter placed as a High Performer and Leader in both the Small-Business Staffing and ATS grids, as a Leader in the Staffing grid, as a High Performer in the ATS grid, and was ranked Highest User Adoption among Small-Business ATS vendors.

We are honored to serve our users and we extend a heartfelt thank you to everyone for their thoughtful reviews!

If you’d like your opinion considered in G2’s next round of B2B software reporting, please visit https://www.g2.com/products/pcrecruiter/take_survey and submit your own review of PCR.

Version 9.7.33 adds Recycle Bin filtering and searching – a new capability suggested by PCRecruiter users in our Ideas & Requests forum. Also, RingCentral users must re-authenticate. Details in the blog post.

The development team has released a minor update to PCRecruiter this morning. With version 9.7.33 comes a new capability that was suggested directly by PCR users like you in the Ideas & Requests forum. We invite all of our users to offer their input on future enhancements to PCR via the forum, and to up-vote the features they’d find most helpful.

Recycling Bin Search

Whenever an item is deleted in PCRecruiter, it is moved to the Recycling Bin. The Recycling Bin is found in the Data Management area under SYSTEM. Records remain perpetually in the Recycling Bin until a user restores or permanently deletes them. Individual users can restore their own records, while Full Permission administrative users are able to see and restore records belonging to others.

With this new version comes dropdown filters for Date Range, Record Type, and User, as well as a keyword box to search by filename. As recycled records are heavily compressed to maximize account storage, keyword searching of the record contents is not possible. These new filters will make it much easier to locate records for restoration or for permanent removal.

RingCentral Re-Authentication Required

Due to a recent change made by RingCentral, all users who have a RingCentral account connected to PCRecruiter will need to authenticate again to continue using click-to-dial and activity writing functions. To do this:

Log into PCRecruiter.
Select MyPCR from the Main Toolbar.
Click on the “You are not authenticated with RingCentral, click here to login” link.
Sign into your RingCentral Account.
Authorize.

For more instruction, click here for a step-by-step tutorial on this authentication procedure.

Review PCRecruiter for a $10 Gift Card

The folks at Capterra, the leading online resource for business software buyers, are offering $10 gift cards for independent reviews of PCRecruiter. We invite you to click this link and share your thoughts about PCRecruiter and Main Sequence. This is a limited-time offer, and expires after the first 100 verified reviews or on November 20, 2019. We thank you for your time and your opinion!

PCRecruiter 9.7.30 includes improvements suggested on our Ideas Forum, including click-to-open Attachments, edit Profiles in a new tab, and Rollup Quick Comment export to CSV.

Main Sequence Technology has built PCRecruiter on our users’ suggestions from day one. Since the debut of the Ideas & Requests forum on our helpdesk, where users can share their own recommendations and thumbs-up others’ ideas as well, we’ve been able to better gauge user desires. These recommendations help our development team focus on the items deemed the most helpful to the most people.

This week’s update includes three noticeable improvements, all of which were suggested by users in the forum.

Click to Open Attachments

In earlier versions of PCRecruiter, file attachments on Name, Company, and Position records could be renamed by clicking on the Description, while the commend to open and view the attachment was located under the ‘Action’ pull-down. As of v.9.7.30, these actions have been swapped, so that the more common action of opening an attachment requires only a single click on the Description.

Edit Profile in New Window

A new ‘User Preferences’ menu was added to the system’s top right Action menu in our December 2018 update. The Open ‘PCR Action’ in new Tab section of this panel included the option to submit Profile forms using a new tab, rather than inside of a popup window on the main PCR screen. With our new update, this preference has been expanded to include editing profiles in addition to submitting new ones.

Export with Quick Comments

In our January 2019 update we introduced a ‘Quick Comments’ column for Rollup Lists. This suggestion from our forum gives users a way to jot down a short comment about any record, specific to that Rollup. In PCR v.9.7.30, this Quick Comments column is now included when a user exports the Rollup to CSV.

What would you like to see in upcoming releases? Visit the forum at help.pcrecruiter.com to add your voice to the conversation. Also, there are a limited supply of $25 Amazon gift cards left for anyone who writes a detailed review of PCRecruiter on G2, so submit yours today!

Watch this blog and our Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn accounts for bigger feature announcements in the coming weeks.

Announcing the integration of PCRecruiter and Sense! Join us 6/18 at 1:00 EDT for a webinar with Sense Co-founder Pankaj Jindal to see how PCRecruiter and Sense can work together to turbocharge your candidate experience to drive placements, increase talent NPS and drive higher engagement across your entire life-cycle.

Announcing the integration of PCRecruiter and Sense.

WEBINAR
Tuesday, June 18, 2019
1:00 PM EDT

Sense is the only end-to-end engagement and communication platform built just for recruiting and staffing. This all-in-one platform enables you to drive more revenue through personalized messaging, delivered at scale and customized with real-time PCRecruiter data.

Join us on Tuesday, June 18th at 1 PM Eastern for a webinar with Sense Co-founder Pankaj Jindal to see how PCRecruiter and Sense can work together to turbocharge your candidate experience to drive placements, increase talent NPS and drive higher engagement across your entire life-cycle.

Automated Communication That Feels Personal

Sense helps companies automatically build relationships with their candidates and clients. Sense delivers personal email and text message communications mapped to each candidate’s unique journey, then captures it in PCRecruiter. From on-boarding to redeployment, Sense automates communication for new and existing applicants and existing employees – saving time and driving up the bottom line.

More Candidates, Faster Placements

With involuntary turnover as high as 25% and redeployment rates lower than 5%, staffing and recruiting firms can no longer afford to neglect candidate engagement. Sense consistently nurtures the dormant contacts in your database to drive higher engagement, quicker placements, and more revenue. On average, recruiting teams using Sense see their candidate NPS double and for our staffing clients, their redeployment rates increase to almost 30%.

Get The Most Out Of Your PCRecruiter Data

Sense’s enterprise grade integration with PCRecruiter syncs data in real-time. Every message and response associates to the correct PCR contact record, while every PCR field is usable within the Sense platform to make your outreach relevant and timely.

Give Your Recruiters Two-Way Texting Superpowers

Texting candidates results in an average response time of under 90 seconds and reply rate of 51%. With stats like that, your team can’t afford to just being sending emails. Sense Messaging gives recruiters the ability to send broadcasts and 1:1 texts directly from PCRecruiter. And every conversation gets captured back to the candidate record – at no cost to you.

PCRecruiter 9.7.26 builds on the Rollup List improvements we released earlier this year, reducing the number of clicks needed to add records to Rollup lists, giving more useful information about records being added, and adding new navigational shortcuts to improve your workflow.

We’ve released an update today that includes further improvements to the Rollup List changes we released earlier this year. We’ve reduced the number of clicks involved in adding records to Rollup lists, tweaked the column layout to give more useful information about records being added, and created new navigational shortcuts to improve your workflow. We’ve also made some minor improvements to printing and filtering lists.

Adding Records to Rollups

When adding records to Rollup Lists, we have replaced the Name, Company, Position columns so that only the column for the type of records you’re adding is shown. In place of the other two columns you’ll see Added and Ignored.

In the example shown below, only the Name column appears and all three columns are green. If we were adding Companies, you would see dark blue. Light blue is used for Positions. These colors are used consistently on other major record screens in PCRecruiter.

We can see in the new columns that 18 Name records have been added to the “Cleveland” list, bringing the total up to 107. We can also see that one of the selected records was ignored because it was already on that Rollup.

You’ll also note that the Rollup’s name “Cleveland” is a hyperlink. With the new update, you can now jump to the active Rollup directly from this screen by clicking its link, rather than closing the Add panel and navigating to the main Rollups area.

We’ve also reduced the clicks involved in adding records to a newly-created Rollup. In this version, your currently selected records are automatically added to the Rollup as soon as you save the new list, eliminating the need to click on the new list to add the records.

Further Improvements

The Print action on Rollup Lists now prints with your custom column selections. In previous versions, only the CSV Export option used the custom layout.
The Clear Stage item in Rollup Stage popups has been renamed to No Stage.
The filter popup at the top of the Stage column on Rollup Lists now displays a number and checkbox for the No Stage item. This will allowing users to filter the view to those records which have not been given any Stage.

More great new features are in the works, as always. Share your own ideas for how PCRecruiter can improve your business in our Ideas & Requests Forum, read other users’ suggestions, and vote for the ones you’d find most helpful. We are listening!

PCR Mobile App – May 2019 Update

A new version of our free PCR Mobile app for Android and iOS is out this week, with the options to add Activities and view Rollup Lists. Plus, a new Custom Search Form is available in the Job Board.

A new PCRecruiter update, v.9.7.25 is out today. In addition to our regular improvements and bug fixes, this update also comes along with improvements to the PCR Mobile App. The app is available for FREE now on Android (v. 9.7.25106) and iOS (v. 9.7.6010), and gives you mobile access to your name, company, and position records on the go.

The new version of the app includes the ability to create Activity Records and also to view your Rollup Lists. (The ability to edit your lists from the app is planned for a future update.)

This update also includes a new Custom Form type for the Job Board, which will allow you to have a job search form on your homepage, a sidebar widget, or anywhere else in your website. When a search is run, the jobseeker will be redirected to your job board with the search results pre-loaded into view. Contact your PCRecruiter representative to discuss adding this to your website.

Lastly, you’ll notice that the alert popups indicating incomplete fields or other warnings have been re-styled.

We’ll have more updates to share in the next few weeks. Share your own ideas for how PCRecruiter can improve your business in our Ideas & Requests Forum, read other users’ suggestions, and vote for the ones you’d find most helpful.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:

A new PCRecruiter version is out this week, and the latest edition comes with updates to the PCR mobile application and the Job Board.

The PCRecruiter app, which is available for free on the Google Play and iOS App Stores, affords users mobile access to their names, companies, and positions. The app is perfect for on-the-go access to your contacts, resumes, activities, and notes.

In earlier versions of the app, Activities could be viewed but not created. In this update, you can now enter Activities. We’ve designed the new entry screen in conjunction with recent improvements to Activity entry in the main PCRecruiter interface.

