Recruit Roadmap - Candidate portal UX enhancements

This article covers the key high-level changes clients can expect when our new Candidate portal user experience product update goes live. Deployments of the upgrade to clients are expected to start in May 2020.

This Kallidus Recruit release is the culmination of many months of research and testing to improve nearly every user journey for candidates within the Kallidus Recruit Candidate portal.

In addition to the many highlights described below, there are also a whole bunch of minor improvements in all sorts of areas, which have been made following extensive UX testing with real people - from how the pagination works when navigating between multiple pages of vacancies, to the main navigation.

This update is really going to massively improve the candidate experience for all clients, make it quicker and easier for candidates to apply and to perform required actions throughout the recruitment process.

We will be in touch with more detail and specific dates for your system very soon.

We hope you're all as excited as we are about this project going live for you!

Vacancy search/list page

1. Use of new iconography
2. New easier and clearer search and sorting behaviour with combined filters
3. New option to display miles for distances instead of kilometres after doing a location search
4. Dedicated tiles for greater visibility of talent community/general applications and job alerts

5. New vacancy list - tile mode configuration option showing vacancies as tiles with short descriptions

Vacancy details page

1. Location information displayed in title bar
2. Apply button at both top and bottom to better support candidates landing on this page from job boards where they've already read the description
3. Standard vacancy sharing options to make it easier for people to spread the word
4. New iconography

Streamlined application process

1. Enhanced inline registration options (no password required) - good for quick and easy applications to vacancies using short application forms
   
2. New inline registration options (no password required) for making a general/speculative application and when signing up for job alerts
   
3. For longer forms, start an application by just entering an email address or social sign-in, with intelligent routing based on whether the candidate already exists or not, has a password already or not, etc.
   
4. Option to pre-fill application form using an uploaded CV (using parsing if already configured) or a previous application at any time
   
5. For multi-page forms, new visible progress indication in both the side navigation and on a revised Summary page
   
6. New clear confirmation pages on completing an application (general or to a vacancy) and when signing up to job alerts
   
7. Improved form fields, e.g. searchable, multi-select lists (see job alerts screenshot above) and drag and drop/immediate document uploads (below) - no more double clicking to select a file first, then a separate click to upload the document
   

New email verification and improved email validation

1. Optional email verification - helps to ensure candidates are using valid, working email addresses
   
   N.B. No barriers to applications, even if email verification enabled - candidates can always apply, but will need to verify their email address to access their dashboard and additional functionality if they login subsequently.
   
2. Improved email validation - the general format of email addresses is validated and unintentional leading and trailing blank spaces are stripped out automatically
   
   
3. Email verification bypass option for Recruiters - to help with candidate support if necessary
   
4. Recruiter visibility of verified and unverified email addresses or who has had verification bypassed
   

Improved "My applications" dashboard with clearer calls to action

1. Simpler, focused navigation once logged in - relates only to application/profile-related activities
2. Prioritised actions across all applications displayed at the top - the actions related to vacancies with the latest activity and/or which are nearest the point of hire are prioritised, rather than displaying all actions for all vacancies at the top as is the case currently
3. General/Speculative application submission and updating direct from the dashboard
4. Direct access to and clearer calls to action for each active application

Interview scheduling

1. Clearer call to action to choose a slot when a candidate is scheduled to an interview
   
2. Improved slot selection page, with function to filter by preferred date(s), time(s) and/or location(s)
   
3. Selected interview date and time clearly visible on dashboard, with dedicated change slot option (candidates may reschedule their own interview up to the point a candidate is locked in a slot, based on your configuration)
   
4. Clear signposting of currently selected slot and up to when a candidates may reschedule themselves when re-selecting slots
   

Combined General application/Talent bank profile

1. Previously, when a candidate was added to the talent bank, any candidate-facing preferences were entirely separate to their general profile preferences. The general profile now just converts to a talent bank profile automatically, with all the information managed in once place.
   
   N.B. The classifications selected by the client remain client-facing only and do not need to be displayed to the candidate.
   
   
2. When a candidate submits a general application, a submission acknowledgement email will now automatically be sent - clients may edit this as required via self-service
   
3. When a candidate is added to the talent bank for the first time, a notification email will automatically be sent - clients may edit this as required via self-service
   

Direct link to unsubscribe from job alerts with no login required

1. Job alerts emails may now include a link to unsubscribe directly, with no requirement for the candidate to login to do so
2. New unsubscribe page to allow candidates to unsubscribe directly from a link in an email or to update their preferences
   

Talent pool CRM improvements

1. Automated "Keep warm" or vacancy invitation emails to people in your talent pool may now include links to allow candidates to confirm that they are still interested and happy to be in your talent pool, with no login required to confirm
2. New Confirm preferences page to allow candidates to confirm preferences directly from a link in an email or to go to their account to update their preferences (login required to update preferences, but email pre-populated when logging in)
   

New Kallidus cross-product Cookie preference settings

1. Cookie preference panel automatically pops up on first visit if no Kallidus cookie preferences yet saved
   
   N.B. If Analytics cookies are turned off by the candidate, all Google Analytics and custom tracking event codes will be automatically disabled.
   
   
2. Standard link to cookie policy page in footer (from where candidates may change their current Kallidus cookie preferences at any time)
   

New standard Kallidus design theme

The above screenshots are all taken using a new Candidate portal design theme, developed especially to take maximum advantage of all the improvements made. The new design has been extensively tested to ensure that all functionality is as intuitive and easy to use as possible. Whilst other existing themes will incorporate all the above enhancements from a functionality perspective, the design itself is implemented in its purest and most easy-to-use form in the new theme.

Clients may therefore wish to consider switching to the new theme at some point after the update goes live to make the best use of the new design. The new theme allows simple configuration of the following:

• Theme colour (the blue colour in the above screenshots)
• Text colour on theme colour backgrounds (white in the above screenshots)
• Primary buttons background colour (the orange colour in the above screenshots)
• Primary buttons text colour (white in the above screenshots)
• Banner image (used on the Vacancy search page and other brochure pages, but no longer on other pages - keeps candidates focused on the important content and what they need to do, without having to scroll down all the time)
• Banner image height

We will, in future, add further options to the above, based on feedback from clients, so let us know what you'd like!