Recruitment Pipeline for Agencies

Agencies are good at pipelines right up until the pipeline contains people. The same business that would never let a qualified inbound lead sit unanswered for nine days will leave a strong designer's application in a shared inbox for two weeks, because hiring is nobody's actual job. The job spec goes out, applications arrive in four different places, someone skims them between client calls, three get a reply, the rest get silence, and six weeks later the role is still open and the team is still short.

The specific failures are mechanical, not moral. Applications land across email, a job board, LinkedIn messages and a form on the careers page, so there is no single list and no way to compare. Screening is done from memory, so two people reading the same CV apply different standards and neither writes down why. Interviews get booked over email ping-pong, which is where the best candidates drop out, because they are interviewing elsewhere with a company that replied in an hour. Skills tasks get sent and then forgotten, with no deadline and no chase. Interviewers leave the room with an impression and never fill in a scorecard, so the hiring decision is made by whoever speaks most confidently in the debrief. And the people you said no to are deleted, when a third of them were good enough to hire for a different role six months later.

The leak is twofold. First, slow process costs you the candidates you most wanted, and you never find out, because they simply accept somewhere else. Second, every week a role stays open is a week of work the agency either turns away, pushes onto the people who are already there, or subcontracts at worse margin. A hiring pipeline built with the same rigour as a sales pipeline closes both gaps: every applicant has a stage, a score and an owner, every stage has a clock, and every outcome is written down so the next hire is faster than the last.

Pipeline and stages

One pipeline, Recruitment, with the requisition held as a field rather than as separate pipelines, so one board shows every open role and you can compare load across them.

• Applied - application received from any source, deduplicated against previous applications.
• Auto-Screened - knockout questions evaluated and screen_score written. No human has looked yet.
• Recruiter Review - a human decision on anything the scoring could not settle. Target: cleared within 2 working days.
• Phone Screen Booked - 20-minute call on the calendar.
• Phone Screen Done - scorecard submitted. Nothing advances without one.
• Task Sent - paid skills task issued with a deadline.
• Task Returned - submission in, awaiting marking by two reviewers.
• Panel Interview - 60 minutes with the hiring manager and one peer.
• Final Conversation - 30 minutes with the principal. Values, expectations, and the compensation conversation, which a human always leads.
• References and Checks - references requested, right to work confirmed.
• Offer Out - offer issued, decision pending.
• Hired - accepted. Triggers the pre-start sequence.
• Declined by Us - with a stage and a reason recorded.
• Withdrew - candidate pulled out. Reason captured, because this is your most useful diagnostic.
• Talent Pool - good, wrong role or wrong moment. Carries a revisit date.

Calendars

• Phone Screen - 20 minutes, round-robin across whoever screens, 6 slots per day maximum, 12 hours minimum notice, 5-minute buffer. Candidate-friendly hours including two early-evening slots per week, because people have current jobs.
• Panel Interview - 60 minutes, collective availability across the hiring manager and the peer interviewer, 48 hours minimum notice, 15-minute buffer after for the scorecard.
• Final Conversation - 30 minutes with the principal, 2 per week maximum.
• Trial Day or Shadow Session - optional, half-day block, used for senior delivery roles.

Custom fields

• requisition_id and role_applied - the role and its open requisition
• source_channel - Careers Page, Job Board, Referral, Outbound, Agency, Reapplication
• referrer_name - populated when source_channel is Referral
• screen_score - number 0 to 100 from the screening questionnaire
• knockout_failed - text, which job-related requirement was not met
• portfolio_link, cv_file
• location_mode - Onsite, Hybrid, Remote
• notice_period_weeks and available_from
• right_to_work_confirmed - switch, set only by a human after seeing documents
• comp_expectation_captured - switch. The conversation itself is held by a human and never recorded in an automated message.
• task_sent_date, task_due_date, task_returned_date, task_score_1, task_score_2
• scorecard_count - number of submitted scorecards; gates stage movement
• panel_score_avg - calculated
• reference_status - Not Started, Requested, Received, Concern Raised
• offer_sent_date, offer_response_due, offer_outcome
• decline_stage and decline_reason - Skills Gap, Experience Level, Portfolio Depth, Role Mismatch, Availability, Withdrew, Accepted Elsewhere
• pool_revisit_date and pool_role_fit
• do_not_contact - switch, honoured by every workflow