If you need the Activity to appear as a calendar item, you’ll check the ‘Schedule’ box. This adds a color picker and an ‘Alarm’ checkbox to the screen. The color options match those you’ve configured for your schedule in the PCRecruiter full browser version. Checking ‘Alarm’ allows you to choose your advance warning for the scheduled event.

The ‘Followup’ box below has similar color and alarm options, and can be activated with a simple tap.

We’ve also added access to Rollup Lists into the app. The ‘Recent Rollups’ area at the bottom of the main screen displays the four most recently viewed lists. To the right, color-coded blocks show how many names, companies, and jobs are on each list. Tap the block to view the desired records, including any custom stage icons you’ve configured.

If you want to view a Rollup that’s not one of the four most recent, you’ll find the Rollup Search option in the side menu. This menu also contains the search options for names, companies, and positions, and gives you access to the PCR Analytics if this feature is active on your account.

This update also includes an additional feature in the PCR Job Board. We’ve added a new Custom Form type for building a job search form that can be displayed on your website independently of the job listing and apply screens. For example, you might want to include a job search form in your website’s homepage or sidebar. When a search is run, the visitor is taken to the job board page of your site with their results on display. To explore implementing this feature on your website, or to discuss migrating from the Classic Web Extensions to the PCRecruiter Job Board, contact your PCR representative.

Follow us on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or here on the PCRecruiter blog for all the latest news and updates, and visit the Ideas and Requests forum at help.pcrecruiter.com to share your suggestions for future integrations and features.

Candidate Presentations – April 2019 Update

PCRecruiter 9.7.24 includes a list of improvements to the ‘Candidate Presentations’ feature that we released last year, streamlining your client relationships and making your selection process even more efficient.

A new PCRecruiter update, v.9.7.24, has been released to our SaaS hosted customers. Our developers have been hard at work on many enhancements and changes to the Candidate Presentations feature that we released at the end of last year. Based on feedback from our users, we’ve made a number of improvements to this area of PCR, which allows recruiters to send their clients an attractive, branded package of candidate details and attachments, and to receive trackable feedback.

What’s new in Candidate Presentations?

Improved Template Creation
- We’ve reorganized and relabeled the Settings panel for greater clarity.
- New -/+ icons were added for adding and removing fields from the layout.
- A pencil icon has been added for relabeling fields.
- We’ve moved the Date for the attachments to its own display area at the right.
- The revised Add Header/Footer Image panel now includes options to repeat or stretch the image.
Improved Sending
- A “Create Presentation” is now available in the Action menu on the upper right corner of the Name Record, so you can send a presentation directly from the candidate’s screen in addition to sending from Pipeline and Rollup screens.
- A new yellow warning icon has been added to call out items in the Presentation that will be skipped over because they don’t contain any data for the selected record.
- We’ve streamlined the To: and From: options on the Send screen, including access to alternate email addresses for you and your client.
Improved Presentation Display
- Any included fields that contain a URL will now be clickable in the presentation.
Improved Feedback Display
- The Feedback column on the Pipeline has been made more compact, and it now displays a highlighted icon and a number when feedback is present.
- The display of the Feedback popup has been adjusted to better separate name, email, and rating. We’ve also added the Date to the panel.
- Feedback Lists now include direct links to the names, jobs, and companies involved.
- The Action button in the Feedback list now includes a View Presentation link.

If you’d like to share your ideas about how PCRecruiter can improve your business, visit our Ideas & Requests Forum to tell us what you’d like to see! Learn more about to using the Candidate Presentations in our Learning Center.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:

PCRecruiter’s Candidate Presentations feature makes it easy to send attractive, branded packages to your clients with all the key candidate details and attachments for their review, and to collect and monitor their feedback.

With the latest PCRecruiter update, we’ve incorporated feedback from our users to make presentations easier and more intuitive to create, customize, and monitor, resulting in a more efficient placement process.

The changes begin here, in the Presentation Template setup screen, where you define with simple drag and drop which items of data you want to share with your hiring authorities. We’ve streamlined and consolidated the settings panel to make options easier to identify and set – such as the enabling of resume and attachment downloads by the recipient.

We’ve also updated the field selection area to make adding and removing fields from your presentation simpler. You can use the plus and minus icons to add and remove fields from view and use the pencil icon to give any field an alternate name when viewed your client. When you’re in the Attachments area, you’ll see that the file dates have been moved to the far right, better separating them from the attachment names.

There have also been several improvements to the utility for adding header and footer images to the screen, including new options to repeat or stretch the image, giving you even more control over your branding.

Now, let’s look at the changes you’ll notice during the process of using the Candidate Presentations feature.

We’ve added a new starting point for this process. You can now choose “Create Presentation” from the Action menu on a Name record, in addition to starting from a Rollup or Pipeline as before. Once you’ve opened a presentation to send, you’ll see these new icons indicating sections that have no content – such as attachments that don’t exist for the selected candidate. These segments will be skipped over when the presentation is generated.

You’ll notice enhancements while sending a presentation as well. The ‘From’ option is now a dropdown that includes any additional aliases you’ve configured for your PCRecruiter username under System > Email Alias List. The recipient box has also been updated with a list of large, easily identifiable names. If a recipient has multiple email accounts on file, you can click here to select any alternate address. You can also make this change after selecting a recipient by clicking on the name and using this dropdown.

After the presentation arrives in the recipient’s inbox, they’ll review the info and you’ll receive an email notification that the presentation has been opened. Any fields in the presentation that contain a URL will now display a clickable link that opens in a new browser tab.

Another email notification will arrive when the feedback has been submitted, and the text of the feedback is now saved in the Activity record.

Let’s look at the changes to viewing the feedback inside of PCRecruiter.

On the pipeline, the Feedback column has been compacted into simple icons that display the number of feedback responses. Clicking on the feedback item, you’ll see we’ve upgraded the display, better separating the name, email, and star rating. We’ve also added in the date on which the feedback was recorded.

When viewing a list of presentations, either from one of the records involved or from the Overall Presentation List under the System area, you’ll see that there are now links directly to the relevant records, with easily identified color-coding for Names, Positions, and Companies. The Action button, which previously included only a link to edit the presentation, now includes an option to view the presentation as well.

These improvements came from valuable feedback provided by PCRecruiter users following the initial release of the Candidate Presentations feature a few months ago. If you’d like to share your ideas about how PCRecruiter can improve your business, visit our Ideas and Suggestions forum at help.pcrecruiter.com. Stay up to date on PCR by following us on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Our friend Mike Gionta is hosting a 4-day virtual summit from March 26-29, 2019 called the Recruiting Firm Owner Summit. Solo-recruiters and search firm owners are all welcome at this FREE series, which has been attended by just under 25,000 recruiters from 6 continents over the past ten years.

Topics include:

How to increase billings even during a bad market or recession
The secrets to breaking through your income “ceiling” and the science of getting truly rich
The art & science of getting retainers that lead to $100k clients!
How to negotiate higher fees and establish long term repeat contracts with clients
The 6 lies that block recruiting success
The 5 secrets recruiters can use to build 7 & 8-figure recruitment businesses without ever having to micromanage or get back into the tools
Success secrets from the field for solo/independent recruiters
The great techniques for sourcing candidates when you don’t have a network
The key unknown methods of how to sell contracting business to your assignments to ensure you get those assignments!
The 3 keys to consistently growing $$ for recruiters
7½ ways to ditch your clients and still increase your revenue

Remember, these tips are from recruiting firm owners for solo-recruiters and search firm owners. All 12 sessions, taking place March 26-29, 2019, are offered at no charge.

Grab your spot by clicking here.

PCRecruiter 9.7.23 adds support for creating Notes for contacts from the PCR Capture utility, along with many performance enhancements and issue resolutions. See our blog for details on this and other recent improvements.

The PCRecruiter hosted servers are being updated today with a new release that includes dozens of performance improvements and issue resolutions, covering a wide range of areas in PCRecruiter, including our Analytics, Candidate Presentations, Rollup Stages, and more.

Although this update is largely dedicated to work on our existing features, we have added one new feature with this update.

Those of you who use PCR Capture will find a new Additional Notes box at the bottom of the ‘Review Data’ step. Any text added to this box will appear in the NOTES section on the Name record.

This new feature in PCR Capture is a great way to augment new records or update existing ones with keyword-searchable details as you go about your sourcing tasks online.

This update also lays some groundwork for new partnerships and announcements to come in the next few weeks, so keep your eyes on our blog and social networks.

What other features would you like to see in our coming releases? Visit the Ideas & Requests forum in our customer support portal and get involved in the future of PCRecruiter!

PCRecruiter Update 9.7.22 – Rollup Stage Filters and Quick Comments

PCR’s new update adds the ability to filter and pre-sort Rollup Lists by the Stage column, as well as a great new ‘quick comments’ feature for Rollup records, and the option to mandate that all users use the Global Rollup Stages.

We’ve released a new update this week that includes improvements to the Rollup Lists, PCR’s versatile tool for managing lists of names, organizations, and positions. Here are the key features:

A new “Quick Comments” column can be added to your Rollup layout. Quick Comments allow the user to supplement a record’s Rollup Stage with brief notes. These notes also appear when viewing the ‘Rollups’ area of the individual record.
The number of clicks required to add a record to a list has been reduced, and even more so when adding a record to multiple lists at the same time.
A ‘Filter’ icon has been added to the top of the Rollup Stage column header. Clicking it allows the user to temporarily filter their view of the list to only the selected Stages.
Rollup Stage is now available as a primary or secondary Default Sort option when configuring your Rollup layout.
The ‘Global Rollup Stages’ released in our October 2018 update can now be made mandatory for all newly created lists. If the checkbox is disabled, users can choose whether to use the Global Stages or their own individual ones when creating new lists.
The use of the terms “Stage”, “Status” and “Description” on Rollups has been updated for consistency across screens.

Video Transcript

Rollup Lists are one of PCRecruiter’s most versatile features, allowing you to group and sort names, jobs, and organizations for a variety of purposes. This week’s update includes a set of improvements to Rollups that make them an even more convenient way to manage your contacts and positions.

The new update uses fewer steps for adding records to a list, and makes it faster to add the same record to more than one list. You’ll open up the ‘Add to Rollup’ window, and then simply click on the lists you want to add the record to. You’ll see the record count for that list go up, and a colored progress bar to keep track of which lists you’ve already put the record on.

