Hiring top talent demands efficiency. You may also need: 

• Real-time visibility into your pipeline
• Automated communications to keep candidates engaged 
• Advance promising applicants to the next stage without manual intervention

The question is, how do you skip the manual work while improving quality and consistency through systematization?

The answer lies in identifying how a modern applicant tracking system (ATS) can help you simplify the hiring journey. 

With this tool, you can automate what takes up the most time: distributing job posts, screening candidates, scheduling interviews, or collecting onboarding paperwork.

In this guide, we’ll explore 12 methods to automate tasks and cut down manual redundancy while boosting your hiring engine. 

12 ways to automate every hiring stage 

Let's explore which hiring stages are ready for an upgrade and how you can hand off specific tasks to technology. We'll look at easy-to-implement examples and how Kula ATS, an AI-driven, all-in-one platform for hypergrowth companies, can entirely streamline the process.

Sourcing 

Let's dive into how automating key sourcing tasks like candidate vetting and job distribution can upgrade your pipeline's quantity and quality.

1. Use killer knockout questions

Finding the right candidate can feel like searching for a needle in a haystack. To simplify this process, knockout questions instantly weed out unqualified applicants, saving time on pointless screening calls. 

For example, if you're hiring on-site senior engineers, your knockout questions can quickly filter out those looking for remote work or lacking suitable experience.

In this case, Kula ATS streamlines your hiring process with killer knockout questions that automatically reject unqualified candidates. You can further customize the application process for each job, department, and brand using configurable screening questions and integrated assessment tools.

2. Set up a system that rejects or defers candidates 

Hiring means rejecting many candidates, which can be emotionally draining. With Kula ATS, you can automate the process using configurable delays and personalized messages.  his frees you from manual rejections while maintaining a human touch, especially with AI-powered templates. 

Another situation that crops up often is when hiring is paused. The roles are still open and will be filled, but not immediately. In an event like this, Kula can defer the candidates with a customized message and remove them from the hiring pipeline for the length of time that you decide. You can later automatically fetch them back at a specified date and restart the process with a message.

3. Automatic job ad creation and posting 

There are generally three elements to posting a job:

• The actual job post 
• The career page for candidates to apply 
• The platforms on which you choose to advertise the job opening

Kula ATS can take care of all aspects by:

• Efficiently write job posts with ready-made templates that you can apply company branding to 
• Quickly publish a branded career page with an out-of-box career page builder 
• Automate job ad dispersal on high-visibility platforms and search engines at no extra cost

You might not think of templates and AI as automation, but they drastically speed up job post creation! With Kula, you can whip up branded listings in minutes.  Plus, our career page builder lets you launch a polished page in days instead of the usual months-long development process.

Kula ATS also eliminates the tedious task of manually posting jobs to multiple sites and paying individual fees.  Its automation instantly distributes your job postings across platforms like Indeed, Google Jobs, Glassdoor, and more – without additional effort or cost.

Screening 

With a strong applicant pool established, what screening tasks can be automated for more effective and scalable evaluations?

4. Automate candidate advancement after screening 

When you’re screening profiles to determine if they meet basic qualifications to advance in the process, you’re going through every application manually. Is this process sustainable and error-free?

The idea with automation is to set up rules that will automatically advance candidates who pass the initial screening criteria to the next stage without human review.

For example, the Kula can be configured to:

• Auto-advance candidates with 5+ years of experience in senior roles
• Auto-advance candidates with specific skill keywords or certifications
• Auto-advance candidates who completed a qualifying assessment

As soon as the platform detects a candidate meets preset screening criteria, it can move them into a phone screening or video interview without any action needed from you. 

This also ensures qualified applicants don't slip through the cracks.

You can now focus on more strategic hiring tasks than basic application reviews.

5. Cut down on workload with one-way interviewing

Let’s take automation one step further. Can we skip those initial screening calls? 

Yes! Kula ATS lets you streamline further with one-way recorded interviews. Candidates answer your preset questions via video on their own schedule, saving you from countless live calls.  Then, you simply review the best submissions before moving forward with in-person interviews.

This brings several key benefits, such as:

• Reduces your workload by eliminating real-time call coordination
• Enables candidates to interview on their flexible schedule
• Allows batch review of submissions to identify the best candidates

Kula ATS’ automation can also handle the process of sending questions, prompting candidates to record responses, compiling submissions, and sharing with reviewers.

6. Use conversational analytics to pick up on subtle cues 

AI conversational analytics can ingest audio or video interviews and identify subtle verbal and non-verbal cues that may indicate a promising candidate. These aspects a human recruiter may easily miss.

Here are some examples of insightful cues Kula’s algorithms can pick up:

• Word choice signaling strategic thinking or creativity
• Confident tone demonstrating leadership skills
• Facial expressions showing authentic enthusiasm
• Hand gestures highlighting engaging communication

While small details might seem insignificant,  AI conversational analytics can analyze thousands of subtle speech and visual cues. This reveals how candidates think, connect ideas, and present themselves – going far beyond the simple content of their answers.  This way, automation helps you quickly identify top talent based on these deeper insights.

Scheduling 

Eliminate the headaches through automation that enables candidate self-booking, syncs calendars, and prevents double-booking.

7. Enable candidates to self-schedule 

Emailing back and forth to find times that work for all parties is exhausting, especially when you have to coordinate with the candidate and a third party.

