Top 2023 Talent Management Software to recruit efficiently

June 21, 2023 • Hiring Developers

By Jordan Plummeridge

Talent acquisition professionals and recruiters are always looking for new ways to build and maintain their talent pools. In fact, it’s their third most important priority this year after candidate experience and talent retention according to our State of Tech Hiring 2023 survey. But how exactly should they go about it?

In this article, we’ll show you how talent pool management software can be used to expand your talent pool and offer our top picks on the market. Along the way, you’ll learn what these tools can help you accomplish, discover their benefits and find out how to choose the right one for your needs. Let’s get to it!

What is Talent Management Software?

Before we begin, let’s get a quick recap of what Talent Pool Management Software is. A TMS is an integrated suite that takes care of the primary aspects of Talent Management, namely: recruitment, engagement, development, and performance management. In other words, they are made to ensure your current and future employees stay happy and engaged throughout the employee lifecycle, from the initial attraction phase to offboarding.

They typically contain a variety of modules to help you put your talent first, whether in terms of recruitment or performance. This way you can focus on building both your talent pool (those who’ve not yet been vetted for a position) and your talent pipeline (those already deemed qualified).

🔖 Related read > Technical Hiring: The 2023 Guide for Companies to Hire the Right Talent Easily

Benefits of Talent Management Software

So, you understand the definition, but what are the benefits for your company? That’s what we’re going to break down for you in this section.

The great thing about TMS is that they often offer one-size-fits-all solutions. That means you’re often spoiled for choice in terms of features. Indeed, some of the most popular suites offer everything from applicant tracking and compensation management to relationship management and recruitment analytics. Here are just a few of the capabilities offered by these powerful tools.

Customizable job profiles

First up, is the ability to easily create new job profiles based on your company’s needs. By filling in the most important details you can then use these profiles for candidate matching and creating job advertisements. The great thing about these job profiles? They offer extensive customization capabilities beyond simply the job title and department. Think cognitive skills, personality traits and culture fit. Everything you need to find suitable candidates that’ll stick around in the long term.

Automated candidate sourcing

Recruiters are always looking for ways to make their job easier.. That’s where TMS can really shine, with a gamut of tools that can reduce hiring time and improve the quality of hires. More specifically, this means matching passive candidates’ skills and experience with job requirements to find a good fit. They can even automate job postings and recommend the best sourcing channels based on industry, location or other criteria. This is made possible thanks to advanced algorithms and data analytics. The result? Less time spent hunting through job boards and more time spent building relationships with qualified candidates.

Candidate tracking and management

No TMS would be complete without this essential feature. Applicant tracking allows you to aggregate all the important information about candidates in one place. This is regardless of what stage of the recruitment process they are in. You can then search for key skills and job titles and find the perfect candidate for your position with ease. Another useful feature? Automatic ranking and sorting of candidates’ profiles and background and reference checks. What better way to build your talent pool in total confidence?

Reporting and analytics

The majority of talent management solutions allow you to receive actionable insights in the form of reports. This can help you understand everything from hiring performance and time to hire to retention and DE&I. With this essential data you can then begin to create an effective data-driven recruitment strategy.

Integration with other HR tools

An excellent thing about these software suites? They tend to integrate effortlessly with other HR tools that can make your life a whole lot easier. That way you can manage everything from one platform, facilitating task management and collaboration. And did we mention that many also offer social media and email integration?

🔖 Related read: 3 Keys to Succeed in Technical Sourcing: A Comprehensive 2023 Guide

How to Choose the Right Talent Management Software

Clearly then, there are myriad benefits to utilizing these recruiting platforms. But how do you go about selecting the right one for your needs? We’ll cover the key areas where you should put your focus.