Tags

• applicant-new, reapplication, referral
• screen-pass, screen-borderline, screen-fail
• task-sent, task-overdue, task-returned
• panel-booked, panel-no-show, scorecard-missing
• offer-out, hired, withdrew
• pool-3mo, pool-6mo, pool-12mo
• stale-candidate - applied automatically after 5 days with no movement, and it should embarrass you

Forms and surveys

• Application Form - per role, on the careers page. Name, contact, portfolio or work samples, CV upload, location_mode, available_from, notice_period_weeks, and one free-text question specific to the role. Short. Every extra field costs you applicants.
• Screening Questionnaire - 6 to 8 job-related questions, each weighted, with 2 hard knockouts tied only to genuine requirements of the job, such as right to work in the country of employment or possession of a required certification. No question touches a protected characteristic.
• Skills Task Submission - file or link upload with a short rationale field and a self-reported time spent, which tells you whether your task brief is honest about its own length.
• Interview Scorecard - internal, one per interviewer per stage. Four to six job-related competencies scored 1 to 4 with a mandatory one-line justification per score, plus a single hire or no-hire call. Free-text-only scorecards are worthless; the forced justification is the point.
• Reference Request - sent to referees after candidate consent, with three questions and no leading language.
• Candidate Experience Survey - two questions, sent after every rejection regardless of stage. How did this process feel, and what would you change.
• Pre-Start Checklist - sent after acceptance: equipment, access, first-day logistics, documents needed.

BO's role and guardrails

• BO acknowledges every application within minutes, in writing, with a real timeline rather than a platitude.
• BO answers candidate questions about the role, the working pattern, the interview process and the task from an approved careers FAQ document, and nothing else.
• BO nudges candidates who have an unbooked interview link or an overdue task, and reschedules on request.
• BO never scores, ranks, shortlists or rejects a candidate. Scoring from the questionnaire is a deterministic rule set on job-related answers; the decision at every gate is a named human's.
• BO never discusses compensation, benefits, notice buyouts or contract terms. Those go to the principal with a one-line handoff.
• BO never asks about, records or reasons from age, health, disability, pregnancy or family status, religion, race, ethnicity, nationality beyond lawful right-to-work status, sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, marital status, or union membership. The questionnaire does not contain such fields, and BO is instructed to redirect if a candidate volunteers them.
• BO does not message candidates outside 08:00 to 20:00 in the candidate's own time zone.

Numbers and channels

• One dedicated recruitment number for candidate SMS, registered, identifying the agency by name in the first message.
• A careers landing page per open role under your own domain, each with its own application form and its own source tracking, so you can tell which channel produces hires rather than applications.
• Candidate email from a monitored people or careers address, with replies threaded into the candidate record.
• Internal alerts to one hiring channel in Slack or your team chat: new applications that cleared screening, missing scorecards, overdue tasks, and stale candidates.

One candidate, from application to first day.

