It was just a question of time. When Google launched Hire last year, everyone knew it would eventually introduce its search technology into the product and make finding and reengaging resumes in your database more, well, Google-y.
And that day is today.
“For every person hired, a company typically engages with 250 candidates,” said Omar Eduardo Fernández, product manager, Hire by Google in a release. “Often, many of the 249 that don’t get hired are a great fit for future openings — but companies haven’t always had an easy way to identify past candidates that might be a good match for new jobs.”
Unlike many currently solutions that let recruiters source the Internet at large, Google’s current iteration of candidate discovery only focuses on a company’s current resume pool. I suspect that will change, as Google continues to aggressively evolve the Hire product.
“Candidate discovery is an intuitive search capability that gives recruiters a head start by helping them quickly find a short list of past candidates who are a fit for new positions,” said Fernández. “This saves recruiters time, because they can now easily identify and re-engage known candidates instead of spending time trying to find new ones.”
In addition to sourcing your current database for potential candidates when a new job is posted, Google believes discovery goes beyond typical search by better understanding the intent of searches.
“Candidate discovery understands the intent of what recruiters and hiring managers are looking for,” said Fernández. “It takes a search phrase like ‘sales manager Bay Area’ and immediately understands the skills and experiences relevant to that job title, as well as which cities are part of the Bay Area. That means the search results will include candidates with sales management skills even if their past job titles are not an exact keyword match.”
Additionally, Hire lets recruiters search and filter based on the previous interactions with the candidate, such as the type of interview feedback they received or whether a job offer was made. Candidates with positive feedback and candidates who received an offer in the past but declined it will rank higher in search results.
Google says beta testers of the product have filled open positions faster with the new tool. “Candidate discovery is intuitive in a way I’ve never seen before,” said Teresa Olsen, director of talent acquisition at Productive Edge .”I’ve never had a system find relevant candidates so quickly, even understanding acronyms. I’m really impressed that it pulls up the different iterations with a single search term.”