We’ve also made some changes to the lists themselves. A new ‘filter’ icon appears at the top of the Rollup Stage column. In the popup, any Stages in use on this list will be highlighted, along with a count showing the number of records at that Stage on this list. Checking off one or more of the Stages and clicking ‘Done’ will filter your view to only the records matching your selected Stages. The filter icon changes color to indicate that a filter is active, and the filter remains active until you reload the list or remove the filter checkmarks.

You can also set your Rollup configuration to use the Stage column as the default primary or secondary sort order, so that your lists sort by Stage automatically when you open them.

The other new feature on the Rollup screen is a ‘Quick Comments’ column that can be added to your layout. This column allows you to add a brief note to the Rollup List itself for each of the records on it, supplementing your Stages. For example, if you’re using the Rollup for a calling list, you might change the Stage to ‘Attempted’ and then include in the comments box that it’s your second attempt, or that the line was busy, and so on.

These same comments are visible and editable from the Rollups panel of the record, so you can adjust or review the comments for all of that record’s various Rollups in a single location.

Lastly, we introduced a new Global Rollup Stages feature last October, allowing admin-level users to define Rollup Stage icons, activities, and automation plans that could be applied to all users in the database, overriding any per-user Stage setups. This new version includes a setting which forces these Global Stages to be applied to all new Rollups. With the box unchecked, the individual user can select whether to use the Global Stages or to continue using their own personal Stage configurations on a list-by-list basis.

Tell us what you’d like to see added to Rollups by logging into the Ideas and Requests forum at help.pcrecruiter.com. Post your ideas, or vote and comment on the ideas that would be helpful to you. Keep up to date on PCRecruiter by following us on Twitter and Facebook, joining our LinkedIn Users Group, and watching for the banner notifications inside of PCR and on your login screen.

PCRecruiter Job Board

Modern, mobile-friendly, and highly customizable. The PCRecruiter Job Board offers the flexibility and branding of a bespoke job board with the simplicity of an off-the-shelf system.

The PCRecruiter Job Board is modern, mobile-friendly, and highly customizable. Combining the fast, affordable implementation of an off-the-shelf job board with the custom flexibility of a bespoke candidate portal, the Job Board offers a straightforward applicant experience that meets your employment branding needs.

A PCR consultant will work with you to configure and format the Job Board with the right fields and features to suit your requirements. Several starter templates are available to choose from, and our designers will adjust the style and layout to match your branding. Once the Job Board is configured, easy copy/paste code frames it into your company website, where it’s also ready for action with Google Jobs, Indeed, and other job posting providers and aggregators.

Your candidates will be able to quickly find and apply to your current openings or simply submit a resume, and can use their social network login for fast and accurate data entry. The apply process can be as simple or complicated as you need it to be, and is fully EEOC and GDPR compliant.

Whether you’re designing a new website or are just looking to modernize and improve on your current job listings, contact a PCRecruiter representative to learn how the PCR Job Board can help to achieve your goals.

Common Questions

Q: Will it work with my web hosting platform?

Yes. The Job Board is hosted on the PCRecruiter server and embeds via a unique iframe+javascript combination into most web platforms, including WordPress, SquareSpace, and more. If you’re using a WordPress, our WordPress plugin makes it even simpler. Some DIY platforms such as Wix, GoDaddy Website Builder, and Yahoo Small Business may restrict embedding options. For these hosts there are alternate methods available for linking to the Job Board. We will provide you or your web designer with instructions when your Job Board is ready to be published.

Q: What does it cost?

In most cases, a one-time $250 fee covers the consultation and personalized design work. Complex application or design requirements may affect costs. Monthly fees will depend on your PCRecruiter contract. Ask your salesperson for details.

Q: I’m already using the PCRecruiter Web Extensions. How does this affect me?

Our legacy Extensions will continue to remain active for the foreseeable future, although no non-critical updates are being made to them. You may continue to use them as long as they serve your needs. However, we hope you will consider the many advantages to migrating.

How the Job Board differs from the Web Extensions:

Vastly more customizable. Practically every step of the process has configurable layouts, labels, and messaging. The Job Board can accommodate many formats and functions which were not possible in the Extensions.
Responsive design. Roughly half of all web traffic comes from mobile devices. The Job Board works on desktop, tablet, and mobile screens.
More search-engine friendly.
Allow candidates to register with a social network as an alternative to creating a PCR-specific password. LinkedIn, Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, Facebook, and Indeed – you may enable all, some, or none as you wish. You can even disable password/login requirements entirely, although this may increase the likelihood of self-duplication if you have returning applicants.
The Job Board can load resumes and attachments directly from online document storage services – DropBox, Google Drive, OneDrive.
It can work with your existing Profile forms, but it also may reduce your need for them due to its highly customizable apply/register forms.
A secure session cookie allows jobseekers to browse your website after applying / logging in and then to return to the Job Board page without having to sign back in again.
The most notable difference is in how the Job Board handles returning users and duplicates:
- With the Classic Web Extensions, a jobseeker who already existed in the database and attempted to apply without logging in first would be halted and required to log in with their password before proceeding. This could confuse the visitor or delay their application process.
- With the Job Board, PCR allows the process to go simply forward as normal if the candidate does not log in first. If the name and email or the resume are an exact match for an existing record, PCR generates an association between the two records and marks them with an icon in your search results. The PCR user can then make the determination as to whether to merge, delete, or edit the duplicate records.
- Applicants who use the same social network login or the same email/password combination for subsequent visits will not generate a duplicate record.

Video Transcript

Flexibility. Clarity. Speed. That’s what you and your job seekers expect from a Job Board, and that’s what PCRecruiter delivers. The PCRecruiter Job Board provides a straightforward, user-friendly application experience for active and passive candidates.

The Job Board is, above all, remarkably adaptable. Adaptable to any screen size or device, putting your jobs within the reach of millions of candidates on desktop, mobile, and tablet devices, and adaptable in its ability to support an infinite combination of data points in a wide array of layouts and styles to meet your employment branding needs, now and in the future. The PCR Job Board combines the flexibility of a made-to-order career portal with the smooth implementation of an out-of-the-box solution.

The Job Board is hosted on the PCRecruiter server, making it easy to embed or link to on practically any web hosting platform. And, if your site is built on WordPress, a convenient plugin makes framing-in the Job Board a snap.

A PCRecruiter consultant will work with you to define the specifications for your unique Job Board, and one of our designers will match the fonts, colors, and styling of the Job Board to blend seamlessly with your company website.

Built on industry-standard web frameworks like Bootstrap and jQuery, and integrated with secure authentication services like LinkedIn, Facebook, and Google for easy candidate entry, the Job Board is modern, mobile, and ready to meet your needs.

With the PCRecruiter Job Board in your website, you’re ready to gain maximum exposure via third-party sites like GlassDoor, Indeed, and others using PCR’s integrated posting tools, and easily shareable direct links. Plus, the Job Board supports the necessary tagging for Google indexing and Google Jobs.

A typical candidate experience begins on the job list and search page, which can be laid out in a variety of ways depending on the design of your website and the demands of your job data. If you only have a few jobs, the search can be disabled entirely, or if you have a lot, the form can be configured with any compliment of fields and filters to quickly get your jobseekers to the results that they’re after.

The appearance of the results is also totally adjustable. For example, a traditional table layout can be helpful when there are many jobs to display with a handful of details each, while a grid allows for more extensive info about each position. A list layout can offer room for longer job description excerpts, or furnish a more compact use of screen space. The complete job descriptions, along with any other fields you wish to include, are just a tap away.

Applying to a job begins with the option to use popular social networks as a shortcut to creating a record and importing contact details. The same social network can be used as a login on future visits to apply for other jobs or, if you wish, to update candidate information.

The jobseeker’s info is now in your database, and they’re presented with an application form to complete their record. This form can be as simple or as complex as you wish. Whether you just need a resume, email, and phone number, or a complete work history with attachments and references, the PCR Job Board can handle it. This form can be followed by optional job-specific profiles to help sort and qualify candidates automatically.

The process wraps up with a customizable thank-you message, and automated emails to the applicant and the internal position contacts. And of course, the Job Board meets your EEO or GDPR compliance requirements.

In addition to the complete search and apply experience, the PCR Job Board also includes a Custom Forms feature. These forms can be integrated into your website for simple resume or contact submission by candidates, or for name and company entry by business development prospects. You’ll be notified by email, and ready to respond immediately using PCR’s integrated email or phone capabilities. Like the rest of the PCR Job Board, these one-way submission forms are mobile-friendly and can be seamlessly designed to suit, whether you’ve got a professional web designer on your team or are managing the website yourself.

The PCRecruiter Job Board offers everything you need to get your positions online for candidates to view and apply to, and the implementation is simple, swift, and affordable. Whether you’re designing a new website or are looking to modernize and improve on your current candidate experience, contact a PCRecruiter representative to learn how the PCR Job Board can deliver for you.

Happy New Year from PCRecruiter

The PCRecruiter team sends you joy and goodwill, and expresses our deep appreciation of the PCRecruiter community, which no doubt includes a number of the best recruiters in the world.

2018 was a year of powerful growth at Main Sequence Technology. Our capabilities for the design, development, delivery, and servicing of PCRecruiter were improved across the board. This resulted in more frequent, more dense, and higher-quality updates, including enhancements to our Activity and Rollup utilities, new tools for Chrome with Capture 3 and Google Voice, plus calculation tools for split-desk recruiting. We also released major new features like our Candidate Presentations and Email Campaigns.

In addition to our technological progress, we implemented a great new support system this year, with improvements like online chat and the Ideas & Requests forum. These have helped us to better understand and serve the PCRecruiter community, and to plan for more exciting improvements in the coming year.

Today’s PCRecruiter is the best we have ever offered. Even this website got a makeover this year! We look forward to ‘leveling-up’ again in 2019. It’s a privilege to serve you.

To the PCRecruiter community around the globe, we extend our best wishes in this season of light that your new year will unfold with peace, strength, and abundant prosperity.

User Preferences & Google Voice (Update 9.7.21)

PCRecruiter v 9.7.21 includes a revisions to User Preferences and Security, including preferences for opening record entry screens in new tabs rather than popups, plus a Google Voice Extension for Chrome, and further revisions to the Activity entry screen.