1. A midweight paid media specialist finds the role on a job board and clicks through to the agency's own careers page for that role. She completes the short Application Form in under four minutes, uploads a CV and links a portfolio. source_channel records Job Board, requisition_id records the role.
2. Within two minutes she gets an acknowledgement from the careers address, written by BO and approved once as a template: Got your application for Paid Media Specialist. Here is what happens next: we review every application within two working days, and you will hear from us either way by Thursday. If you have questions in the meantime, reply to this email. A promise with a date in it, which the pipeline then has to keep.
3. She is sent the Screening Questionnaire immediately, seven job-related questions, five minutes of work. She completes it the same evening. screen_score comes out at 78, both knockouts clear, tag screen-pass applied, stage moves to Recruiter Review.
4. The hiring channel in Slack gets a single line: role, name, score 78, portfolio link, available in 4 weeks. The recruiter opens the record next morning, reads the portfolio, and clicks Advance.
5. The phone-screen invitation goes out with a booking link offering slots in the next three working days, two of them at 18:00. She books Thursday at 18:00. Stage moves to Phone Screen Booked. Confirmation sends immediately; reminders at 24 hours and 1 hour.
6. The 20-minute screen happens. The screener gets a scorecard link in their task list the moment the call ends and completes it in four minutes: four competencies, one justification line each, hire. scorecard_count becomes 1, stage moves to Phone Screen Done.
7. The skills task goes out the next morning with a clear brief, an explicit time budget of two hours, a stated deadline of five calendar days, and a plain statement that the task is paid. task_sent_date and task_due_date are stamped, task-sent applied.
8. Day 3 brings one friendly nudge. She submits on day 4 through the Skills Task Submission form, with a self-reported 95 minutes. Stage moves to Task Returned and two reviewers get marking tasks due in 2 working days.
9. Both reviewers mark independently - task_score_1 and task_score_2 - without seeing each other's score. They land at 3 and 4. The panel interview invitation is released.
10. She books a 60-minute Panel Interview for the following Tuesday with the hiring manager and a peer. Both interviewers get the prep pack 24 hours before: application, questionnaire answers, portfolio, task submission, both task scores and the phone-screen scorecard. No interviewer walks in cold.
11. Scorecards are due within 4 hours of the panel. The peer has not filed by the next morning, so a reminder fires, then a second at the 24-hour mark with the hiring manager copied. Both land. panel_score_avg is 3.5, scorecard_count is 3, and the gate opens.
12. The Final Conversation with the principal is booked for two days later. This is where compensation is discussed, by the principal, in a conversation - comp_expectation_captured is switched on afterwards, and no figure is ever put into an automated message.
13. References are requested with her consent, right_to_work_confirmed is set by a human after seeing documents, and reference_status moves to Received.
14. The offer goes out the same day the references clear, with offer_response_due set to five working days out. Stage moves to Offer Out, offer-out applied, and a light check-in sequence arms itself.
15. She accepts on day 2. Stage moves to Hired. The Pre-Start Checklist sends, equipment and access tasks open against the ops lead, the first-day calendar invite goes out, a buddy is assigned, and the hiring channel gets the only announcement anyone actually enjoys. Her start date is written to available_from and a 30-day and 90-day check-in are scheduled before she has even started.
16. Every other candidate in the pipeline for that requisition is moved to Declined by Us or Talent Pool within 24 hours, with a written reason and a real message. Three strong runners-up get pool_revisit_date set six months out.

Eight workflows. Every one of them checks do_not_contact first and exits silently if it is set.

1. Application Intake, Deduplication and Auto-Screen

Trigger: an Application Form submission, or an inbound application arriving from a job board or LinkedIn via a Zapier or Make step.

Conditions and branches:

• Match the email address against existing candidates. If a record exists from a previous requisition, do not create a duplicate: add the new requisition to the existing record, apply reapplication, and surface the previous decline_reason to the reviewer.
• If requisition_id is closed, send the closed-role message with a talent-pool opt-in and stop: This role closed on [date], so I will not pretend otherwise. If you would like us to keep your details for similar roles, click here and I will hold them for 12 months.