Self-scheduling automation allows candidates to sign up directly for open interview slots themselves without zero assistance from your team. 

When you invite candidates to interview, they receive a link to a real-time calendar showing pre-set available times you configured. They can select an open slot like an online appointment booking system.

Behind the scenes, the Kula ATS platform can automatically:

• Sync interviewers’ calendars to identify scheduling conflicts
• Release certain time slots for candidates to select openings
• Send candidates a confirmation of their booked times
• Add the meeting to all attendees’ calendars

This self-service scheduling streamlines the complex back and forth of email tags.

8. Automatic calendar syncing for interviewers

Scheduling interviews requires finding a time that works for the candidate and the hiring manager involved. 

Calendar syncing can continuously and automatically sync the interviewer’s calendars in the background. This identifies meetings already booked and any availability conflicts between internal staff.

For example, if a recruiter is scheduling a coding interview with two engineering managers, Kula ATS would:

• Sync both managers’ calendars automatically
• Show the recruiter common openings those two are jointly available
• Allow booking an available slot directly, factoring in existing meetings
• Add the interview to both calendars automatically

Even if candidates self-schedule from open slots, the system ensures not to double-book interviewers. And any last-minute meetings staff add get reflected to prevent overlaps.

9. Assign tasks and delegate responsibilities 

Tracking hiring tasks manually is a recipe for inefficiency.  Assigning tasks with due dates is a step up, but the real win is automating the assignment process itself.

Customizable rules can trigger automated alerts and assign steps to relevant staff for any hiring stage. For example:

• When candidates reach the screening stage > Assign screening tasks to recruiters
• When references are submitted > Assign reference check to coordinator
• When the offer is signed > Assign paperwork collection to the HR associate

With Kula ATS, you can set due dates that automatically notify assignees to complete items and update the status as they work. Overdue tasks escalate alerts as needed.

Rather than manually inspecting checklists, the system proactively pushes progress notifications and reminders based on configured rules. This keeps everyone accountable without constant checking up.

This would ensure that:

• Tasks consistently assigned to the right people
• Due dates and notifications prevent dropping balls
• Transparency into real-time progress for all users

By leveraging assignment automation and reminders, critical hiring tasks can run on auto-pilot while you remain the overseer of the process.

Interviewing 

With a strong applicant pool established, what screening tasks can be automated for more effective and scalable evaluations?

10. Automate interview and feedback reminders 

Scheduling interviews is one thing, but ensuring all parties attend is another matter. Overloaded hiring managers who have back-to-back meetings often get their timings mixed up. 

To help with this, automation can send timely interview reminders. With Kula ATS, rules can be set up to:

• Send confirmation emails to candidates when meetings get booked
• Trigger reminder emails to candidates 24 hours before scheduled times
• Notify internal recruiters and interviewers one day ahead 

By automatically sending templatized reminders through candidates' preferred communication channels leading up to the interview, attendance rates improve.

Overwhelmed hiring managers also take time to give you feedback. With the help of Kula ATS’ AI-driven note-taking, conversational AI, and feedback reminders, they can get back to you much faster than before. This is how the reminders would work:

• Send an automated debrief request to interviewers asking for feedback within 24 hours
• If no response after one day, auto-nudge stakeholders to submit comments
• Escalate an alert to the recruiting team if feedback is still not received after 48 hours

This way, you have complete visibility if assessments lag without much checking in. 

11. Send interview context with resumes and assessments 

You need to understand the candidate's background and progress to conduct successful interviews. However, prepping for interviews is often an afterthought, with interviewers scrambling at the last minute.

You can automate collating and sending relevant candidate documents and data to interviewers at a scheduled time, say 20 minutes before a meeting. 

Based on set rules, the platform can automatically compile and email the following with calendar invites:

• Candidate resume & application info
• Completed assessments or work samples
• Notes from previous interview rounds

This packages everything interviewers need to review ahead of meetings at their convenience without manual coordination from you.

Emailing candidate context and shared history leading up to scheduled discussions results in:

• More tailored, personalized conversations
• Deeper insights tying together all evaluations
• A more informed interview team all around

Onboarding 

Make the vital first weeks frictionless through automation that handles rote tasks like paperwork, policy reviews, equipment, and systems access.

12. Send out candidate communications automatically 

Once a candidate accepts an offer, getting them accurately onboarded with paperwork, company policies, and logins can bog down your teams. However, automation rules can trigger the necessary onboarding communications.

For example, when an accepted offer is logged in the system, it can automatically:

• Email personalized offer letters with details requiring signatures
• Email links to HR paperwork that must be completed
• Email employee handbooks, workplace regulations, etc
• Email IT credentials setting up corporate logins/email
• Schedule calendar invites for orientation sessions

Additional templated emails can also be sent leading up to start dates with first-week prep materials, recommended reading, introductions to key contacts, and more.

Automating these administrative candidate communications leads to a more polished welcome for the incoming team member.

Automate the busywork with Kula’s ATS

Automation delivers major advantages across sourcing, screening, scheduling, interviewing, and onboarding. The key is to identify administrative bottlenecks and configure rules and triggers to eliminate repetitive tasks. This provides visibility into pipelines, keeps candidates engaged, and advances processes—helping scale your talent strategy quickly. 

As outlined in these examples, Kula ATS can be the most suitable end-to-end tool that makes your recruitment automation accessible. 

Want to learn more about Kula’s benefits? 

Schedule a demo today!