The December 2018 PCRecruiter update includes several fixes and improvements, including follow-up improvements to the newly revised Activity entry screen (see our October 2018 update.)

The most noticeable alterations in this release are related to the User Security and Preferences features. We have reviewed the panels of the User setup screen, located under the System area, to remove and regroup items that may have become outdated or were more logically placed with similar items.

While regrouping these items, we added a new User Preferences panel to the top right menu in PCR, and moved some of the personalizing preferences there. This gives the individual user control over some options that previously required a system admin’s involvement. This new screen also has a completely new set of preferences which let the user open the Add Record, Add Activity, Add Note, Send Email, and Submit Profile screens a new browser tab rather than the usual popup window for more screen space or use of a second monitor.

We’ve also released a PCRecruiter Google Voice Plugin for Chrome that adds Dial Using Google Voice and Text Using Google Voice buttons into PCR’s dialing popup. Clicking either button allows you to launch a call or compose a text message, and then have it handed off to your Google Voice Extension while also creating an outgoing Activity record. Download the plugin from the Chrome Store and see our Learning Center for more information.

These updates began with suggestions from our users in the Ideas forum at help.pcrecruiter.com. Please log in and post your ideas or vote and comment on the changes that would be helpful to you. (And be sure to drink your Ovaltine!)

Video Transcript:

As 2019 approaches, the PCRecruiter team remains hard at work on new features and improvements, including the update we’re excited to release this week. As always, the new update includes a number of minor fixes and improvements, including several follow-up tweaks to the revised Activity entry screen that we released in October 2018.

The primary changes in this release are in the area of user Security and Preferences. Our development team has reviewed these panels of the User setup screen under the System area, removing outdated items, and moving some items from one section to another.

Non-administrative users will now find a “User Preferences” option in the menu at the top right corner of PCRecruiter. This new area gives the individual user control over a few of the personal preferences that previously required a system admin’s involvement to change. For example, the ‘Hold Sub-Navigation’ option, which causes PCR to remember which panel of the Position, Name, or Company record you’re viewing, and to continue to show that same panel as you navigate to other Positions, Names, or Companies. This can be helpful for tasks like clicking through multiple names and viewing the resumes without needing to click on the ‘Resume’ navigation item each time.

A brand-new set of preferences have been added to this screen. This column allows the user to choose to open the Add Record, Add Activity, Add Note, Send Email, and Submit Profile links in a new browser tab rather than a popup window. Using a new tab can offer more screen space to work in and affords the option to move that panel into a second monitor.

We’ve also released a new Extension for Chrome: the PCRecruiter Google Voice Plugin. Available for free in the Chrome Store, this plugin adds “Dial Using Google Voice” and “Text Using Google Voice” buttons into the Phone Dialing popup on your PCRecruiter records. Clicking either button allows you to launch a call or compose a text message, and then have it handed off to your Chrome Google Voice extension. Unlike using Google Voice alone, using the PCRecruiter Google Voice Plugin creates Activity records indicating when you called or what text message was sent.

These updates began with suggestions from our users in the Ideas forum at help.pcrecruiter.com. Be sure to log in and post your ideas or vote and comment on the changes that would be helpful to you.

Look for more updates in the coming weeks, and keep up to date on PCRecruiter by following us on Twitter and Facebook, joining our LinkedIn Users Group, and watching for the banner notifications inside of PCR and on your login screen.

PCRecruiter Update v 9.7.21 – User Preferences & Google Voice

The December 2018 PCRecruiter update includes several fixes and improvements, including follow-up improvements to the newly revised Activity entry screen (see our October 2018 update.)

Video Transcript:

These updates began with suggestions from our users in the Ideas forum at help.pcrecruiter.com. Be sure to log in and post your ideas or vote and comment on the changes that would be helpful to you.

Candidate Presentations

PCRecruiter’s latest update includes the first release of our ‘Candidate Presentations’ feature, which streamlines your client relationships and makes your selection process more efficient.

PCRecruiter’s latest update includes the first release of our Candidate Presentations feature, which streamlines your client relationships and makes your selection process more efficient.

With this new utility, you’ll be able to email attractive, branded packages to your clients containing the relevant candidate details and attachments. Clients and hiring authorities can then review the selected records and submit feedback directly to your database. Feedback can be viewed from the position pipeline, from the candidate’s record, or from the company record associated with the job opening.

You control the fields that are displayed and which attachments are included in these presentations. Three basic templates and fourteen color themes are included, which you can add your custom header and footer to, including a company logos. Custom styling is also available, and branded themes are offered upon request.

We anticipate a slate of additional capabilities being added to Candidate Presentations in the near future. Visit our Ideas & Requests Forum to tell us what you’d like to see! Learn how to use the Candidate Presentations in our Learning Center.

Also in the near future you’ll be seeing a new ‘Job Feeds’ area appearing in the Post window on your position records. This system will allow you to opt your positions into job feeds for a growing list of third-party job boards. More information about specific job boards will be posted as these new feeds are activated. If there are particular job boards you would like our team to pursue, let us know in our Ideas & Requests Forum.

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:

With PCRecruiter’s “Candidate Presentations” feature, you’ll find it easy to send attractive, branded packages to your clients with all of the important candidate details and attachments for their review, and to collect and monitor their feedback.

Your client receives an email containing a link to one or more candidates that you’ve submitted to them. These fully-configurable screens contain your selected data fields and attachments from the PCRecruiter database.

The Presentations feature comes with stock templates, which you can easily apply your company’s logo and colors to. Custom templates can be designed to suit. Contact our sales team for details.

To submit feedback, the client simply clicks the ‘Feedback’ button, enters their name and email address, and includes their notes about the presented candidate. A star rating feature is also available.

Inside of the database, the Pipeline screen indicates which candidates have feedback on file, and clicking reveals each of the submitted responses.

Responses can also be viewed under the “Presentations” tab on the candidate record, or the company associated with the job opening. Each line indicates who the candidate was presented to and for which position, who sent the presentation and when, how long the presentation remains open for feedback, when it was seen and how many times, an average of the star ratings, and a link to view the feedback comments from each of the respondents.

PCRecruiter’s Candidate Presentations streamline your client relationships for a more efficient placement process. For more information on Candidate Presentations, visit our Learning Center or contact support@mainsequence.net.

The PCRecruiter team is heading into the Thanksgiving holiday, for which our offices will be closed on Thursday, November 22 and Friday, November 23, with some new updates to our software and to our services.

You’ll notice that we’ve got an improved support chat system. The live chat icon is located both on the PCRecruiter company website and at the lower-right corner of your PCRecruiter login screen. Clicking this icon will now present you with options to route your inquiry to specific departments. This update will not only help us to expedite our customers’ requests, but it is also a step toward more efficient and powerful support options we are planning for the future.

We’ve also been seeing remarkable results from the suggestions made by PCRecruiter users in the Ideas and Requests forum. PCRecruiter has, from its very beginnings, been built on the requests and ideas of the professionals who use it. Over the past several months, this forum has proven invaluable in helping us to better understand the needs of our users, allowing for discussion and voting on their great suggestions. Dozens of the recommendations born in the forum have already been planned or implemented, and we invite you to join in the conversation.

We’ll be posting more specifics about changes in the v.9.7.20 update released this morning when we return to normal business hours next week, including the details of our exciting new Candidate Presentations tool.

To our users in the U.S., Happy Thanksgiving!

GetApp’s quarterly ATS ranking showcases the leading Applicant Tracking cloud apps in the North American market. PCRecruiter has been once again ranked in the Top 10!

GetApp research team identifies and evaluates hundreds of products, focusing on the top 10-15 cloud-based software products in the Applicant Tracking System (ATS) software category. They then creates the Category Leaders list to help business owners and decision-makers in evaluating their ATS technology options.

The ranking highlights key factors that small businesses should consider when assessing which software products may be right for them. These factors include user perception (“user reviews”), compatibility with other systems (“integrations”), mobile offerings (“mobile”), technical capabilities (“functionality”), and product security (“security”).

Check out the rankings at GetApp’s site or contribute your own review of PCRecruiter.

GetApp Category Leaders constitute the subjective opinions of individual end-user reviews, ratings, and data applied against a documented methodology; they neither represent the views of, nor constitute an endorsement by, GetApp or its affiliates.

PCR Update v.9.7.19 – New Activity Screen & Global Rollup Stages

PCRecruiter’s new update this week comes with a revised ‘New Activity’ window and the ability for system admins to define database-wide Rollup Stage configurations with per-task icons and automations.

A new update will be rolling out on the PCRecruiter servers this week. In addition to our usual fixes and improvements behind the scenes, this update includes some noticeable new features and improvements:

The New Activity screen has been redesigned to include:
- The same action shortcuts that you see in the ‘Recently Viewed’ records area on the main search screens.
- A link to view the Schedule.
- A ‘Duration’ dropdown to give scheduled items a time slot.
- More convenient access to the color and alarm items for scheduled items.
- Option to generate a separate Activity for follow-ups.
- Option to schedule follow-ups onto other users’ calendars.
- A reworked configuration panel with improved default options and color labeling/ordering tools.
A new Global Rollup Stage Icons panel under SYSTEM:
- This allows admin users to define Rollup Stage icons, activities, and automation plans to be applied to all users in the database, overriding any per-user stage setups.
- The Global Rollup Stages also come with a ‘Function’ dropdown so that different groups of stages can be configured for different purposes.
URL Tel: Protocol support:
- A new ‘Hyperlink’ option has been added to the configuration icon by the phone number on records in System > Users.
- When active, clicking the ‘Phone’ icon by any number in the name, company, or position record will launch the default Tel: software on your computer (Skype, etc.) Windows 10 users: see ‘Choose a default app for each protocol’ in your Start menu to define your machine’s Tel: app.
“Greener is Greater” coloring in Lucene keyword search results:
- Databases configured with the Lucene Search Engine will see green shading on keyword search results, indicating strength of the match to the search query.
- To see if your database is using the Lucene, check the upper right corner of the Advanced Search screen for the label “Keyword Version: Lucene.” Contact a representative for more info.
Contractor Module updates:
- A new Timesheet Payroll View toggle appears in the ‘Contract Hours’ list view. This toggle switches between the standard view of contractors currently on assignment and the new view of contractors currently due for payroll.
- The Paychex CSV output now includes the Position Id.