Actions in order:

• Create the candidate, create the opportunity in Applied, write requisition_id, role_applied, source_channel, portfolio_link and the CV file. Apply applicant-new.
• Immediately, within 2 minutes: acknowledgement email. Got your application for [role]. Here is what happens next: we review every application within two working days and you will hear from us either way by [calculated date]. The next step if we move forward is a 20-minute call. Questions? Reply to this email and a person will answer.
• Immediately after: send the Screening Questionnaire link.
• Wait 2 days. If the questionnaire is not completed, one reminder: Still keen on [role]? The screening questions take about five minutes and I cannot move you forward without them: [link]. Wait 3 more days, then move to Talent Pool with decline_reason Availability and pool_revisit_date 6 months out.
• On completion, evaluate the knockouts. Any knockout failed: write knockout_failed, move to Declined by Us, decline_stage Auto-Screen, and run workflow 7.
• All knockouts clear: calculate screen_score from the weighted answers. 70 and above, apply screen-pass. 50 to 69, apply screen-borderline. Below 50, apply screen-fail. Move all three to Recruiter Review. The score routes; it never rejects.
• If source_channel is Referral, add 10 to screen_score, notify referrer_name's manager, and flag the record in the hiring channel. Referrals get read first because they convert better.
• Post one line to the hiring channel: role, name, score, band, portfolio link, availability.
• Create a review task for the named recruiter, due in 2 working days.

Exit: declined, pooled, or advanced by a human.

2. Recruiter Review Clock and Phone Screen Release

Trigger: opportunity enters Recruiter Review.

Actions in order:

• Wait 2 working days. If no decision, remind the recruiter. Wait 1 more working day, then escalate to the principal in the hiring channel naming the candidate and the days elapsed. This workflow exists to protect the promise made in the acknowledgement email, so it should be loud.
• Wait 2 more working days with still no decision: apply stale-candidate and send the candidate an honest holding message. I promised you an answer by [date] and we have not managed it. That is on us. You will hear from a person by [new date]. Nothing damages a hiring brand faster than silence; a late apology beats a disappearance.
• On Advance: move to Phone Screen Booked pending booking and release the invitation. Thanks for the detail on [specific answer they gave]. Next step is a 20-minute call with [screener first name] - no preparation needed, it is mostly us answering your questions. Grab whichever slot suits: [link]. Evening slots are on there too.
• Wait 2 days. No booking: one SMS. [First name] - [agency] here about the [role] call. Booking link is in your email from Tuesday, or reply with two times that work and I will sort it. Reply STOP to opt out.
• Wait 3 more days. Still no booking: move to Talent Pool, decline_reason Availability, pool_revisit_date 6 months.
• On Decline: run workflow 7.

Exit: booking created, decision recorded, or pooled.

3. Phone Screen Confirmation, Reminders and No-Show Recovery

Trigger: a Phone Screen booking is created.

Actions in order:

• Immediate confirmation email with the time in the candidate's time zone, the screener's name, the join link, and one line on what the call covers. Apply panel-booked equivalent for this stage and cancel the chase sequence.
• Generate the screener's prep note: application, questionnaire answers, screen_score, portfolio link, availability.
• 24 hours before: email reminder. 2 hours before: SMS with the join link only.
• At the scheduled end time: create the scorecard task for the screener, due in 4 hours. The link goes straight to the pre-filled Interview Scorecard.
• Wait 4 hours. No scorecard: remind the screener. Wait 20 more hours: apply scorecard-missing and post to the hiring channel. Candidates must not wait on an unfiled form.
• On scorecard submitted, increment scorecard_count, move to Phone Screen Done, and branch on the hire or no-hire call: hire goes to workflow 4, no-hire goes to workflow 7.
• No-show branch: 10 minutes past the start with no attendance, apply panel-no-show, email: Sorry we missed each other. Life happens - here is the calendar again if you still want the conversation: [link]. Wait 2 days, one SMS. Wait 3 more days, move to Talent Pool. One no-show is never treated as a rejection.
• Candidate-initiated reschedule: allowed freely up to twice. On the third, route to the recruiter rather than the automation.

Exit: scorecard filed, or pooled.

4. Skills Task Dispatch, Deadline and Dual Marking

Trigger: stage moved to Task Sent.