Business requirements: Before anything else, you need to determine what the main challenges are in your recruitment process. Are you spending too long parsing through applications and doing repetitive tasks? Is providing a positive candidate experience proving difficult for your company? Or perhaps you are lacking adequate data to make informed decisions? Whatever the case, you’ll want to collect feedback from your team to ensure everyone is on the same page.
Integration and compatibility: You’ll also want to check whether the software you’re looking at will integrate well with existing processes and HR tools. This may also include social media functionality to be able to interact with potential candidates.
Cloud-based or on-premise: It’s worth also considering whether the solution will work well for you in terms of security. If you have highly sensitive data, you might not want to have everything on the cloud. Of course, there are advantages and disadvantages to both, so be sure to do your research!
Reporting and analytics: As you likely know, analytics data can be invaluable for improving your current recruitment processes. Be sure to check whether this module is included as part of the suite or if you need to purchase an add-on.
Pricing: Any business decision will require weighing up the costs. Given that the company will likely need a number of subscriptions it may be worth shopping around and comparing the best offers. Be sure to revisit your business needs and allocated budget to make the final call. And don’t forget to consider any additional fees for add-ons or implementation.
Availability and customer support: If you’re going to make a substantial investment in a TMS, you need to be sure that you’ll receive quality service throughout. After all, it’s likely you will need some assistance in getting set up and optimizing your use of the software. As with any purchase, be sure to read online reviews to get a clearer idea of whether expectations meet reality. Exploring their website and documentation may also help you discern whether they would be a good fit for your company.

Best Talent Pool Management Software Options

Now that you have a clear understanding of all things TMS, let’s dive into the best options on the market. Each has been selected for its range of features and facility of integration with other HR tools.

Smart Recruiters

Starting off with Smart Recruiters, this talent acquisition solution has a variety of tools broken into three main categories: attract (for talent sourcing), select (for applicant tracking), and hire (for offer management). For sourcing, for example, they can assist you with direct sourcing via job boards, CRM and recruitment campaigns, and managing prospective applicants.

They also offer other bespoke tools such as a recruiting chatbot and AI recruiting software. In any case, they are top rated on TrustRadius, so they must be doing something right.

Greenhouse

Next, we have an applicant tracking system that offers the usual suite of tools you’d expect. Calling themselves a ‘hiring operating system’ they separate their products into two categories: recruiting and onboarding. For recruiting, we find tools that can assist with structured hiring such as the ability to access and optimize job listings, automated surveys, and analytics. As for onboarding, their software allows you to create a personalised welcome experience, organize company resources, and evaluate your onboarding performance thanks to insightful reports.

Did we mention that they offer a built-in tool for preventing bias in the recruiting process, a goal tracker to help you meet hiring targets and a standardized pay transparency method?

Lever

This list wouldn’t be complete without mention of Lever. This top rated recruiting software offers both ATS and CRM (candidate relationship management) functionality. Indeed, LeverTRM allows you to not only track applicants but also build relationships with them thanks to a variety of innovative tools. What’s more, they offer actionable analytics to assist you with your hiring strategy and data collection and reporting to help you prioritize diversity and inclusion. All of their solutions are scalable so you can benefit no matter which stage of growth your company is at.

iCIMS

Last but not least, we have a cloud-based recruiting platform. With their Talent Cloud, they offer a scalable solution that can meet a variety of business needs whether to attract talent or hire en masse. As you’d expect, they offer an ATS (the #1 in terms of market share), and a variety of other valuable features such as career sites, CRM, marketing automation, employee surveys, analytics, and more! Their value calculator allows you to see exactly how much business value you can achieve in terms of savings and efficiency. A great way to get a visual understanding of its benefits.

The best thing about all of these options? They all integrate seamlessly with our interview and screening tools. That way creating tests and interviews and sharing the results can be as simple as a click of a button.

Time to Build a Robust Talent Pool

So we’ve reached the end of our overview. We hope that you now have a clearer understanding of what Talent Management Software is and how it can be used to make your life as a talent acquisition professional easier and more rewarding. It’s up to you to now choose the right talent management system and get started building that dream talent pipeline.