Imagine: You’ve got a job opening, and you’re swamped with a massive pool of candidates – but you don’t have the time or resources to sift through all of them to find a perfect fit. That’s exactly what Jason Hilton, Director of UX for Avionté, faced when hiring an entry-level product designer. He had a whopping 1,100 applications to go through, and realistically, would have only been able to review a limited number of candidates. This means that most of the resumes submitted would never even have gotten a look.
Being a prominent supplier of staffing and recruiting software focused on simplifying recruiters’ responsibilities and enriching the talent experience, Avionté acquired the PIXEL platform. This acquisition paved the way for the birth of Avionté PIXEL – an advanced chatbot powered by natural language processing. Seamlessly integrated with AviontéBOLD and the Avionté 24/7 mobile platform, Avionté PIXEL serves as a true recruiter’s assistant, helping to swiftly pinpoint best-fit candidates through automated interview questions, timely notifications, reminders, and crucial correspondence.
Video: Overview of Avionté PIXEL chatbot candidate screening conversation with workflow into AviontéBOLD.
So, we had an idea. Why not put Avionté PIXEL to the test to see if it could help us reduce the manual process associated with finding the ideal applicant for the open Associate Product Designer role? With the help of this advanced technology, Jason and our HR team were able to efficiently narrow down a very large pool of applicants to find – and successfully hire – the right candidate to fill the role.
“Any reputable company that believes in its products should be able to leverage them effectively,” says Jason Hilton.
When Jason joined Avionté, he was tasked with an exciting mission—to help revolutionize how recruiters identify and connect with potential candidates using our cutting-edge chatbot, Avionté PIXEL.
But, as Jason was working on this project, he faced an unexpected challenge when searching for an entry-level product designer to join his team. To his surprise, he received an overwhelming number of applications, nearly 1,100, for the role.
Managing such a high volume of applicants would typically be quite time-consuming and resource intensive, making it difficult to find the ideal candidate in a sea of applications. In today’s fast-paced world, where job seekers have limited time and numerous options, having a tool that can swiftly connect with a vast pool of talent, identify the best candidates for specific roles, and enable instant engagement and communication would be a game-changer in the search for the best-fit candidate.
“For most organizations, there is a need to get someone in the role quickly,” said Matt Movern, VP of Human Resources at Avionté. “So, if you’re able to eliminate or automate steps that are highly manual, you’re going to give yourself the opportunity to fill that role quickly and in a highly efficient manner.”
So, how did Jason and the HR team sift through almost 1,100 applications to find the perfect candidate for the role? They used this opportunity to internally leverage Avionté PIXEL’s capabilities on a larger scale.
Avionté PIXEL is a highly customizable talent engagement tool that allows recruiters to tailor questions asked during the pre-screening process and determine how candidate responses are evaluated for questions that require a definitive answer.
Avionté PIXEL essentially acts as a recruiter’s assistant, enabling them to design interviews and personalize automated communications that are immediately sent via chat message to a candidates’ phone upon application.
Here are some key features that set Avionté PIXEL apart:
By empowering candidates to interact with Avionté PIXEL through their phones, agencies can attract a broader pool of interested individuals who can effortlessly engage with the chatbot anytime, anywhere, directly from their mobile devices, making the entire process quick and convenient.
“Candidates are often applying for numerous positions, so if they get a response to their application right away and can undergo a quick interview on their phone – whether on the bus or in a coffee shop – that right there is ultimate engagement with talent,” said Jason.
Avionté PIXEL also enables recruiters to nurture candidate engagement throughout the entire talent lifecycle by automating a range of actions. These actions include scheduling interviews, sending first-day reminders, and personalized birthday messages to streamline the hiring process and foster a sense of connection and appreciation while also saving the recruiter’s valuable time.
Through careful collaboration and iterative testing, Jason and the HR team devised a set of pre-screening interview questions to effectively filter candidates based on necessary job requirements. The first set of questions required straightforward responses, designed to assess specific qualifications necessary to fulfill the role. By assigning weight and rank to these crucial qualifications, Avionté PIXEL could score each applicant to help quickly identify the best candidates who met specific criteria.
According to Matt: “Talent has many options, so recruiters must be able to swiftly gather data, take immediate action, and engage the right candidates as quickly as possible to compete for their interest. The dashboard views are immensely valuable for promptly identifying and engaging with those top candidates to move them through the process and fill any open positions – especially when dealing with a high volume of applicants.”
Then, by incorporating more open-ended questions and the live chat feature, they were able to locate those candidates who also had the ideal blend of crucial, but intangible, qualities and personality traits like enthusiasm, work ethic, and creativity—attributes vital for thriving in a dynamic and highly creative role.
In fact, the chatbot played a pivotal role in discovering an exceptional candidate, Kimberly Abakah, who might have otherwise been overlooked. The incorporation of open-ended questions within the bot interview provided candidates like Kimberly with the opportunity to showcase their intelligence and creativity, enabling them to stand out beyond a mere checklist of experience.
“During my job search, I applied to over 200 roles. After encountering many faulty job applications and screening processes, I began to think about how companies say they value a good user experience, but don’t make the job application process very user-friendly for candidates. This was the first position I applied for that featured a bot. PIXEL allowed me to answer questions in a way that spoke to my personality and intelligence. It made the process very engaging and gave me the impression that Avionté cared more about the type of person I was, and whether our approaches aligned, than solely focusing on specific job experience.”
Kimberly AbakahAssociate Product Designer, Avionté
Kimberly also used the live chat feature while completing her interview and was able to engage directly with Jason, initiating a valuable back-and-forth conversation that set her apart from the crowded field of applicants. Through these interactions, Jason recognized the perfect balance of skills and personality traits that would ensure her success in the position and was able to hire for the job.
“Before PIXEL, some people wouldn’t have gotten noticed, and some people might have gotten more attention than they deserved. Kimberly wouldn’t have even been on my radar if we used more manual recruiting methods,” said Jason.
Thus, the combination of technology and human interaction facilitated by Avionté PIXEL enabled Jason and Avionté to streamline their hiring process, attract the right candidates faster, and create a less stressful and more engaging experience for all stakeholders involved.
In the competitive talent race, speed and engagement are vital for sourcing the right candidates, capturing their interest, and filling critical roles swiftly.
With Avionté PIXEL’s assistance, Jason and the HR team accelerated their hiring process, saving valuable time in candidate sourcing by leveraging the chatbot’s unique, customizable features and live chat function to pinpoint the perfect candidate — even amidst fierce competition. And with the ability to quickly identify and engage with this candidate, they were able to fill this critical role.
“Recruiters don’t have unlimited time,” said Matt. “And to have a tool like PIXEL which can make you more efficient and focused, so you can spend valuable time with the right types of candidates, is a significant value-add for recruiters – and the efficiencies recruiters are going to gain from this are game-changing!”
Having tested the product in our recruitment process, we confidently deliver this innovative solution that revolutionizes efficiency and time-savings for recruiters, while providing a more engaging experience for candidates.
According to Kimberly: “AI (Artificial Intelligence) itself is evolving rapidly, and it’s important to remain faithful to the idea of improving human connection through these tools. PIXEL is an instrumental step to changing the experience surrounding a process that’s had so many challenges.”