Actions in order:

• Send the task brief with a stated time budget, the deadline, the submission form link, and the payment statement. Here is the task. It should take about two hours and we pay for your time at the rate in the brief - that is not a favor, it is your work. Deadline is [date], five days from now. If that window does not suit, reply and I will move it; a bad week should not cost you the role. Submit here: [link]. Stamp task_sent_date and task_due_date, apply task-sent.
• Wait until 2 days before the deadline: light nudge. Task is due [date]. Anything unclear in the brief, ask me - the question is not a mark against you.
• On the deadline with nothing submitted: apply task-overdue, email offering one extension of 3 days, and create a recruiter task.
• 3 days past the extension: move to Withdrew, decline_reason Withdrew, with a short human note. Record it as a withdrawal rather than a decline, because this is the stage where your task length is on trial.
• On submission: stamp task_returned_date, apply task-returned, move to Task Returned, acknowledge within 5 minutes with a date by which they will hear.
• Create two independent marking tasks, due in 2 working days, each reviewer blind to the other's score. Write task_score_1 and task_score_2.
• Branch on the two scores: both 3 or above, release the panel invitation. Both below 3, route to workflow 7 with decline_reason Skills Gap. Split (one 3-plus, one below), create a 15-minute adjudication task for the hiring manager rather than averaging. Averaging a split hides the disagreement that matters.
• Wait 2 working days on an unmarked task: remind both reviewers, then escalate to the principal at 4 days.

Exit: both scores filed and a branch taken, or candidate withdrawn.

5. Panel Interview Coordination and Scorecard Enforcement

Trigger: panel invitation released, then on booking created.

Actions in order:

• Release the invitation with the collective-availability link, interviewer names and roles, the format, and an explicit statement of what is being assessed. 60 minutes with [hiring manager] and [peer]. We will spend most of it on your task and how you think, not on your CV. The competencies we are scoring are listed here so you are not guessing: [link].
• On booking, move to Panel Interview, apply panel-booked, generate the video link, and add both interviewers.
• 24 hours before: send both interviewers the prep pack - application, questionnaire answers, portfolio, task submission, both task scores with justifications, and the phone-screen scorecard - and assign each a named competency to lead on so they do not both ask the same questions.
• 24 hours before: candidate reminder email. 2 hours before: candidate SMS with the link.
• At the scheduled end: create a scorecard task for each interviewer, due in 4 hours, and explicitly instruct that scorecards are filed before any debrief conversation.
• Wait 4 hours: remind anyone outstanding. Wait 20 more hours: apply scorecard-missing, post to the hiring channel naming the interviewer. Wait 24 more hours: escalate to the principal. The stage gate does not open until scorecard_count equals the number of interviewers.
• On all scorecards filed, calculate panel_score_avg and branch: both hire calls positive, release the Final Conversation booking link. Both negative, route to workflow 7. Split, create a 30-minute debrief task for the hiring manager and principal with both scorecards attached, and let a human decide.
• On Final Conversation completed: the principal records the outcome and switches comp_expectation_captured. No figures enter any automated field or message.

Exit: gate opened, decline routed, or candidate withdrawn.

6. References, Offer and Pre-Start

Trigger: stage moved to References and Checks.

Actions in order:

• Email the candidate requesting referee details and explicit consent to contact them. Wait 2 days, one reminder.
• On details received, send the Reference Request to each referee. Set reference_status to Requested. Wait 3 days, remind the referee. Wait 3 more days, create a recruiter task to telephone. Never let an unresponsive referee silently stall an offer.
• Create a human task to verify right to work from documents and set right_to_work_confirmed. This is never automated and never inferred.
• If any reference raises a concern, set reference_status to Concern Raised, halt the offer automation entirely, and task the principal. No automated message goes out on that record again until a human clears it.
• On references clear and right to work confirmed: move to Offer Out, stamp offer_sent_date, set offer_response_due to 5 working days out, apply offer-out. The offer itself is sent by the principal through your e-signature tool, not generated by the automation.
• Day 2 after sending: a short personal check-in from the hiring manager, not the system. No pressure on the paperwork - but if anything in there needs explaining or you want to talk it through with someone who will actually be in the room with you, I am about today and tomorrow.
• One day before offer_response_due: internal task for the principal to call. No automated chase on an offer.
• On signature webhook: move to Hired, apply hired, write available_from, and fire the pre-start block - Pre-Start Checklist to the candidate, equipment and access tasks to ops due 5 working days before the start date, buddy assignment, first-day calendar invite, and 30-day and 90-day check-ins scheduled immediately.
• 7 days before start: a warm message with first-day logistics and a named person to ask for. 1 day before: a short note from the buddy.
• On offer declined: record the reason, task the principal for a 10-minute call to learn why, and move to Talent Pool with pool_revisit_date 12 months out. People who decline an offer and are treated well sometimes come back.

