Finding the Right ATS

December 1, 2009

Recruiting without an Applicant Tracking System (ATS) can make you feel like the woman in this picture… completely swimming in a sea of resumes. I am in the process of looking for an ATS for OpenView to use for our internal recruitment efforts and for recruiting support for our portfolio companies. For growing venture capital firms or expansion stage companies, an ATS should streamline the recruiting process, saving time and money. In order to determine which needs our ATS must satisfy, I have researched the features that are being offered by many different ATS’s and made a list of the major categories which I feel cannot be compromised.

Top 10 Things to Look for in an ATS:1. Affordability. These systems should really pay for themselves with the time they save your team, and precision which they allow your recruiters or HR managers to operate.
2. Flexibility. The system should be easy to configure and customize.
3. Functionality. A good ATS will allow you to easily utilize its tools.
4. Usability. Allows you to track candidates throughout the interview process, enter notes and interview feedback, and automatically connect through email (Outlook).
5. Reliability. A system that has proven itself as a leader in the field, and has already worked out any kinks in their software.
6. Support. Excellent customer support including advice of best practices and content assessment.
7. Integration. In the future, I would hope that the ATS would be capable of integrating with back-end HR applications.
8. Scalability. Since growth is the goal of our companies, we need a system that can scale with us.
9. Reporting. We need a system that has the ability to create custom reports that offer complete drilldown capabilities.
10. Customer Satisfaction/Reviews. This combines almost every other category, but have excellent customer reviews and satisfaction rates are a key indicator of an ATS is probably the most sure sign of a system that you will get the most benefits from implementing.

VP, Human Capital

<strong>Diana Martz</strong> is Vice President, Human Capital at<a href="http://www.ta.com/">TA Associates</a>. She was previously the Director of Talent at OpenView.