This change was made based on feedback from our users. We invite you to make your suggestions and vote on others’ ideas in the features forum at https://help.pcrecruiter.com

VIDEO TRANSCRIPT:

This week we’re releasing a fresh update to PCRecruiter, and our users will be able to take advantage of some helpful improvements. Let take a look at what’s new:The most noticeable changes are in the Add Activity window.

We’ve carried over the ‘recently viewed record’ card layout from the Search area to the top of the Activity panel, giving you the same data points and shortcut icons to send email, link to a position, and so on. This convenience will be especially helpful to users who immediately open a fresh activity when making or taking a phone call. A new shortcut link to view your schedule has been added as well.

The interface for adding scheduled items has also been streamlined. A ‘Duration’ dropdown has been added so that you can set a designated time slot for Activities correlated to scheduled events. The tools for selecting a color code and reminder alarm for your scheduled items have been moved so that they appear directly along side the time and duration.

The process of creating a follow-up activity has been made simpler as well. The same duration and alarm tools have been included here, and new options have been added which let you generate a separate Activity for the follow-up, and schedule that follow-up for one or more other users in the database.

The Share Activity panel allows you to duplicate the same Activity to other contact records in the database and to email a copy of the Activity text to that person as well.

The configuration panel for the Activity window has also been updated. You can now define the labels and order of your Schedule Event color codes from here – a panel that was previously only available on the Schedule screen itself. This panel also allows you to set default options for your new Activities and follow-ups to save data entry time when it counts.

One final change in the Activity window will be helpful to those of you who use Skype or other phone applications that recognize the TEL protocol from web links. A new ‘Hyperlink’ setting has been added to the user’s Telephone Settings, found by the contact phone number in each user record. With this toggled on, clicking the phone icons from your contact records will not only launch the Activity window as always, so that you can record the details of the call, but it can now hand off the selected phone number to your computer’s designated phone app for automatic dialing.

This update also brings improvements to the Rollup List stages. In previous versions, the names, colors, icons, and activities for Rollup Lists were set up on a per-user basis. Now you’ll find a Rollup List Global Stage Setup under the System area. The Rollup configurations made here will be applied consistently for all users in the database. In addition, you can create separate Stage configurations for different Functions like Marketing, Sales, Development, Recruiting, and Sourcing. Once these Rollup Functions are configured, they’ll appear as a new option when you’re creating or editing a Rollup, giving that list the stages and automations that you need for performing that type of task.

In addition to these major changes, and of course our continual performance enhancements and fixes behind the scenes, PCRecruiter databases configured for the Lucene search engine will now see new coloring on keyword search results. This “greener is greater” color coding shows records in which your selected keywords appear more frequently and closer to the top of the document with a darker green, while those results that don’t match as strongly will appear with a lighter green.

We’ve got a lot of other new features on the way before the end of 2018, many which have been suggested by users like you in the Forum at help.pcrecruiter.com. Be sure to log in and post your ideas, or vote and comment on the ideas that would be helpful to you. Keep up to date on PCRecruiter by following us on Twitter and Facebook, joining our LinkedIn Users Group, and watching for the banner notifications inside of PCR and on your login screen.

July 2018 Update

PCRecruiter will be updated this week with a revised interface for finding and opening Rollup Lists and a new ‘Rollup Rank’ option for star-ranking names, companies, and jobs. We’ve also given the login screen a face-lift and released a brand new company website.

Main Sequence is thrilled to have released our brand new website today! We applaud our designer and the technical team for their hard work on this project over the past several months.

In conjunction with the new site, you’ll also be noticing an updated look to the PCRecruiter login screen, as well as the popup banner that appears in PCR when new announcements like this one are posted.

In addition to the website launch, we released a new PCRecruiter update on Wednesday, July 18.

The video above details some of the most noticeable changes you’ll see in this update, including a simplified way to navigate to your desired Rollup Lists as well as a new Rollup Rank star-rating column for your candidates, job openings, and clients or departments.

What do you want to see changed or added in PCRecruiter? Visit our forum at https://help.pcrecruiter.com to share and up-vote ideas. Our team is listening!

Video Transcript

PCRecruiter has been updated with a fresh slate of fixes and performance enhancements this week, and as always, we’ve added in some helpful new features as well. Let’s roll through the changes you’re going to notice.

The biggest changes in this release can be found in the Rollups area. We’ve revised the interface for finding and opening your lists, making it clearer and easier to use.

You’ll notice that the boxes for switching between your Recently Viewed Rollups and All Rollups are gone, and have been replaced by a simplified search bar across the top. The extra horizontal screen real estate has been used for displaying the date on which each list was created and the system’s unique code associated with that list. We’ve also added color to the three columns that display the record counts for your lists to help them stand out. As always, clicking anywhere within the colored boxes will load your desired records.

The search bar works like it always has, but it is now presented on the screen even while viewing your recently viewed lists. Just enter the name of the list, filter by category or usernames if you wish, and search. You’ll notice that you’re automatically switched to the ‘All Rollups’ view when the results appear. You can use this toggle to change back to the recently viewed lists.

The next big change you’ll find is the new Rollup Rank option, which can be helpful in organizing and prioritizing records in relation to a given project. We’ll start by using the ‘Configure’ action on any Rollup screen. In the layout panel, we’ll add the new Predefined: Rollup Rank, and drag it into place. Then we can save and close the configure panel.

Now when we view any list, the Rollup Rank column appears. Hovering over the five stars selects a percentage and clicking saves that desired rank. You’ll be able to see and edit this same ranking while looking at the Rollup panel from the individual record. This same ranking will be visible to any other user who also has the Rollup Rank column in their layout.

We have the option to preserve these rankings when copying or moving a record to another Rollup. A new checkbox appears at the top of the “Move to Rollup” and “Copy to Rollup” windows. If left unchecked, the record will have an empty ranking on the new list it’s been copied or moved to.

Let’s look at one more minor improvement that’s been made in this area. We’re going to open a list of Positions and use the Configure action to change the column layout. We’ll click to set a new field, and then search for “Interview” in the dropdown. There are “Current Count” and “Total Count” options for each of the Pipeline screen’s main Interview Types. These columns are not new in this version, but what is new is that the column header now displays whether it’s a Current Count or a Total Count column. This will be helpful for those of you who are displaying both kinds of counts in your layout. These same changes apply if you’ve added these Count columns to your Position search results layout.

Outside of the Rollup improvements, here’s what else you’ll see in this release:

The Duplicate Names Report, found under the Reports menu, now includes duplicate check criteria for First Name, Last Name, and Cell Phone, as well as Last Name and Cell Phone. And in case you missed it in the update earlier this year, you can also run a duplicate check on a specific Rollup list.

Also, a new “No Permission” option has been added to the “Attachments” security setting for names, companies, and positions. In previous versions, a user’s security settings could prevent them from deleting attachments, but could not prevent them from accessing them. This new option removes the Attachments navigation options from the screen.

We’ve got a lot of other new features on the way this summer, many which have been suggested by our users in the Forum at help.pcrecruiter.com. Be sure to log in and post your ideas, or vote and comment on the ideas that would be helpful to you. Keep up to date on PCRecruiter by following us on Twitter and Facebook, joining our LinkedIn Users Group, and watching for the banner notifications inside of PCR and on your login screen.

Along with various fixes and improvements released this morning, PCR now automatically writes an Activity when a record’s Stage is changed on a Rollup. Users may disable this function from the Stage Configuration panel.

This morning our ASP service was updated with a new release that includes a number of fixes and improvements. Along with these routine maintenance items, we’ve adjusted the way Activity records work with Rollup Stages.

As of this update, changing the Stage icon on Rollup List will always write an Activity to the record involved. The text of the Activity will include the details about which Rollup the change was made on and which Stage was set.

Users may disable the new Activity writing for any Stage by adjusting the configuration of their Rollup Stages. See the documentation for making this change at https://learning.pcrecruiter.net/configuring-rollup-stages

This change was made based on feedback from our users. We invite you to make your suggestions and vote on others’ ideas in the features forum at https://help.pcrecruiter.com

PCR update 9.7.17 rolls out this morning with GDPR compliance tools, the Email Campaign add-on, and a long list of major and minor improvements.

This morning PCRecruiter was updated with a set of improvements, fixes, and new features, including comprehensive GDPR management.

This update was particularly driven by the PCRecruiter feature suggestion forum. We value your feedback greatly, so please keep posting and voting on ideas you would find most useful – the details make the difference! This update includes substantial plumbing for future releases, including a coming Job Board update and new publishing features planned for Summer 2018.

Here is a detailed list of changes included the May 3, 2018 update:

Email

New ‘Insert Field’ options have been added. ‘Name.Photograph’ inserts a picture of the applicant, which can be helpful in Pipeline letters. The ‘Searcher.PositionList’ feature creates a clickable list of the selected positions, linking back to the Job Board.
In PCRMail, the menu icons for Compose, Get New, etc. have been relocated to the left side of the screen for easier access.
Our new Email Campaign feature, paired with our Analytics, is now available as an add-on:

Record Management

The ‘Merge’ action for Company and Name records, previously only on search results screens, is now available on Rollup List.
The Duplicate Names Report under the main Reports menu can now be run by Email Address only.
The Duplicate reports now include a Rollup filter for smaller-scale duplicate management projects.
Our new set of tools for compliance with The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) are now available for use. We’ll be hosting webinars about these features on May 7 and May 14.

Searching

When performing a search using the basic three-field search form for Names, Companies or Positions, you can now use the breadcrumb navigation link to return to the form without losing your search criteria. (This behavior was already present in the Advanced search.)
Activity Search queries are now saved for later re-use from the Action menu.

Phone Fields

In previous editions of PCRecruiter, the ‘Ex._____’ suffix for phone extensions was visible on all phone number fields. This will now only be visible for numbers that do not begin with a + and that exceed 10 digits.

