Direct skills matching removes some of the obstacles that an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) puts in front of job seekers. By relying less on keywords and more on skills, employers will have an easier time placing the right candidates in the right roles. We discuss why job matching is the solution for companies looking for a modern approach to hiring.
Skills vs. Experience
As a job seeker, it is frustrating to know that you are capable to do a job, but since your former job descriptions aren’t hitting exactly the right keywords, your application will never see the outside of the computer processor.
Human Resource Managers and Hiring Managers want the best applicant for the job. But is the Applicant Tracking System delivering quality candidates? If you follow any recruiters on Twitter, you wouldn’t be surprised to hear that they aren’t. Our systems focus on hitting the right keywords, and a mistake in tense can get a resume thrown out of consideration. And a human never even saw it!
As human beings, we are all adaptable, creative, and problem solvers. If we continue to lean on Applicant Tracking Systems, we will stifle the best facets of ourselves. If I am a brand-new grad and have excellent math ability, I can figure out Excel. Logic is a skill I can offer an employer. But, since “logic” wasn’t a keyword match, oh, well! Guess I’ll keep driving for Uber instead of using my gifts because I have student loans to pay. ATS is only as good as the person filling in the requirements.
Multiple Points of Entry
There are dozens of options for Applicant Tracking Systems, but none works as advertised. If you’ve been in the job market for a minute, you know the frustration of trying to use one to apply for a job. Many of them purport to be able to “automagically” upload your resume. But, in practice, filling out these systems is downright laborious. Half the time, that functionality is disabled because it’s more trouble than it’s worth. So, when applicants are told they must upload their resume and fill out the lengthy job application, it’s no wonder they get frustrated. The resume upload answers every single field in the application, but the system is incapable of parsing it.
Now, multiply that times 100. Every single job post must be answered one at a time. The same answers to the same questions. Over and over. And, there is no guarantee a human will ever see it.
Poor Communication
The final nail in the coffin of an Applicant Tracking System should be the utter disregard for the humanity of the job seeker. Hop on a Reddit thread sometime. If it doesn’t break your heart, you don’t have one. Thousands of job seekers applying to thousands of jobs. They may be new grads, recently laid off, or even looking for a job that can accommodate a disability. But, for whatever reason, they get nowhere in their job search. *cough* ATS *cough*
After applying to dozens, if not hundreds of jobs, job seekers become disillusioned with the whole setup, feeling like nothing they do works. ATS does a poor job of communicating with job seekers that don’t make the cut. More often than not, applicants hear nothing. They feel like they are sending their applications into a black hole. Sometimes, they get a rejection letter with no reason behind it. Which is a huge improvement, by the way, to silence.
But, even the best communication is lacking the human element. Candidates would like to know why they aren’t chosen or what they could do to improve to make themselves more attractive to employers. They deserve better. And that’s where pepelwerk’s skills-matching solution comes in.
Skills Matching: Better Than an Applicant Tracking System
What if we could do better than an outdated, unreliable Applicant Tracking System? Wouldn’t a better idea be to offer up jobs that match a job seeker’s skill set? What if you went into a job application, and all you saw were jobs that you matched to, based on your skills? What if that system notified you and suggest a skill you could add to make yourself more valuable?
As a hiring manager or recruiter, imagine waking up to a deck of applicants. Each one matched your job based on what you said the needed skills were. No stacks of resumes to click and close. Just a direct connection to people that have the required ability. That’s what pepelwerk does. Explore for yourself why we are the matchmakers of the working world.
