Democratizing Hiring Tech with No-Code Platforms

By Perry Oostdam, CEO and co-founder of Recruitee

As companies around the world rapidly adapted to remote workflows at the beginning of 2020, many HR and recruitment organizations also had to use new collaboration, and information management systems for the first time. These platforms needed to be lean, easily deployable, affordable, and rapidly scale. Teams also had to adapt quickly and be able to use these new tools in ways they hadn’t before.

For many organizations, it quickly became apparent that no-code hiring platforms were a good solution. In Human Resources, no-code platforms allow all team members to create, adapt, and streamline their workflows within a scalable online platform without the need for outside help from IT. Needless to say, this is a very liberating idea for lean teams who want to work quickly and efficiently.

This article will dig into the world of no-code HR platforms, and provide insights on how to use them.

What is no-code tech?

No-code tech is a term used in the software industry to describe tools that require little-to-no programming or technical expertise to use or master. They typically involve simple drag and drop functionality and easy-to-use graphical user interfaces that rely on images and icons to create user outputs rather than code.

No-code platforms have exploded in popularity in recent years across many different industries. The goal with each of these platforms is the same: to make it easier for individual workers and teams to do their jobs, and to remove the coding barrier that often makes that difficult.

What such platforms have in common is that they’re customizable to individual and team needs without help from the IT department. Because of this, virtually anyone can use these platforms to create their own apps, automation, workflows, and so on.

In the context of recruitment, no-code platforms are quickly being used to replace disparate and often clunky tools used for:

• Sourcing candidates
• Writing job descriptions and requirements
• Building careers site
• Communicating with candidates
• Collaborating with team members
• Onboarding new hires

Previously, each of the above tasks would likely be completed using some combination of spreadsheets, Word documents, outsourced help from a web team, and email. With no-code tech, all of these tasks and workflows can be centralized into one easy-to-use platform.

What are the benefits of no-code hiring tech?

The overarching benefit of no-code hiring tech for HR and recruiting staff is that it lets any team member – regardless of technical competency – learn and use the software quickly.

Onboarding these platforms is fast because they are designed to be intuitive and easy to use. Because of that, transitioning from old platforms or workflows is quite seamless, allowing teams to pivot rapidly but also maintain their level of output as they do so.

Once the platforms are up and running, the benefits of no-code HR tech are many, including:

1. Reducing manual tasks. No-code hiring platforms are specifically designed to automate and streamline time-intensive and manual tasks. With minimal set-up and testing, manual tasks like parsing resumes, sending the invitation and follow-up emails, and assigning tasks can all be automated on a rolling basis as new job openings occur. And, as individuals become more proficient on the platforms over time, they too can identify areas in their own jobs that can be automated or streamlined via the platform.
2. Removing the need to rely on IT. While everyone loves working with IT, relying on an external partner every time you want to customize a page or workflow can be a major efficiency drag. No-code hiring tech removes those requirements, allowing HR teams to solve their own technical problems and own their own outputs.
3. Enabling templated workflows. Almost all no-code HR software comes with out-of-the-box templates that can be used to quickly create, duplicate, and deploy:
   1. Hiring workflows
   2. Onboarding or training material
   3. Careers sites
   4. Job descriptions and recruitment ads
   5. Job offer processes
   6. Communication cadences and automations
4. Reducing cost to the company. No-code tech reduces or eliminates the need to have dedicated software for each specific workflow. It also removes the need to have dedicated software developers, IT staff, or outside consultants on the payroll to help maintain a cumbersome system. As such, no-code tech can accommodate virtually any HR technology budget. In fact, many such platforms can be purchased for as little as $25 per user per month.
5. Providing fully customizable work experiences. HR and recruitment staff can choose which features, workflows, and automation they want to include in their daily tasks. This is compared to larger (and bulkier) HR teach suites that often have a “kitchen sink” list of features that can be confusing and overwhelming for new users. Because the barrier to entry is so low with no-code tech, individual users are quickly able to customize the platform to fit their needs and abilities.
6. Providing the ability to scale as needed. No-code hiring tech can be easily scaled as your company grows. Scalability here applies to both cost and new user onboarding due to the simplicity and low-cost benefits mentioned above.
7. Freeing up time to be strategic. Lastly, anyone in recruitment will attest to the fact they’ve spent many hours on manual, repetitive, and, ultimately, low-impact tasks. This is true of many positions, but the volume of these tasks is quite significant in recruitment. By automating and streamlining these workflows, recruiters have much more free time to think strategically, network with candidates, and perform the high-impact work that often gets swept under the rug.

The benefits of these platforms are apparent, but there is always the challenge of deciding where and how to deploy them within an organization.

How to use no-code tech in human resources

The specific use cases your company will receive from a no-code HR platform depends on the features and functionalities of the platform that you choose, and the workflows you currently have in place.