System / User Management

The Copy User screen now begins without any options selected, and has a new ‘Select All’ option. A ‘Save as Default’ option has been added to save time when applying the same changes at a later date.
The options to copy Name, Company, and Position layouts have now been separated so that the layout for a single record type may be copied to other users. This also applies to copying Record Cards and Activity Defaults.
A new “Create/Update Profiles” option has been added under User Securities > Other. This new setting gives non-admin users the option to create and edit Profile forms.
The “Enable User Level Security” option has been moved to the Groups panel and has been renamed to ‘Restrict Access.’
The ‘Ignore All Security’ option for System Administrator security has been renamed ‘Full Permission’
The ‘Diversity Source List’ has been renamed ‘EEOC Source’ for clarity.

Positions & Interviews

A new Action item, ‘Copy Position’, has been added. This will generate a duplicate of the current Position under the same Company, which can be edited before saving the record.
The ‘Interviews’ tab within Name records now can be sorted by clicking the column headers.
The “Place Appointment on Schedule” option can now be given a default setting to save selecting it each time
Default search options can now be stored for “Link to Position” screen.
New options have been added to display ‘number of Interviews’ counts in both Position Rollup lists and Position Search Results.

Rollup Lists

On the ‘Add Rollup’ screen, we have renamed ‘Description’ to ‘Name’ and ‘Memo’ to ‘Description’ so that they match the labels used when looking at the main Rollup menu.
On the ‘Recently Viewed’ Rollup screen, hovering the cursor over the Description will now display the entire Description.

Splitdesk

A new option allows users to hide the predefined Splitdesk Types: Candidate Owner, Company Owner, Interviewer and Position Owner. This is done by un-checking “Use ownership fields on Candidate, Company, and Position Records”.

Work History

The ‘History Fields’ sections for Work History, Education, Licenses, References, and Military have been updated with a clearer and more streamlined interface in Profile forms.

PCRecruiter is ready for the GDPR

Main Sequence’s guiding principles in regards to EU Data Protection Laws are to:

Remain continuously informed about the status of actual legislation, current recommended best practices as presented by the EU government, data protection authorities, and pertinent private industry exemplars, and accomplish technical requirements associated with compliance.
Ensure that customers are offered the longest practicable lead time to make required changes and minimize business disruption, including any ongoing obligations to Main Sequence, associated with Main Sequence’s compliance, or non-compliance, with relevant EU Data Protection laws.

The Genesis of GDPR

The pertinent law, scheduled for full-effect 25 May, 2018, is EU Directive 016/679, headed “General Data Protection Regulation”. The now-standard acronym is “GDPR”. The GDPR law is presented as lengthy assembly of principles related to nearly every aspect of handling information.

The GDPR is structured around detailed and defined roles for the various parties involved with handling information. The persons that are the subjects of information (candidates, clients) are called Data Subjects. The parties that process data (recruiters) are called Data Processors, and the parties that collect and use the data (such as Main Sequence) are Data Controllers.

The GDPR rule developed in light of the previous rule, and from a political process that unfolded over the previous decade. The political sticking points involved with international data protection are inescapable when subjecting firms with varying interests, assets, and exposures to various sovereigns, and arriving at dispute enforcement mechanisms that are actually compelling of good behavior.

So far, these structures have taken the form of quasi-treaties. One that was heavily relied on by Data Processors was known as “Safe Harbor”. Safe Harbor was built around a memo of understanding between vendors and US government agencies that the vendors would reasonably respond to EU data protection authority demands.

Eventually, the EU judiciary did not find that protection to be adequate, and in ruling C-362/14, the EU Court of Justice determined that Safe Harbor would no longer suffice for compliance with EU Data Authority rules.

This decision created immediate disruption and uncertainty for hundreds of cloud vendors and thousands of customers. In response to that pressure, the EU executive body (EU Commission) issued COM 566 (November 2015), stating that Data Exporters who had executed contracts with Data Importers containing unmodified EU provided standard Model Contract Terms (and appropriate appendices) would be compliant until further notice. These contract terms are explicit and comprehensive, although enforcement remains situational.

Main Sequence’s Status as Data Controller

Main Sequence interprets section (106) of Directive 016/79 (“The Commission should monitor the functioning of decisions on the level of protection in a third country, a territory or specified sector within a third country, or an international organization, and monitor the functioning of decisions adopted on the basis of Article 25(6) or Article 26(4) of Directive 95/46/EC.”) as authorizing us to continue offering EU Model Contract Terms until at least 25 May 2018 or such time as the EU Commission no longer recognizes the Model Contract Terms as sufficient safeguards under Directive 016/679.

Along with GDPR, a successor to Safe Harbor was created. It’s called Privacy Shield. Main Sequence is a certified participant in Privacy Shield as of 20 November, 2017. That certification may be found here.

In EU Commission COM(2017) 611 (final), the Commission states that: “In its Decision of 12 July 2016 (“the adequacy decision”), the Commission found that the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield (“Privacy Shield”) ensures an adequate level of protection for personal data that has been transferred from the European Union to organisations in the U.S.”

Main Sequence is satisfied that Data Controllers may use our services in the reasonable expectation that they will be found adequate under GDPR.

A key open question of enforcement for Data Processors appears to be the question of where data must be hosted. On 16 October, 2017, The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari in the case United States v. Microsoft, which turns on the question presented to the court:

Whether a United States provider of email services must comply with a probable-cause-based warrant issued under 18 U.S.C. 2703 by making disclosure in the United States of electronic communications within that provider’s control, even if the provider has decided to store that material abroad.

On 23 March, 2018, The Clarifying Lawful Overseas Use of Data Act, commonly known as the CLOUD Act, was signed into law. The CLOUD act contains a provision that requires email service providers to disclose emails within their “possession, custody, or control,” even when those emails are located outside the United States. This law rendered moot United States v. Microsoft, which was dismissed by the Supreme Court on 17 April, 2018.

This development removes a significant potential incentive for the EU to demand in-region hosting services.

PCRecruiter Compliance

In addition to the model contract terms, Main Sequence notes the following in regard to compliance with Directive 016/679:

PCRecruiter security settings will be set to high by default
Consent management tools already exist in PCRecruiter for opt-in and opt-in renewal + status notation. These tools are being streamlined and extended for GDPR, and GDPR specific training/consulting/configuration will be available to our customers prior to 25 May, 2018.
Data portability tools already exist in PCRecruiter to download individual data records as report objects. As with consent management, these tools will be streamlined and ready for use when the law comes into effect. The data portability requirements of the GDPR, in particular, are likely to be developed by enforcement practice subsequent to the 25 May, 2018 effective date of the regulation.
Main Sequence will provide complete database return to customers upon request.
Main Sequence will report to a customer any data breach within 72 hours of discovery.
Search and sort tools to facilitate removal of no-longer pertinent data at appropriate intervals already exist in PCRecruiter.
Main Sequence will perform all minimum legal requirements for EU Data Processors, and in the event of a default by Main Sequence of any EU Data Processor requirement, Main Sequence will release any EU Data Controller customer from any future contractual obligations and /or waive any early termination fees associated with closing a PCRecruiter account prior to contract expiry.
Main Sequence will actively monitor compliance responsibilities for EU Data Processors operating in the United States and processing EU Personal Data.
Pseudonymisation is not a required technique, but may lower exposure to notification requirements in the event of a security incident. It is unlikely that PCRecruiter records can be fully pseudonymised because direct identifiers (data that can be used to identify by cross-linking through other information that is in the public domain) such as addresses, phone numbers, etc. are essential recruitment information. Pseudonymisation features may be expanded in PCRecruiter (for example, “blinded” C/V’s) or coded candidate submissions which could work to limit further interrelationships between recruitment firms and their customers as pertaining to the GDPR
Main Sequence has no role in selecting a Data Protection Officer for customers, or in acting as one on behalf of customers.
Main Sequence recognizes that our customers may require support to configure PCRecruiter for essential tasks associated with their role as Data Controllers. Important steps for Data Controllers include, but are not limited to:
- Documenting Security of Processing
- Evaluation Pseudonymisation/Encryption
- Assessment of Compliance
- Data Breach Notification Planning
- Estimating Data Protection Impact
- Identifying Data Protection Officer
- Design Data Acquisition and Maintenance for Minimum Impact
- Review/Update Processor Contracts
- Audit Record of Processing Activities
For customers requiring certification for PCRecruiter as a Data Processor, please refer to our Privacy Shield certification. For customers seeking information/training/configuration of Data Controller tools within PCRecruiter, please contact your Main Sequence sales consultant or submit a request to our online support system to schedule services.

GDPR Compliance Features

The following capabilities will be available upon request in the first week of May, 2018:

GDPR Data Fields

A GDPR tab on all name records, which contains new fields for tracking the Consent Date and Consent Purposes.

Consent Status Highlighting

Records with Consent Purpose set to Awaiting Consent or Revoked Consent are flagged in orange and are automatically opted out of all list-based email. Names that exist in the database at the time of activation will be automatically set to Awaiting Consent.

Consent Form Letters

Consent Form Letters are generated, which include ‘Insert Field’ merge tags leading the recipient to affirm or revoke consent. Selecting Deny sets the Consent Purpose field on the name to Requested Deletion.

Job Board Consent Requirement

A configurable consent agreement is added to the PCR Job Board so that all online applicants are prompted to affirm consent before proceeding to submit information.

Activity and Consent Log

The system adds New Activity types for tracking consent activity, and also adds a dedicated “Consent Log” panel for retaining all details and notes pertaining to consent collection.

Inactive Record Identification

An EUC Consent Purpose filter is added to the Identify Inactive Records panel, facilitating the location of inactive records and adding them to a list for Forgetting or other handling.

Global Change

A new Global Change option allows admin to apply consent setting to multiple records at once, such as all names that have Requested Deletion. All changes are recorded to the Consent Log.

Forget and Download

New Forget and Download action items appear for admin-level users, allowing them to relegate any single contact to the Forget Bin or to back up the record’s fields and attachments locally. An option also exists for ‘auto-forgetting’ records that remain without consent for a given period of time.

Forget Bin

Once ‘forgotten,’ a record is given an ID and sent to the Forget Bin admin area. The email remains visible in the bin only. The ID takes the place of the record in Position Pipeline history.

Our popular PCR Capture Chrome extension gets a fantastic new “PCR Match” feature in today’s update, and we’re also opening registration for a webinar with our partner Verified First.

