by Ben Hess, Managing Director, ThirdPool Recruiting
I’ve had several questions raised about the difference between an ATS and a CRM.
The Customer Relationship Management (CRM) software paradigm is well-known because it is used by most companies to manage the sales process.
For recruiting, a CRM is commonly used to nurture the relationship between your company and the recruiting prospect.
This relationship can take months to develop and culminates when the recruiting prospect says: “I’m ready to move forward in the recruiting process—let’s do this!”
Most CRMs are well-equipped to provide many low-key touches over a long period of time until the recruiting prospect self-activates.
The Applicant Tracking System (ATS) is designed to efficiently process candidates who are actively engaged in the recruiting process.
In real estate, the ATS is similar to escrow software.
Once a purchase-sale agreement is signed, escrow software marches the transaction through a predictable series of steps that lead to a closing.
Similarly, an ATS should purposefully guide an active prospect towards becoming an agent in your company.
There is a cadence to the steps and an expectation that the end result will be a hire.
The most common ATS used across all industries is an Excel spreadsheet. Most hiring scenarios are simple, infrequent, and low-volume.
A custom ATS becomes valuable when the complexities and volume of the hiring process warrants something more powerful.
