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ATS integrations for continuous data

Automate data flows by integrating your Applicant Tracking System (ATS) to keep candidate information up to date and speed up hiring decisions.

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Applicant tracking system (ATS) software provides recruiting and hiring tools for enterprises. Initially used by large corporations that receive several thousand inbound job applications on a weekly basis, today approximately 95% of Fortune 500 companies rely on ATS software to help integrate recruitment processes. Instead of sorting through crowded inboxes and manually reentering the same data over and over, recruiters and hiring managers use ATS to keep themselves organized and efficient, which is critical for fast-growing companies that are hiring for multiple positions and departments simultaneously.

Integrate ATS with APIs

Modern ATS solutions extend beyond the collection and sorting of resumes; these systems now offer full HRIS, HCM, and HRM business process automation tools to speed hiring pipelines, simplify employee onboarding, communicate with applicants, distribute of job postings, and proof of government compliance. Modern applicant tracking systems may offer:

  • Career sites: branded portals featuring job openings, customized forms, pre-screening questions, and more.
  • Advanced search: search and sorting features that allow recruiters to quickly search for candidates with specific keywords, phrases, and skills or experience.
  • Online assessments: validate skills to ensure candidates are a good fit from the start, also guaranteeing standardization in the selection process.
  • Web-based and mobile-first platforms: mobile-optimized career pages allow candidates to apply faster, and hiring managers can move away from desktops and laptops and recruit on tablets or phones.
  • Social recruiting: recruiting has moved beyond job board postings and into the world of talent networks — social recruiting leverages data, personalized messaging, gamification, and automation capabilities in social networks to target top candidates.
  • Analytics: a paperless recruiting process allows users to generate and store reports to track hiring efforts, candidate/employee engagement, and more.
  • Hire-to-retire enterprise integration solution: with the initial hiring processes going fully digital, companies can use a full HR suite to eliminate duplicate data and inefficient workforce management across an organization.

Additional functionality and workflow customization – such as document collaboration, rules and permissions, and integrated marketing automation – vary from system to system.

In addition to expediting the hiring process on the recruiters’ side, the candidate experience is becoming more of a top priority as companies battle for the best talent. Today's job seekers and employees expect frictionless application and onboarding experiences as well as timely communication. As a result, companies use an integrated ATS to automate new job opening alerts, email responses, and interview or event reminders. Many employers now use systems that allow job applicants to upload their vital information directly from their profiles on websites like LinkedIn or Indeed. Further, some companies are investing in chatbots to interact with prospects and employees, helping them complete their application or keeping them engaged throughout the process with status updates and alerts.

However, not every ATS has an integrated marketplace to offer these capabilities out-of-the-box. As a result, point-to-point integrations are implemented to manually connect individual recruiting and HR endpoints with APIs. While this quick-fix approach may solve the immediate connectivity challenge, achieving seamless integration as the business – and demand for talent – expands requires expertise in each endpoint and becomes increasingly complex.

ATS integration with HCM and HRM systems

Using ATS software saves both time and money. But when a company uses multiple SaaS applications – perhaps other human capital management (HCM) and human resources management (HRM) systems – it is crucial that they connect and integrate. Without a robust integration system, synchronization becomes difficult, and information does not flow. Generally, the practice of taking data from one application to another is extensive, expensive, and adds to the growing list of IT demands. In fact, a recent study found that 92% of IT decision makers say integration needs span beyond IT to a wide range of business areas including HR (37%).

Consider this real-life hiring example: Applications for open roles often come in through applicant tracking systems like Greenhouse or Jobvite. Once a candidate is hired, their information needs to be transferred into the company’s HCM and HRM systems. However, many HR organizations use third-party ATS like Greenhouse, Jobvite, or BambooHR that are not connected to their HCM or HRM systems, meaning HR managers must manually reenter the data into the appropriate employee onboarding systems and then inspect it for compliance. HR also has to review employment documents to verify that the new employee has the legal right to work and has to begin an employee provisioning process to make sure she has the right equipment to do her job.

ATS workflow automation

But what if that entire process could be automated? Then the new hire could spend less of her onboarding period filling out paperwork with repeat information and more time learning about the new job. If the ATS were integrated with HCM, then once a role closes with a new hire in the tracking system, that data could automatically populate in Workday, eliminating the need for data entry. An integration with the E-Verify system in the United States could establish the legal right to work very quickly and the closing of a role in the ATS could trigger a series of events that will provision their desks, their computer equipment, their email accounts, among other things; this makes employee onboarding a lot more pleasant and efficient. This integration could also make the onboarding process much more personal by sending an email informing the new hire of the orientation schedule, what to expect on the first day, etc. It’s also possible to integrate Docusign with Workday, making the inevitable paperwork that comes with starting a new job much easier.

Robust applicant tracking systems could also integrate with background check providers for easy checks and authorizations, send offer letters, and even predict an applicant’s potential performance at the company. While each applicant tracking system is designed to work in their own way, they all have the common goal of streamlining the hiring process.

Applicant tracking system (ATS) APIs

There are dozens of ATS used by companies — some of the more popular solutions include:

With hundreds of out-of-the-box connectors and templates to common HR endpoints, Anypoint Platform makes achieving a single view of the employee easy. Mule SDK also provides an intuitive IDE for building your own connector to serve your specific ATS use case.

To learn more about how systems and applications integration can help streamline ATS and HCM processes, download 7 HCM integration best practices.

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