As an entrepreneur, you already have so much on your plate. You’re responsible for managing every aspect of your business – from marketing and sales to accounting and customer service. The last thing you need is another full-time job: finding new employees.

Without a recruiting solution in place that’s designed specifically for startups, you might struggle with candidate sourcing, screening candidates and managing your pipeline. In this blog, we explore some of the signs of when a startup, small business, or enterprise needs more help in its recruiting process so that you can make an informed decision about whether or not investing in a recruiting solution makes sense for your team right now (spoiler alert: it will).

1. It’s taking more time to fill positions

You’re seeing a trend. Hiring is taking longer, and it’s because there are more candidates to sift through. You may also be experiencing an increase in the number of positions that you need to fill due to the growth or expansion of your business or team.

The average job posting receives 250 applicants per spot and takes around 40 days to fill. That means every role you post is going to cost your company valuable time and money in lost productivity, which is why many companies are turning to automated hiring solutions that can help speed up the process by automatically screening and ranking applicants. If you find yourself spending hours every week trying to recruit for new positions, it’s time to look for a better solution.

2. Mundane hiring tasks are taking up most of your time

If you’re a startup founder, your time is precious. You have big ideas and huge goals to achieve, but you also have to build a team of talented people who can help you make it all happen.

But sometimes, that’s not so easy to do. You may find yourself spending hours on mundane hiring tasks like posting job listings, vetting candidates and even scheduling interviews. And when an offer does come through, it takes even longer to negotiate the compensation package and close the deal.

A recruitment platform can save you time by automating these processes and giving you access to thousands of pre-screened & ranked candidates every day.

3. You don’t have a pipeline of qualified candidates

This is by far the most important reason why startups should invest in recruiting solutions. A lot of startups rely on referrals from current employees, posting on social media, or word-of-mouth. This can be effective — but it’s also time-consuming, unpredictable, not always viable, and doesn’t always yield great results. If you want to find top talent that matches your culture, you need recruitment software that works for your small business.

You need an automated process that finds strong candidates and brings them into the hiring funnel. A pipeline of qualified candidates is essential to the success of your business.

4. You don’t have an effective way to store or manage candidate data.

Candidates generate a lot of data — resumes, cover letters, references and interviews — and you need a good place to store all of it, not only until they make their final decision about joining your team, but also for future reference. If you don’t have an effective way to store this data, then you risk losing critical information that could affect the outcome of the hiring process, and potentially waste time digging through emails, files and folders. A recruiting software will allow you to store information about each applicant in an organized way in one place so you can easily access it when needed.

5. Your cost-per-hire is too high

If your business is spending a good amount of resources (time, money & effort) but is not seeing results that are worthwhile, it may be time to invest in a recruiting solution. Recruitment software can help you find qualified candidates faster and at a lower cost than traditional methods like job boards and referrals, and advanced reporting capabilities help keep track of hiring KPIs and eventually help measure ROI on hiring; plus, the average cost-per-hire can be reduced by almost 70%! That’s one heck of an ROI!

6. You don’t have an Applicant Tracking System

If you are using Excel or other spreadsheets to manage your applicants, it might be time to consider upgrading. An ATS is essential for tracking applicants, managing resumes and sourcing talent. It will also enable you to use tools like automated chatbots and video interviewing, which can help you find better candidates faster.

It automates the process of screening & ranking applicants, and helps you keep track of each candidate’s progress in the hiring lifecycle. You can also use it to send automatic reminders to applicants who haven’t responded within a certain time period, and use chatbots to automatically answer FAQs and collect documents.

However, be careful while choosing an ATS; there are basic ATSes that only digitalizes your hiring process, while there are next-gen ATSes that are powered by AI that help you enrich candidate data with additional data-points and empower you to make better hiring decisions. A strong AI-powered applicant tracking system will help you get organized, manage applicants, and communicate & engage with them throughout the hiring process.

Invest in a recruiting solution so you can expand and grow

If any of the signs mentioned here rings true for you, it’s time to move from the wayside and get serious about technology. Your business will likely only succeed if its people thrive. And that means you need better tools in place for hiring, managing and retaining them.

A recruiting solution is an investment and one that will pay for itself. It can help you find candidates faster, make your hiring process more efficient, and save you time and money in the long run.

In today’s information-driven world, you should have the right tools available to make sure you can take care of the people that power your business of the future. That includes efficient new ways to fill jobs, manage candidates and even develop your own pipeline. There is no reason any startup should be without one of these solutions. 

From sourcing & screening talent to interviewing & onboarding, AI-enhanced solutions are enabling recruiters to use every resource they find more effectively, feed their pipelines with value every day and build an even bigger talent pool that’s always available and ready to grow their business.

We’re here to assist!

Ultimately, every business needs a recruiting solution! It’s the missing piece that is often overlooked that will help an organization excel and grow. As you look to scale up and fill your open positions, choose wisely: it may be one of the most significant decisions you make – and a trusty AI-powered recruitment solution by your side will be of immense help!