Staffing Software – What’s the ‘SaaS’ all about?

Staffing firms and recruitment agencies use Staffing Software to source, map, shortlist, track, interview, and hire candidates. Staffing software solutions enable Human Resource Personnel to match the right candidate with the right job. Such software solutions enable communication in both directions – with the corporate clients as well as the candidates. 

Staffing software is akin to Sales Software to the extent that they help in recruitment marketing, and creates and manages a candidate pipeline, while also allowing for Candidate Relationship Management. These software can integrate with most other HR software that your organization might already be using.According to LinkedIn, nearly all (almost 99%) Fortune 500 companies leverage dedicated recruitment software, and an overwhelming majority (94%) of recruiters report that using this software has significantly improved (positively influenced) their hiring process.

For a product to be recognized as Staffing Software, it must ensure the following minimum functionalities:

• Help build a Talent Bank
• Fulfill Talent requirements efficiently
• Provide regular feedback – in the form of analytic reports – on candidate performance, and the efficiency of the recruitment process as a whole

Key Features to look for in Staffing Software 

Staffing software needs to provide features that will streamline the entire recruitment process and make it more efficient.. 

Staffing agencies are always hiring for multiple positions for multiple clients. It’s always either a client or a candidate on the phone. Information can get mixed up, or worse, lost. Your staffing software should be built keeping such practical aspects in mind. It should let you multi-task with as much ease and freedom as possible.

Let’s look at some important features that any Staffing Software should possess.

#1 Search

Strong search capabilities are a must for staffing software. It should let you search by combining multiple keywords so that candidates can be matched to specific job criteria.

#2 Lead generation

This can save tons of time for the recruiting team. Manually creating a candidate pipeline asks for a huge time commitment and escalates costs. The huge number of irrelevant resumes makes the task tedious. The software should aid in the identification of available candidates who are a good fit for the job.

#3 Candidate tracking

Any decent staffing solution must provide this capability. An analysis of the current and past workforce of the organization can help the software understand where it must look to source candidates who are a good fit for the organization, and who have the highest likelihood of getting converted into an employee.

#4 Hiring solutions

Skill-based or experience-based searching, background screening, skill testing of candidates, and other functionalities are a must for staffing solutions. Depending on the industry, the size of the organization, and the specific product, more or less of these features could be provided.

#5 Reference and Resume Check

Reference checking is a routine part of the hiring process. Having this process automated within the staffing software is a huge time-saver.

The software should also allow for Resumes to be downloaded. This enables proper segregation of candidates as per experience, qualifications, positions being considered for, etc.

#6 Third-party integrations

Staffing software must provide integrations with other Recruitment and HR software. It must also communicate well with career websites, job boards, etc. Integration with various email providers, social media, and other career enhancement portals can increase a recruitment team’s capabilities manifold.

#7 Customizable Analytic Reports

Reports need to be generated at various stages of the recruitment process to make it a more efficient and a pleasant experience for prospective employees. There may be paperwork to be filled out by the candidates. These forms can be organized and customized within the software. This also facilitates the assessment of candidates and the smooth onboarding of employees.

#8 Communication and Administration

Portals for supervisors, employees, and/or clients, email integration, creation and saving of templates, mail merge, tagging, and tracking functions. These are some of the capabilities expected of staffing software that can aid in day-to-day functioning.  

With the help of these, the HR and/or Recruitment teams can bring method to the madness involved in high-volume hiring, and keep things organized.

#9 Intuitive user interface

An easy and intuitive interface will reduce the training and acclimatization time for the users. It must increase user efficiency, especially with processes that may not be very important but necessary nonetheless. 

How to Compare Different Staffing Software 

While we have provided a list of the ‘Best Staffing Software’ further in this article, here we will list some general criteria based on which an organization may choose their software service provider.

Any staffing software must ultimately aim to provide an organization with a workforce that enhances productivity and growth.For this, an efficient Applicant Tracking System (ATS), besides a Candidate / Client Relationship Management module, is a must.. The software should readily integrate with your existing HR Processes/software, and help automate them. It should integrate with your email client to send out automatic email messages/reminders, update job boards, monitor and post to social media, update event calendars, etc. 

An efficient staffing software should be readily customizable to the needs of the organization and industry. It should not burden the organization with unnecessary or irrelevant features, which will complicate processes. 

Finally, you can’t improve what you cannot measure. A comprehensive, but easy-to-navigate report with analytics, at regular intervals, is what can make a software worthy or otherwise.

Top 5 Best Staffing Software

Finally, here’s a list of the 5 top Staffing Software to choose from. Though there are various products available, it is always best to do a comparison and find the one that will suit your organization. 

#1 Zoho Recruit

With built-in reporting, dashboards, etc., Zoho is one of the more advanced software out there. Besides analyzing resumes, it can create custom career pages and list vacancies on job boards too.

Zoho has a ton of other software in its arsenal. And Zoho Recruit benefits from this support and experience. The software is completely customizable at every stage for almost any industry.

