The value of automation for recruiters is well-documented. From a more effective job ad posting to streamlined resume screening, automation can handle a lot of the busy work for talent acquisition professionals, which allows the team to handle the real work of matching the best talent to open positions. But recruitment automation is more than simply handling “busy work”—mainly because that busy work takes place in the digital landscape. Recruiters can’t search every corner of the internet for quality candidates— but an automated system can.

In the digital age, automated processes are necessary to attain the most efficient and effective hiring and will ultimately add value to your organization by enabling talent acquisition teams to find top talent. But how do you convince decision-makers within your organization to adopt recruitment automation?

Begin With The Basics

What is recruitment automation? Will robots be interviewing prospective hires? Do we even need an HR team if AI is making all our decisions for us?

There are always misconceptions about AI software and automation; non-experts may feel like it’s too good to be true, as though you simply must wave a magic wand and your automated system picks out your top five job candidates. But at its core, an automated system simply collects data for you and sifts through that data to find what you are looking for whenever you have a hiring need. Over time, there will be a lot of applicant data, and your recruitment automation software will key into patterns to optimize the efficiency and effectiveness of your hiring, ultimately enabling prediction for things like best source of hire or a potential candidate’s quality of hire—or even anticipating the next hire you will need to make.

Assemble The Data

What percentage of companies are using recruitment automation software? How has recruitment automation software improved key performance metrics for other organizations? The numbers can help make it clear from a business standpoint that these platforms can help your organization stay competitive with other, similar organizations by improving efficiency. From time to hire, time to fill, quality of hire, turnover rate, attrition rate, to candidate engagement scoring, recruitment automation can optimize the efficiency of your hiring and help you build a stronger workforce.

Propose A Trial Period

The user-friendly tools of an automated system can be purchased as a monthly subscription. There is not a huge investment up-front, and your organization does not need to hire a data scientist to run the software. That is precisely the benefit of automation: by utilizing AI technology, the system adjusts, learns, and adapts to become more efficient over time—all on its own. While the software may be an adjustment for some HR professionals, the technology is ever-improving. It is also very user-friendly and can produce reports to help you explain all the benefits and understand all the decision-making that happens.

Assemble The Qualitative Information

Specific examples can help decision-makers understand the weak points in your current hiring process and imagine what an optimized process would look like. For example, what is the difference between manually performing keyword searches as you winnow a pile of resumes vs. the automated process? What people are doing when they perform keyword searches is sifting through digital data. But, they also have to carefully scour each resume for the relevance of the search term, which takes time. The automated system can do this better every time.

Whether it’s being able to search for a multiplicity of synonyms that a keyword search doesn’t do (like finding work experience as a “Digital Marketing Manager” vs. a “Digital Media Manager”) or scoring each resume to create a shortlist, the automated process will sift through the information in a much more efficient timeframe.

Clarify The ROI

The most costly aspect of the hiring process is the job ad; when you use recruitment automation software, the cost reduction correlates to the reduced length of time that the ad runs. Rather than post an internet ad based on hunches and guesswork about which site will work best for your next vacancy, the automated system tabulates lots of data based on the job type to source the best location. Thus, your ad finds the eyes of talented candidates more quickly and runs only as long as the ad performs well and is necessary. This saves money because you aren’t paying extra for an ad that underperforms. Further, it improves your quality of hire by using a data-driven approach to finding the best source of hire. Better sourcing produces better quality candidates.

While the cost-savings on a single job ad campaign will be immediate and obvious, the business case in terms of ROI should take the long-view. Improvement in your quality of hire means less turnover and more hires that will gain long-term experience and add value to your organization over time.

Collect New Data: KPIs

The KPIs that drive strategy for the talent acquisition team are set at the top, and often include markers like time to hire, cost-per-hire, or quality of hire. The case for an automated system can be measured with improved KPIs, and luckily, recruitment automation software can create reports on these KPIs when it’s time to make the case to keep that software subscription.

The analytics component of recruitment automation software really just makes the case for itself. Your main sell: the process can help the talent acquisition team (and higher-ups) understand their processes better and clarify where they can continue to improve.