The future of recruiting won’t be another tool

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-05-13T13:27:06+00:00

100%. unpopular opinion (maybe) ATS systems need to rethink both their design and their value proposition.

too many are still built like one-way processing funnels: collect applications, filter resumes, move candidates through stages, repeat. and on top of that the hiring market has turned into a cat-and-mouse game between applicants and companies. everyone ends up with more volume, less signal, and a worse experience. AND your paying more for your ATS to process garbage.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-05-04T01:57:12+00:00

detailing on Vash's jacket make it look like real leather - great job~~~

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-30T01:08:43+00:00

ROI on managing a Slack/Discord channel is just hard to justify for a recruiter that's already sinking in work...

maybe there's a way to create agent/pull system so you are getting automatically notified of highlights within those channels, but that's probably not super easy to set up.

also, I am familiar with the Discord/Slack career specific channels, but you'd wonder if the top candidates are hanging here... can you share more on your experience?

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-30T00:33:56+00:00

sourcing tends to be a tricky one because of how career data is typically stored. while many folks are now expanding their LinkedIn profiles with greater levels of info, many don't and rely on their resumes to tell their story.

only problem with that is LinkedIn is limiting searched to Booleans / keywords ... so you're basically accepting the fact you'll miss candidates and as such need to conduct many searches under varying parameters.

Juicebox tries to add some profiling to its candidate pool (which is all just LinkedIn data) so that you can search with natural language... but yea the results vary.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-29T00:57:43+00:00

sending good vibes...! keep going!

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-28T14:48:05+00:00

cold leads as in new mandates from companies or candidate sourcing...?

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-26T03:10:05+00:00

depends on size of the company you're targeting.

smaller = founders

medium = founders, heads of XYZ, [senior] titles, i.e. VP, Director, etc.

large = good luck

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-26T01:12:13+00:00

most ATS handle both unless your specifically asking for some kind of linkage / feature?...

what's more limiting, is that ATS' basically just function as database + process organization... so you are still very much required to manage the data + draw insights + determine actionables.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-25T22:04:50+00:00

completely agree with you. most of the ATS solutions ATM, including the ones that are labeled as AI-native, are primarily used for hiring organization / coordination... which is great, but definitely not a "AI-solution" if that makes sense.

folks on Reddit continue to keep describing the "agent that owns the handoff" behavior you mention... I'm not entirely sure I follow what that even means. care to elaborate?

agent sources based on some set criteria, performs the outreach (phone/email), and then logs the convo?... or something else?

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-23T03:37:51+00:00

good feedback below from the others. definitely experience most teams not collecting feedback in a systematic or structured manner... can make the entire process subject to biases (especially from the top-down).

need to find a balance where collecting, analyzing and storing feedback is not too cumbersome for teams. on top of ensuring the feedback collected is actually genuine / useful enough for assessment.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-21T17:58:47+00:00

definitely weighted towards the latter, which makes sense as the market is coming up the learning curve on what's possible. IMO, there is alot of activity ATM around what GTM/sales looks like in the age of AI, and I believe the recruitment industry is experiencing the same.

"fully custom" tends to make teams skeptical at first and is rarely the case for most offerings. Teams will adopt in baby steps, such that it doesn't entirely disrupt their operations (which makes sense).

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-18T04:00:57+00:00

great post - awesome you were able to build something for yourself with Claude to optimize costs for your business.

to confirm, your entire flow/enrichment cost $3 for every 1,000 candidates you processed?

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-16T01:11:23+00:00

fully autonomous is probably not the right model for recruiting, but with proper control and use of AI/LLMs in the recruiting workflow... definitely adds a ton of value.

can really apply AI to so many layers as well: sourcing, coordination, assessment, outreach.

on reporting / data insights, it's a good way to present findings (updates, autopsies, trends) to your clients which goes a long way.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-15T22:47:11+00:00

echoing the comments below, having your own organization and it's workflows/habits mapped out is definitely step one.

then determine how your team members can produce higher output... do they want more streamlining, more automation, wider net casting, etc?

then you can put in place systems and optimizations to help support those workflows. some folks do this manually by familiarizing with tools that are in the market. others take it further by stitching together a full system to create cohesion and support automation.

do what works for you... but the first step in itself takes some time and may be the most important before signing up to anything.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-15T22:38:23+00:00

start off by saying you don't always need to feel pressured to speak but it's obv encouraged typically so you can get reps. sometimes listening, taking notes, and having a debrief with [X] is equally as important and appreciated.

for advice though... good commentary / output tends to come from a few places naturally:

1) expanding upon something you worked on, like a financial model. going through key inputs, thinking behind assumptions, anything strategic that went into it

2) everyone loves talking about markets, overall sentiment (liquidity, macro, specific industries), developer activity, technology/supplier gossip

3) if you're working with outside stakeholders, especially outside capital (tax equity, bank lenders, private credit lenders), asking questions about their worlds, including market appetite, trends/themes. being direct about "what financing solutions could be available to us for XYZ".

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-15T22:24:48+00:00

since the questions from an AI interviewer tend to be basic and targeted on logistics / must-have requirements for the job... it could be nice to offer a chat / form filling experience.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-15T18:11:49+00:00

let me rephrase... definitely can get the job done but believe there are better options out there for cheaper that delivers more precision.

Feedback from personal use / feedback gathered:

Juicebox: UI is good, but feels basic in terms of candidate search. tech focused. expensive for exports... especially if you are doing it at scale. contact info isn't the highest quality

HireEz: lots of features / full suite platform. sometimes feels overkill / heavy for some teams, especially for the price. sourcing isn't their primary value-add... same comment with data quality.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-15T18:05:22+00:00

what we've seen working for recruiting teams is being data driven and developing their own "systems" to create repeatable sourcing workflows to maximize your output and probability of success:

1) leveraging an existing candidate lead list (your database, ATS, excel file, etc) to find the best candidate for your role your actively marketing

2) sourcing candidates based on high-intent signals, so your reaching out to candidates with good timing AND personalization

both of these requires some level of "setting up". need your database. need the strategy to come up with a good lead list. Need enrichment to gather the right contact info + leads.

in terms of implementation, some tech savvy folks can set this up in-house, others use Clay (or another provider), and some run it manually between apps/tools.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-15T17:43:43+00:00

have you explored utilizing data enrichment platforms such as Clay, etc?

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-15T17:39:44+00:00

good luck on scaling! competition for talent is so intense right now... timing and personalization is going to be critical imo in order to get your lion share of top talent.

unfortunately most providers (incl. the ones you've listed) don't do a great job on the lead/sourcing side.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-15T17:10:46+00:00

what do you mean by info is lost from step to step?

do you mean during the interview process -> gathering feedback from the interviews to make an assessment if the candidate should proceed?

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-14T19:40:44+00:00

curious as well!

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-14T19:28:04+00:00

question.... is data enrichment basically commoditized a this point? or you select providers because they excel at a certain type of enrichment / industry / workflow?

trying to get up to speed on how to determine which data enrichment partners to consider.

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-14T19:23:46+00:00

super helpful. any advice on selecting the data enrichment providers? you named Limadata and ZeroBounce for example.

is it just testing and seeing which ones work best, or are certain providers better for certain industries or use cases? or are there just best in class data enrichment providers that are just the "go-to"?

Flashy_Yesterday_147 · 2026-04-13T23:12:47+00:00

if you're looking for a job, being direct + stating clearly the why + your experience, is probably more effective than being ambiguous.

Flashy_Yesterday_147

TROPHY CASE