Top 11 Tips to Streamline Your Candidate Database Management

The hiring Process can be tedious, time-consuming, and take up too much energy, but can you imagine how difficult it is to face stacks and stacks of an unorganised database during and after the recruitment of new candidates?

So are you one of those recruiters or hiring professionals who are struggling with optimising your candidate database management? And want to know how to manage the candidate database effectively? If so, then check out this blog; it will provide you with 11 different ways to manage the candidate database appropriately. Thus, the searching part becomes easy and meaningful. 

It doesn't matter whether the database is of new candidates or existing employees, but it is highly important to manage it properly, as an unorganised database brings chaos and takes up too much time and energy when certain data is required from the database.

The recruiting process always starts before there is any vacancy. The human resource team continuously maintains the candidate database in order to ongoing talent acquisition. So, in the future, they will have a strong and meaningful talent pool for growth. 

What is a Candidate Database Management?

The candidate database, also known as the applicant database, is where all the information about active as well as passive candidates store. In the candidate database, recruiters are able to find the profile of candidates who have applied for the job. 

Managing the applicant database means recruiters are updating every piece of candidate information in real time. The candidate database should be managed in a way that is beneficial to both organisations and recruiters. Design a database in a manner to obtain any individual candidate or a group of similar candidates instantly.

It is true that a good recruiter is always familiar with all recruitment stages, processes and things. These things include job posting, attracting the right talent, pre-screening and so on. 

Apart from this, the recruiter also needs to be aware of candidate database management and form a positive relationship with candidates.

Why Should You Care about Candidate Database Management?

Recruiting database is a base and essential factor for the optimal recruitment process. The candidate database is primarily responsible for simplifying all hiring  process activities. It helps recruiters and hiring professionals quickly provide accurate information about high-quality candidates, which ultimately leads them to make better placements for growth. 

The applicant database enables HRs and recruiters to place top talent faster before the opportunity is lost in a tight job market. Hence, managing the candidate database and keeping it clean and organised is incredibly important. So, recruiters have to continuously move candidates from different stages of sourcing, promoting open jobs, screening, profile reviewing, skill assessment, interviewing, onboarding, rejecting, etc. 

If the candidate database is not well established and not updated in real-time, then it will create more confusion and consume an ample amount of time for recruiters. Hence, consistent candidate database management and adding candidates to the database is an important part of the recruitment process.

Top 11 Tips to do Candidate Database Management  Like a Pro

Managing the candidate database is not a piece of cake. It should be managed in such a way that it should be fruitful toward the recruitment process. 

Manage the candidate database where searching and data reverting become accurate and utilitarian. Thus, here we have shared 11 tips to manage the candidate database effectively. Let’s get started. 

1. Pre-planning

The database should be prepared before starting the hiring process so the data can be entered into the database right away instead of piling on the data and struggling to make data entries and maintain the database. Therefore, form a plan if you want a manageable candidate database. The categories in the database can be altered or added later according to the need. 

Raise some valuable questions that justify the pre-planning process.

• What is the purpose of doing this?

• What do you want to achieve?

• Why should it be done?

• What should be the outcomes?

2. Utilise Application Tracking System (ATS)

The simplest and best way to manage your candidate's database is by using an Applicant Tracking System (ATS). It helps to post jobs across multiple platforms and a data-centred approach for hiring new candidates.

The applicant tracking system is the latest recruiting technology with AI automation features. Hence, ATS is able to identify the most qualified and best resume for the open position by detecting candidate skills, qualifications, experience, and keywords. So, ATS suggests you are the best match for the job systematically.

3. Use the screen category filter

Recruiters should build up a procedure for importing and parsing resumes and save them in their database for later use.

This applies to applicants that apply to your posted jobs and applicants that you manoeuvre into your ATS through outsider apparatuses (aggregators and boards). Utilise your screened filter as a channel while scanning for quality candidates in the future.

Here features like the Advanced Search option become really handy. Searching is one type of filter that you can do. Advanced search provides an aggregate of options for searching from candidate databases. You can search on the basis of location, age, experience, skills, source, etc. As follows, you can get more relevant results, and you will save time.

4. Focus on skills over keywords

Keywords as it makes the process simpler for you and your group to discover these candidates. By doing this, you'll additionally lessen your reliance on complex or boolean searches and will be able to stay away from the candidates that bluff using keywords in their resumes.

Entries of skills in the candidate database help you to filter out the right candidate's profile, or we can say qualified candidates quickly. This is because we mention the skills required for an open job.

Using this way, you don't need to depend on the complicated boolean string search, and you can effectively search according to your requirement from the candidate database.

5. Avoid duplicate entries

Your ATS software should be able to avoid generating duplicate entries. Due to the data duplication in the candidate database, it ends up clustered and bulked. And this might be because of sourcing candidates from different places.

So, when you add a new candidate to your database, your hiring software ought to alert you about it by comparing employees' data through email, first and last names, phone numbers, and so on. These will help keep your data organised, save time, and make managing the database hassle-free.

Instead of removing duplication, you can also merge the candidate data of duplicate entries. It is another way to eliminate duplication from the candidate database.

6. Database segmentation

You should create segments in your candidate database based on categories like skills, location, language, experience, etc. This makes it easier to find candidates' data and keeps the database properly arranged.

To make the sourcing process easier, you can also add tags according to the qualification. Generally, use skills as a tag. The well-managed candidate database's aim is to find out the right professional candidates easily and quickly that match the job description of the company's role and responsibilities. 

7. Guidelines for data entry

Set up criteria for how the recruiters should enter data and new records for candidate screening. Also, the data of the candidates that have been organised and properly labelled should be used to set an example that can be used by the recruiters during the hiring process and thereafter. This brings consistency and keeps the database organised.

8. Hire professionals to clean your current database

If your database is totally out of control and you can't comprehend beginning a cleanup procedure, then you should contact somebody to clean your current database. After a while, the candidate database also needs a cleanup process. Because of some unwanted processes and activity, the candidate database got corrupted for some time.

You can consider hiring a great employee, freelancer or intern to organise and label your database properly.

9. Third-party tools

Look for third-party tools that can assist you in organising your database. Different innovations that incorporate into ATS can assist you with parsing resumes into previous or altered scientific categorisations like skills, languages known, experience, and so on, making going through and using the database simpler and more efficient.

So, investment in third-party tools creates a higher version of your candidate database due to its features like automating emails, scheduling interviews, messaging, profile updates, etc.

10. Accessible to the recruiting team

Let know your recruiting team the appropriate utilisation of the candidate database. Make collaboration amongst the team concerning better recruitment productivity. Adopt the right recruitment software and application that are mainly developed for HR recruitment team collaboration. Use various software that is specially invented for recruiters and collaboration. This software makes the recruitment process easy for the team.

11. Continuously engage the database

Send the automated email and messages according to the conversation by using a third-party tool. Keep in touch with each candidate and also communicate with inactive candidates. Maintain good relationships with them to offer them a better candidate experience. If in the future, your company requires their level of skill and expertise, it will be easier for you to make them a part of the organisation. Also, you can keep updating your database with data enrichment.

Final Thought on Candidate Database Management

The old techniques of candidate database management on paper and files or excel sheets are not enough as it can be very complex to maintain. Moreover, the data on paper can easily be lost, forge a huge loss for the businesses.

Adopt the latest recruitment tech and tools that are specially invented for candidate database management only. This recruitment software solution broadly assists you in maintaining candidate databases in various ways. Furthermore, it brings a higher accuracy rate, reducing the time that you spend on managing the candidate database. So, recruiters must implement the above tips to easily and effectively manage the applicant database.