Companies have a problem today, particularly well-known ones: because the Internet keeps everyone connected and a lot of people want to work at these prestigious organizations, their HR teams are being overloaded with job applications.

So, many large corporations today rely on resume scanners (most of which come as part of Applicant Tracking Systems, or ATSs), which scan resumes for certain keywords and then ranks candidates based off the results.

Which works really well unless….

The person has their resume in PDF form. Or they put their work dates in the wrong place. Or they call their experience anything other than “Work Experience”. Or they omit certain keywords. Or if roughly 800 other things happen.

What happens is that people who game the system by loading their resume with keywords and having the right format (aka they Googled how to beat resume scanners) move to the top. So, instead of interviewing people who would be good at the job, companies are interviewing applicants who can write their resume in the right way.

It is processes like this which give technology a bad name, as resume scanners take the human element out of hiring and replaces it with a series of algorithms. Not only is this process ineffective, it is Orwellian as well, treating humans like they are “resources” whose worth can be determined by a few keywords.

A Better Way

Okay, so what’s the solution? How is a company like Google, for example, which once got 75,000 resumes in a single week, supposed to handle all those applications?

Of course, technology has to be used, as companies simply do not have the manpower to interview hundreds of applicants. But it should be the right technology that puts the focus on the person instead of a piece of paper that allegedly contains all of an applicant’s skills and accomplishments.

Just one example, but automated interviewing software gives each candidate an interview, so each can state their case on why they should be hired. And now hiring managers can look those and get to know each candidate, which is much more effective than scanning through a stack of resumes.

Granted, many of these people ultimately won’t be hired, but at least they were treated as more than a piece of paper.

Overview

A lot of recruiters out there see resume scanners as a necessary evil. There is so much noise in the hiring space they are forced to use them, even if they don’t really like it.

But the truth is there is better technology out there now that can give much deeper insight than a resume scanner can. These new technologies, if used correctly, can drastically improve both candidate experience and hiring ROI.

About VoiceGlance

VoiceGlance is a cloud-based hiring tool used by forward-thinking companies to hire smarter, instead of harder. Learn more here.