If you’re like many HR organizations, there’s likely a number of redundant applications or processes that could be replaced or streamlined using a no-code platform.

In a recent interview with SHRM, Trevor White, a research manager for Nucleus Research in Boston, said, “Part of the reason I think HR presents such an opportunity for this technology is there is a sweet spot of a lot of manual, spreadsheet-based processes and a lot of users without a technical background.”  

In other words: the combination of cumbersome processes and lagging tech competencies in many HR teams make no-code tech a major opportunity for organizations to streamline and scale their processes.

To expand on White’s point, here are some common areas of HR and recruitment in which no-code tech thrives:

• Building careers sites. Many platforms include easy-to-use drag and drop modules that allow recruiters to build, edit, and deploy careers sites and employer branding content to the web. This allows recruiters to take charge over what type of content is included on the careers site, without having to rely solely on marketing or IT for help.
• Building the application process. Likewise, these platforms allow recruiters to get very hands-on with specifying all of the different entry points, user flows, and touchpoints that a candidate will experience in the application process. This can include automating responses and invitations based on the result of steps like resume parsing and shortlisting.
• New-hire onboarding. A large component of onboarding is managing all of the paperwork and briefing material before the new hire’s first day of work. No-code platforms can be set up to send automated emails when a “hire” trigger is hit that sends all required onboarding forms. Likewise, automated emails can be sent in the lead up to the candidate’s first day, letting them know what to expect. This keeps the lines of communication open when the candidate accepts an offer and starts the job.
• Creating structured interview frameworks. Standardizing interview questions and scoring is a key component of scaling an agile recruitment process. No-code platforms allow you to create and disseminate lists of screening questions, structured interview scorecards, and weighting metrics that will help ensure that all candidates receive fair and objective considerations.
• Creating analytics dashboards. Most no-code HR platforms contain out-of-the-box or customizable templates to track key recruitment and talent analytics. This allows HR staff to easily drag and drop charts, tables, and counters into a digital canvas that is “always-on” for members of the leadership team. Dashboards like this ensure that all staff are aware of key metrics at all times, making it easier and more efficient to make strategic decisions.
• Reducing back-and-forth emails. The ability to upload and store files in a centralized location, chat in real time between co-workers, and automate invitations and messages are all major advantages offered by no-code HR tech. All of these features reduce the time spent sending emails between colleagues and make it significantly easier to keep track of key documents.
• Developing and deploying surveys. Most no-code HR platforms contain templates for surveys that measure staff engagement, performance, and general feedback. These systems can be used to quickly create and send new surveys to your staff, and to collect and analyze the results. All within one platform.

In a nutshell, no-code tech is an ideal solution for any tasks or workflows that require manual document management, emails, and repeated touchpoints between departments or with candidates.

No-code tech and collaborative hiring

There’s a natural alignment between no-code hiring tech and the growing practice of collaborative hiring. If you’re not familiar with collaborative hiring, it’s essentially the idea of hiring by committee rather than the decision just coming from the hiring manager.

As mentioned throughout this article, no-code hiring tech allows everyone at an organization to be onboarded into the process with little-to-no training. This is a game-changer for companies looking to scale collaborative hiring across the organization. To do so, you need the right tools. But those tools need to be easy and intuitive so that anyone can use them at any time.

That’s the benefit of no-code hiring tech for collaborative hiring.

They allow you to quickly and easily incorporate outside team members into the process who may not be familiar with your platform or workflows. With a little bit of training – which can be templated and recycled through the platform itself – new team members are up to speed in no time.

Compare that to the larger and more complex HR tech platforms. This same process would take much longer and require more effort. The result is slower time-to-productivity, longer hiring cycles, and yet more time spent by the recruiter on training.

No-code hiring tech eliminates that issue, allowing collaborative teams to form quickly and work in an agile fashion with limited roadblocks. The benefits to this, of course, are many:

• Team members can be included in the hiring process as needed
• Collaboration and commentary between team members is easier and more efficient
• The hiring team has visibility into who is in the hiring funnel
• Decisions on who to hire are made by committee, rather than by one person
• Everyone on the team has a say in the final hiring decision
• Onboarding the candidate is easier, and time-to-productivity is shorter

The ultimate goal of no-code tech is a simple one: to remove complexity in favor of ease-of-use and productivity. For any HR organization struggling under mountains of repetitive tasks, too many applications, or too much complexity in their tech stack, no-code platforms are a great solution.

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About the Author

Perry Oostdam is the CEO and Co-Founder of Recruitee a collaborative hiring software for global talent acquisition. With a passion for tech and scaling teams, he has been active in the SaaS space as a founder, advisor, and investor. Perry believes in the power of HR tech to help revolutionize the way companies and teams grow. In addition to Recruitee, Perry has co-founded two other startups: GeoRun and Quality Technology. He is also dedicated to mentoring early-stage startup founders by actively participating in Rockstart, one of Europe’s first startup accelerators.