Posting jobs online has traditionally gone something like this: Need a sales rep? Google “sales representative job description,” copy and paste, make a few edits to customize the ad then publish. As a result, many companies are posting job descriptions from the dawn of the internet.
Startup Uncommon.co has launched a new feature called Talent Forecaster that aims to make job descriptions more targeted. “Today, recruiters and hiring managers write job descriptions in the dark,” said Teg Grenager, CEO at Uncommon. “There’s no information about what people are actually available in the market, so recruiters guess about qualifications they should even ask for.”
Uncommon’s Talent Forecaster uses unique visuals (see animated GIF) to tell recruiters whether what they’re asking for is even available in their market, such as whether they’re being too selective, or even the opposite, too broadly, when writing-up job descriptions. Grenager believes the features gives the market a glimpse into the future of programmatic recruiting and the ways big data and data science can support better recruiting.
“Imagine a future where you can use tools like these to inform hiring plans,” said Grenager. “Maybe it’s unrealistic to get the skill combination you want, so you should actually hire two people. Or maybe if you open the position in a different geography, it’s going to be much easier, and cheaper, to fill it.”
The company is able to do this because it claims a database of some 50 million resumes and 6 million job postings to connect both qualified and interested candidates. Big data, it turns out, can churn out products like Talent Forecaster.
“Uncommon’s Talent Forecaster takes the headache out of wasting hours tweaking your job description, only to have the wrong types of candidates pop into your inbox. With this tool, recruiters can simply input their ideal qualifications, and see immediately whether or not you’re job description is appropriate for the talent pool in your city. No one else is making it this fast and easy to get quality hires, in your region, regardless of industry.”
Email outreach has shared a similar fate as job postings, unfortunately. Copy, paste, send, all in the name of efficiency, but neglecting the uniqueness of each candidate in the process. Textio hopes to solve this problem with its latest offering, Textio Hire. The product works by bringing Textio’s core competency of improving job descriptions with augmentation writing technology and bringing it into recruiter emails, especially to passive candidates.
“We are in a job seekers’ market, and yet many people aren’t looking for new work. Companies are looking for competitive advantages to reach these people who might not be actively looking for a job. You can’t hire someone who doesn’t apply to your job post, or interview people who won’t respond to your recruiting outreach,” says Kieran Snyder, co-founder and CEO of Textio. “Companies who are using Textio Hire to write to candidates have a huge advantage, because they know ahead of time which language is going to resonate.”
In a pilot of Textio Hire, Johnson & Johnson, and Zillow both saw their response rates to cold emails skyrocket by 25 percent and 16 percent, respectively. To work, the company says the product uses data from hiring outcomes to optimize the language a company uses across its hiring teams, measurably increasing response rates from both passive candidates and active job-seekers.
“With passive candidates you only have one shot. You get just one message to inspire a person to pick their head up and engage their interest. And with that message, you’ve got to be able to differentiate your company from hundreds of others reaching out,” said Annie Rihn, VP of recruiting, Zillow Group. “That’s where Textio Hire comes in. It gives my team the language that is statistically proven to attract great candidates and improve our response rates.”
Textio Hire is also available in LinkedIn Recruiter and Gmail.
Disclosure: Uncommon is a sponsor of my podcast.