We’ve released a brand new update to the PCR Capture plugin for Google Chrome today. This new update includes support for Resume-Library.com and a brand new feature: PCR Match. This great workflow enhancer can skim any webpage for “FirstName LastName” formatted links and tell you whether that name is already in your database. If it is, you can send an email, add to a Rollup, and more right from the page you’re on. Check out the details in this video:

PCRecruiter’s integration with IBM Kenexa Assess on Cloud puts a fantastic library of over 1000 assessments and tests at your fingertips. Check out this brief demo video to see how the system works.

The latest update for PCRecruiter includes integration with IBM Kenexa Assess On Cloud, bringing a broad range of candidate assessments to your selection or development process. Whether you’re gauging job fit, traits, or skills, PCRecruiter and Kenexa Assess can help you find the right people for any level from entry to C-Suite.

Learn how this huge library of behavioral and skills tests integrates with your PCRecruiter system in the video below, and contact AssessmentClientSupport@us.ibm.com to get started. IBM offers further detail on their website at https://www.ibm.com/us-en/marketplace/employee-assessments.

Our newest PCRecruiter update rolls out on Tuesday, February 22, including nearly a hundred fixes and improvements, along with a couple of great new integrations and features.

The PCRecruiter ASP receives a long-awaited software update on Tuesday, February 22 which includes nearly a hundred improvements and code tweaks throughout the software.

Our development team has been working tirelessly on these fixes and infrastructure projects, many of which pave the way for some big features to be announced soon. We’re happy to be able to release these changes to you today.

Although most of these changes will not be immediately apparent to our users, three of the more noticeable items are:

A new integration with IBM Kenexa Assess, bringing an extensive library of robust candidate assessments to your placement process.
A new feature for Profile Forms which will immediately store the completed form as a read-only PDF for secure archiving or easy printing/emailing.
The PCR Capture extension for Chrome has been configured to recognize data on resume-library.com.

We’ll be posting in-depth videos about these new features in the coming days, as well as announcing some more very exciting updates, so please follow us here on the blog and on our Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn Group.

The reviews are in, and PCRecruiter has earned the 2018 Top Rated award for Recruiting Software from TrustRadius.

The TrustRadius Top Rated awards are unique in that they are an unbiased reflection of customer sentiment, based solely on user satisfaction scores. In order to earn a Top Rated badge for Recruiting Software, products must be in the top tier of the category with 30 or more reviews and ratings. Every reviewer is verified and every review is vetted before publication to ensure buyers can make truly informed decisions.

According to reviewers, PCRecruiter is living up to their promise of being a trusted name in online recruiting and resume management. Usability, reporting and flexibility for a range of business models were commonly cited strengths across PCRecruiter’s 35 reviews and ratings.

Read on to see what other users had to say.

“PCRecruiter is a seamless database system that allows simultaneous contact with LinkedIn and Facebook data.”

– Executive Recruiter, Financial Services | Read the full review

“We use PCRecruiter system wide at Cerca Talent. We use it for both recruiting and sales which is difficult for most other ATSs on the market. In looking for a reasonably priced applicant tracking system with all the functions of the major players, PCRecruiter has been the right solution for us for over 10 years.”

– President, Human Resources | Read the full review

“I have used PCRecruiter (PCR) for over 15 years. If every vendor that we work with was as good a PCR my life would be a lot better. The functions of the software meet all of our needs; customer service is extraordinary, if you have a suggestion they listen!

PCR has evolved over the years to keep up with new things that are happening like social media. As stated they listen to suggestions and take input seriously.”

– Owner, Machinery | Read the full review

“PCRecruiter is used to manage both recruitment job flow and business development activity. Having started my own business and currently working independently it is essential to the bulk of my day to day activities. Being able to customise different elements of the database means that I am able to search and categorise according to what matters most to my business. New options for attaching files through Outlook has improved workflow significantly.”

– Managing Consultant, Human Resources | Read the full review

“PCRecruiter is being used across the entire organization. The main and major business problem we were able to address was the creation of a centralized database for all of our business groups to use for their clients that expand across several industries, verticals and locations.”

– Data Intelligence Analyst, Staffing and Recruiting | Read the full review

Main Sequence is honored to be included in this list and to appear among such fine company. To learn more, read this guide on how TrustRadius Top Rated works.

Some users have reported that the PCRecruiter Launcher is popping-up unexpectedly with each fresh log-in and with the use of any Launcher control (document editors, schedule alarms, etc.) We have found that the issue is confined to the Chrome browser, and will be resolved by an upcoming Chrome update.

UPDATED JAN. 24: The latest update for Google Chrome is now out, and has resolved this issue. Chrome will update automatically, but if you would like to prompt an immediate update, visit the Help > About Google Chrome panel in your browser’s menu.

Some users have reported that the PCRecruiter Launcher is popping-up unexpectedly with each fresh log-in and with the use of any Launcher control (document editors, schedule alarms, etc.)

After analysis, we have found that the issue is confined to the Chrome browser. The issue is due to Chrome’s failure to adhere to the pop-up preference selection, which should suppress that message if users select the option after the initial use of the Launcher or control. This issue affects all pop-up windows in Chrome (including those unrelated to PCRecruiter) on Windows, Mac, and Linux.

A fix for this issue, which has been detailed by Google as Chrome won’t remember custom protocol associations, has been added to the next release of the Chrome browser (v.64). The production fix is scheduled for approximately January 23, 2018. Details on the release schedule for Chrome can be found here.

The beta version of Chrome, which now contains the fix, can be found here. Main Sequence does not advise the use of beta versions of any browser with PCRecruiter whenever practical. While the current issue is annoying, it does not involve security compromise or a potential for data-loss at this time.

We regret any inconvenience, but please note that the issue is outside of our control.

Happy New Year from PCRecruiter

The PCRecruiter team extends our best wishes for the coming year and our highest regards to all of you! We hope that 2018 brings you prosperity beyond your tallest estimates and great bounty of all that money can’t buy!

It’s that joyful season again. The PCRecruiter team extends our best wishes for the new year and our highest regards to everyone in our audience. As we approach New Year’s Eve, we enter our 20^th year of serving staffing, perm placement, and direct-hire markets for talent acquisition technology around the world. 2017 was a fine vintage, with many of our customers appearing on “top” lists as leaders in their spaces, and PCRecruiter looking better than ever to industry analysts and software review sites.

In 2017, PCRecruiter released our comprehensive Analytics module, a new platform for complex split transactions, a revamp of the whole placements function, and added lots of new timesaving features into the PCR Portal for MS Outlook, PCR Capture Chrome Extension, and throughout PCRecruiter in general.

We also supported a number of new top-shelf integrations this year including Textkernel, Verified First, TextRecruit, LogicMelon, Seek, Indeed, and more. To more quickly respond to end-user needs we added the in-app notification banner and the PCR Canvas for development feedback. We also completely replaced our online service system at help.pcrecruiter.com, including a new Ideas & Requests forum.

In 2018 we are planning to announce even greater enhancements to PCRecruiter’s emailing, job posting, mobile access, analytics, and more.

We hope that 2018 brings you prosperity beyond your tallest estimates, and great bounty of all that money can’t buy!

PCR’s new integration with Textkernel reinforces our native full-text search engine with deeper search and smarter matching capabilities based on the content of your resumes, job descriptions, and other keyword-rich content.

Main Sequence is pleased to announce our integration with Textkernel, reinforcing our native full-text search engine to empower recruiting, staffing, and sourcing professionals with deeper search and smarter matching capabilities based on the content of their resumes, job descriptions, and other keyword-rich content.

Textkernel’s parsing software and its semantic search, sourcing, matching and lead generation tools will transform the way you’re doing business and help grow your business exponentially.

Check out the overview video below, and contact Textkernel for more information on getting started with Textkernel!

What other integrations and new features would you like to see? Log into the https://help.pcrecruiter.com support system and use the Forum to tell us, and to up-vote your favorite suggestions from other users.

PCRecruiter’s new update includes a ‘selected text’ parser in PCR Capture, a new way to navigate between names in the same company, integrations with Verified First and Logic Melon, plus a new user ideas forum.

Holiday Training Special

Our training team is offering a special Holiday Training Special. Book time with our training staff from now through December 31st at a discounted rate of $75/hr, or purchase a block of four hours for $60/hr. This promotion has been very popular in previous years, so we recommend taking advantage of the offer!

The Main Sequence team is back from the Thanksgiving holiday and we’re pleased to announce some handy new features and powerful partner integrations with Verified First and LogicMelon in PCRecruiter!

In the video below you’ll learn about the new “Linked” option on Name records which loads other names from the same company/organization record. You’ll also see the new “Capture Selected Text” feature in PCR Capture that parses contact info from any screen text you highlight.

We’ve also enabled a new Ideas and Requests Forum in our support ticket system where users can submit their suggestions to our team and vote or comment on others’ ideas.

Background Screening with Verified First

We’re streamlining hiring processes by partnering with Verified First, the premier background and drug screening company in North America. This partnership brings organizations of all sizes the ability to validate and verify potential hires right from PCRecruiter. The interface is intuitive and designed to encourage users to comply with FCRA and EEOC laws that govern background screenings, significantly improving time-to-hire when screening candidates.

Once the fast and easy integration is set up, you’ll see a button below the email address on all name records. Clicking the button passes the candidate’s contact info into the Verified First browser plugin. From there, you can initiate your desired package for all sorts of checks and screens. The Verified First integration comes with no setup or monthly fees, and you’ll only be charged when you order screening. Find out more at https://verifiedfirst.com/partner/pcrecruiter/

Job Multi-Posting through LogicMelon

And we’ve revised our integration with LogicMelon, an award winning platform for posting jobs to multiple destinations, including over 2000 free and paid posting job boards, social networks, and niche websites. Check out the demo video below, and visit LogicMelon.com for more on this service’s capabilities, job boards, and pricing.

New Update: Split-Desk Features

This week’s update includes all-new features for dividing credit and commission for placements between multiple users (split-desk), as well as other tweaks and fixes. Check out our update blog post for complete details.

PCRecruiter has a new update this week, with plenty of tweaks and fixes “below the waterline” as usual, plus some noticeable improvements for system users.

All new in this release is a series of tools for managing split-desk recruiting and staffing, where multiple users can split credit for apportioning money commissions or performance measures. These are further refined by the main PCRecruiter record types of organizations, jobs, and people.