Key Features

• Ease of candidate assessment
• In-built CRM
• Integration with Indeed
• AI assistance
• Progress tracking 
• Useful for large and small companies

Pros

• Ease of use
• Automated workflows to help candidates find the right job
• Attractively designed

Cons

• Needs more range of features
• Mobile app is slow

Pricing

Price: Starts at $5 per user per month. Capabilities increase with the price

Free trial: 15-day free trial

Free for life plan: Available

#2 CEIPAL

CEIPAL supports firms in closing placements faster by helping them automate their systems. Its AI-based technology results in the efficient matching of candidates to jobs. The software enables you to create in-depth reports. This further makes giving and receiving feedback easy. 

Key Features

• In-built CRM
• Goals tracking
• Integration with social media
• Job posting
• Interviewing scheduling
• Workflow management

Pros

• Ease of use even for employees unfamiliar with the technology 
• Good customer service

Cons

• Some aspects can be improved and functionalities bettered
• Loaded with features that may be irrelevant to most
• Mobile app has bugs and is unreliable 

Pricing

Price: Starts at $24 per user per feature/month for 6-50 users

Free trial: Available

Free for life plan: Available 

#3 JobDiva

JobDiva boasts of being used by more than 30,000 clients, to whom it provides an end-to-end AI-based staffing solution. One very useful feature of this software is that it can parse resumes based on years of experience. So only a few selected applicants, whose experience in years matches the job requirement, enter the candidate pipeline.

JobDiva can easily manage recruitment, sales, and even back-office processes all by itself, thus saving valuable training time and costs. It also has a robust reporting functionality.

Key Features

• Hassle-free onboarding
• Compliant with equal employment opportunity laws
• Customizable dashboards
• Customizable career portal
• Simple invoicing
• Candidate tracking

Pros 

• No-hassle onboarding
• Ease of searching for candidates
• Good tracking capabilities
• Overall pleasant user experience

Cons

• Notes cannot be edited after saving
• Can be used on only one system
• May slow down the system

Pricing

Price: Please contact JobDiva for a quote

Free Trial: Not available

Free for-life plan: Not available

#3 Bullhorn

Bullhorn’s cloud-based platform caters to over 10,000 companies worldwide. It is an end-to-end solution for recruitment, sales, and CRM.

Bullhorn uses ‘predictive intelligence’ to connect with the best-fit candidates at the appropriate time. From here on it tracks every touchpoint between the candidate and the recruiter. It uses this experience to improve processes across the board.

The software is fully customizable, right from its looks, user preferences, and templates to how it creates and displays records.

Bullhorn can integrate with numerous other recruitment tools like InsightSquared, TextRecruit, HarQen, Sirenum, Mailjet, etc. It is suitable for organizations of all sizes.

Key Features

• Predictive Intelligence Technology
• Sourcing/candidate identification
• Automated resume filtering
• Ease of payroll management
• Easy onboarding
• Employee performance monitor
• Candidate Journey Mapping

Pros 

• Ease of use
• Simple Design
• Candidates’ work history can be viewed

Cons

• Customer service was below par, as per market reviews
• Irrelevant add-on features
• Notes get deleted after 15 idle minutes, and users have to start all over again

Pricing

Price: Please contact Bullhorn for a quote

Free Trial: Not available

Free for-life plan: Not available

#4 Avionté

Like the other candidates on this list, Avionté prides itself on being a one-stop solution to all your recruitment needs. But it does not stop there. Besides ATS, CRM, and recruiting, Avionté also provides for smooth onboarding, payroll, invoicing, and IT.

Avionté can find suitable candidates for you by integrating with Linkedin, Glassdoor, and Indeed. It further uses video interviews, resume filtering, and background screening to ensure job-candidate-organization fit. Its CRM does the follow-ups and emailing, and everything else that a CRM should do to maintain candidate relations, and create a positive brand image for your organization.

Key Features

• Unique application workflows
• Paperless onboarding/payroll, billing & accounts
• Social media integrations
• Full search of resumes
• Time tracking including attendance
• Reporting

Pros 

• Good integration with different software 
• Dark mode is a good value-add
• Good payroll solution

Cons

• Expensive
• Not easy to create reports without using their paid support
• More functionalities can be added
• Sorting through documents can be time-consuming

Pricing

Price: Please contact Avionté for a quote

Free Trial: Not available

Free for-life plan: Not available

Wrap Up

In today’s digital world, using Staffing Software is a complete no-brainer. The streamlined efficiencies that they offer are unparalleled. They help free up key personnel and save loads of man-hours and, hence, costs. 

The final decision about which software to choose for your organization will depend on factors such as industry, size of the organization, Recruitment and HR systems already in place, and your organization’s budget. Before making a ‘buy’ decision, consider what software you already have and what additional capabilities you might need. There’s no point in buying an expensive all-in-one software solution that overlaps with existing software unless one is a major advancement over the other. 

Also explore:

A Guide to Selecting the Perfect Recruitment Software
5 Best Compensation Management Software
7 Benefits of Using Hot Desk Booking Software

FAQs on Staffing Software