These new tools will help you automate the divvying up of activity to make calculating your commissions and incentive plans much easier.

In addition to the user activity credit and fee splitting enhancements, we’ve also made several other changes:

We’ve made improvements to our CV parsing for Latin America. This update enhances the Add Resume screen’s ability to better recognize and segment multi-part first and surnames, and other parts of the contact data. We continue to improve our parser as we encounter resumes and CVs of varying contact info formats.
The company / organization record in PCRecruiter has a legacy “Email/WWW Address” field, which can be used for storing either the company website or a general email address.Users have asked us for an easy way to separate these items out into two fields, so we’ve added a new Split Company Email / WWW Field item to the Global Change area in the System menu. This new utility will allow you to migrate all of the email addresses or all of the web addresses from the standard field to a Custom Field of your choice.
Our PCRCapture plugin for Google Chrome is now equipped to recognize Monster-formatted contacts.
The customized Placement screen layouts can now use Horizontal Splitters. These splitters can also be labeled, giving you the ability to break down the placement screen into clear workflow steps (e.g. “1. Complete this segment and Save before proceeding.”)
This quarter, Main Sequence implemented a new customer service system, enhancing the capabilities of our award-winning support team to search, merge, and fine-tune tickets and customer communications. These tools will increase our ability to identify, and successfully fulfill customer requests more quickly and conveniently.
We’ve also implemented systemic changes to further strengthen PCR’s commercially-high standard of security. These include changes to session authentication procedures, which integrate both local and network-based authenticators. Many security organizations recommend a value of 30 minutes or less of inactivity before automatic log-out, although many users find that interval inconveniently short. The default value is currently 180 min and can be adjusted by your database administrator within the System > Global Timeout area.Please also note that customers are responsible for final configuration of user-exposed security options, such as password strength and end-user permissions. If you wish to review PCRecruiter security settings or schedule a training session on the topic, contact Main Sequence support.

Please get in touch below if you have comments about this update or related topics you’d like to discuss.

And if you’d like to tell us a bit more about yourself and what you get out of PCRecruiter in general, we’ve got a user survey here. Your ideas can be rocket-fuel for tech companies, so please pour it on!

PCRecruiter has once again been ranked a top-ten choice in the Applicant Tracking Software category guides from Capterra and GetApp!

These sites are two of the B2B software industry’s leading directory / recommendation engines. They release regular reports based on user-submitted reviews, feature breakdowns, pricing, integrations, and other factors.

This quarter, GetApp’s Top Applicant Tracking Software list has ranked PCRecruiter in the top ten. The position is based on the strength of ratings from our users and our competitive stance in the mobile app for iOS/Android category.

On the Capterra site, PCRecruiter was included in the top ten Most Affordable Applicant Tracking Software list. Our cost of ownership was favorable compared to other ATS options, based on a hypothetical 2-user, 2-year license with the complete host of available features and services.

Main Sequence truly appreciates the recognition of PCRecruiter’s great ROI and comprehensive range of functions from these valuable independent services.

We invite all of our users to write their own review of PCRecruiter on Capterra or GetApp so that your opinions and experiences can be included in future rankings!

New Features for Contract/Temporary Placements

Our new update this week includes a new margin estimating calculator, the ability to view contract placement data in the PCRecruiter Analytics engine, and a shorter workflow for creating temp-to-perm placements.

A new update to the PCRecruiter system will be rolling out this week, with a focus on streamlining and improving contract recruitment and temp-to-perm placement processes. The new features you’ll find in this release include:

A margin calculator that can be added to your custom Placement record layout. This new tool makes it easy to work out estimated revenue, costs, and profit.
The PCRecruiter Analytics tool can now display contract placement data to help you maximize efficiency and set goals more accurately.
We’ve shortened the workflow for converting contract placements to permanent placements.

Check out the video below to see all of these great new features in action!

We want to know what you think about the new update. Get in touch via the comments below. And if you’d like to tell us a bit more about yourself and what you get out of PCRecruiter in general, we’ve got a user survey here.

PCR Capture Update 2.3

This week, we’re releasing a new version of our PCR Capture Extension for Google Chrome, the browser plugin that makes importing and updating contacts from social networks and other sites a snap.

This week, we’re releasing a new version of our PCR Capture Extension for Google Chrome, the browser plugin that makes importing and updating contacts from social networks and other websites a snap. The new version 2.3 features a variety of speed improvements and bug fixes, as well as these great enhancements:

Improved workflow and interface for duplicate contact detection.
You can now add your captured contacts to any Rollup or Position pipeline on-the-fly from Advanced mode.
When updating a contact that’s already in PCRecruiter, you can now tell Capture to keep the name under the current company from the database, regardless of the company info parsed from the web.
Improvements to recognition of non-English names.
Access to the ‘Country’ field during contact data review.
A ‘minimize’ option on the Capture panel.

PCR Capture 2.3

We want to know what you think about the new update. Get in touch via the comments below.

And if you’d like to post a general review of PCRecruiter for public consumption, Capterra is offering a $10 Amazon gift card to the first 10 reviews submitted. Post your review here.

New Preference: Hold Sub-Navigation

A new User Preference in this week’s update saves time when moving from record to record by automatically loading the most recently accessed area of that record type.

Main Sequence will be releasing a new update on our PCRecruiter hosted servers this week. As always, we’ll be making a variety of fixes and improvements to the speed and functionality of the system, but we wanted to draw your attention to a new workflow enhancing user preference.

Hold Sub-Navigation

A new preferences option called Navigation Configuration has been added. To reach it:

Click ‘System’ in the main menu.
Select ‘Users’
Select ‘Manage Users’
Click on the username you want to adjust.
Select ‘Preferences’ from the side menu.

This area contains checkboxes that will Hold Sub-Navigation for the Name, Company, and Position Lists.

Sub-Navigation refers to the left-hand navigation menu items on Name, Company, and Position records. For example, if you’re looking at Name records the Sub-Navigation menu can take you from the main field display/edit screen to the specific panels for Resume, Notes, Activities, Attachments, Interviews, etc.

When you click on a record from a Search Result or Rollup List in the upper frame of PCRecruiter, the system loads the lower frame with the main view of that record’s fields. However, with this new preference enabled, PCRecruiter will remember which area of the record you last viewed, and will automatically load that same area of the next record that’s loaded.

This can save clicks and time in a number of situations. For example, you can review the resumes of one record after another by clicking on them from a list, as shown in this accompanying animation. Similarly, you can view the ‘Names’ list on company after company, or the ‘Pipeline’ on several jobs in a row without having to re-select the desired area from the nav menu.

Whenever you return to the Name, Company, or Position record view, you’ll always begin on whichever panel you were last viewing. The system will clear its memory of your last viewed area when you close or reload the browser window or when you log out of PCRecruiter.

Rollup API Calls

Another improvement in this update is the addition of new API calls for adding and removing records from Rollup Lists. This will allow basic Rollup manipulation via our public API, expanding the capabilities for integrated apps and utilities from Main Sequence and others.

What is the API?

An API, which stand for ‘application programming interface,’ is simply a list of commands that one program can send to another, along with definitions about the format of those commands. The PCRecruiter API allows software to securely connect to a PCR database to interact with the records. Not only does the API give Main Sequence’s own PCRecruiter Portal for Microsoft Outlook, PCRecruiter Mobile App, and PCR Capture extension the ability to add, remove, and manage records in the system, but the API also gives third-party vendors the capabilities they need to write applications and services that connect with PCRecruiter as well.

The complete PCRecruiter API documentation is available for software developers to review.

Main Sequence is releasing a maintenance update this week containing a variety of fixes and improvements. A few of the more notable enhancements are posted on our blog.

Main Sequence is releasing an update on our hosted servers this week with a variety of fixes and minor changes. The most noticeable improvements are:

Rollup Changes:
- The Recent Rollups screen now displays more of your lists, and has color-coded column headings for Name, Company, and Position for better visual distinction.
- If you’re using the “Scheduled Items” column in your layout, you can now click on the header to sort the records by the scheduled item.
User Security Changes:
- The ‘Copy User Settings’ area under System now allows for the copying of Activity default settings and MyPCR customizations from one user to another.
- A new ‘Current User’ setting has been added to the Auditing Reports security option. This setting limits the user’s Auditing Reports output to only those records bearing their own username.
Position Activity Changes:
- When entering an Activity for a Position record, the “Copy” panel now includes a “Copy to Name” option. Use the popup search to locate a contact by name, and the Activity will also be saved in that record’s Activity log.
- When entering an Activity for a Position record, the “Schedule” panel includes a new option to add a Followup to the Schedule in addition to the activity being created.
While in the Customize window for Position record layouts, you’ll find a new “Configure Status” option under the Action menu. This checklist allows you to hide any of the default Status field options that you don’t use.
We have added confirmation alerts to the Activity and Note entry panels so that the user is warned before allowing them to close a text entry area without saving their text.
The popup selector for the Industry/Specialty field now includes a “Recently Used” option in the “Sort Results” dropdown.
We’ve added a direct link to our Learning Center into the menu at the upper right corner of your PCR window, next to your user icon.

Also, if you have a few minutes to spare, we invite you give us your thoughts on PCRecruiter / Main Sequence by completing this short PCRecruiter User Survey. We appreciate it!

Configurable Record Cards

This week Main Sequence will be updating PCRecruiter with configurable record cards for names, companies, and jobs, which will shortcut action from the Recently Viewed records list and Quick Find.

Our PCRecruiter.net hosted users will notice a change this week to the Recently Viewed record ‘cards,’ as well as the similar cards that appear when using the Quick Find box in the upper right corner of PCRecruiter.

With this new update, users can choose two lines of field data to accompany the name, company name, or job title, plus up to eight user-selected action icons. This new configuration option saves you clicks, allowing you to access key actions for your candidates, clients, departments, and jobs such as sending emails, linking applicants to openings, submitting profile forms, adding activities, and so forth without opening the full record first.

Check out this short video for the details.

Also, if you have a few minutes to spare, we invite you give us your thoughts on PCRecruiter / Main Sequence by completing this short PCRecruiter User Survey. We appreciate it!

If you have any questions, contact support@mainsequence.net