Exit: hired, or declined and pooled.

7. Rejection, Candidate Experience and Talent Pool

Trigger: stage moved to Declined by Us or Talent Pool, from any stage.

Conditions: the message template is selected by decline_stage, because a rejection after a two-hour task cannot read like a rejection after a form.

Actions in order:

• Auto-screen and recruiter review rejections, within 24 hours: Thank you for applying for [role]. We are not taking your application further this time. To be straight with you about why: [the job-related reason]. If you would like us to keep your details for future roles, click here.
• Post-interview or post-task rejections: hold for a human. Create a task for the recruiter to add two specific sentences of feedback drawn from the scorecard justifications, then send within 2 working days. A candidate who gave you two hours gets specifics, not a template.
• Post-final-conversation rejections: a phone call from the principal, scheduled, before any written message. The automation creates the task and blocks the email until the call is logged.
• 24 hours after any rejection message: send the two-question Candidate Experience Survey.
• If the candidate is strong but wrong-fit: move to Talent Pool instead, set pool_role_fit and pool_revisit_date, apply the matching pool- tag, and tell them plainly: This is not a soft no. You were close, and the gap was [specific]. I have put a note in my calendar for [month] when we expect to be hiring for [role type]. If you would rather I did not, reply and I will delete your details today.
• Daily scheduled check on pool_revisit_date: on the date, create a task for the recruiter with the original scorecards and task scores attached. If a matching requisition is open, release a direct invitation that skips the application form and the questionnaire and goes straight to a phone screen link. That shortcut is the entire value of the pool.
• On any new requisition opening: query the pool for pool_role_fit matches and present the list to the recruiter before the role is advertised.

Exit: candidate re-enters an active pipeline, asks for deletion, or reaches the end of your retention period, at which point the deletion routine runs.

8. Weekly Hiring Digest and Stale Candidate Sweep

Trigger: scheduled, Monday 08:00, plus a daily 07:00 staleness sweep.

Daily sweep actions:

• Find every opportunity with no stage change in 5 days that is not in Hired, Declined, Withdrew or Talent Pool. Apply stale-candidate, post the list to the hiring channel with the owner's name and the days stuck, and create one task per owner.
• Find every interview held over 24 hours ago with scorecard_count below the required number, and chase as in workflows 3 and 5.
• Find every task past task_due_date and apply task-overdue.

Weekly digest actions:

• Send the principal and every hiring manager one email per requisition: candidates at each stage, new applications last week, median time in Recruiter Review, median days from application to first conversation, stage conversions, withdrawals with reasons, scorecard compliance by interviewer, source channel performance measured in hires rather than applications, and the current stale list.
• Flag any requisition open more than 45 days with a prompt to revisit the spec, the compensation position or the sourcing channels - a role nobody good applies for is usually a role described badly or scoped wrongly.
• Create one task per hiring manager: clear your stale candidates or close the requisition.

Exit: none. This workflow runs permanently, and the stale list is the one number that tells you whether the pipeline is being run or merely owned.

The first thing that changes is speed, and speed is what wins candidates. An application acknowledged in two minutes, screened in two days and interviewed inside a week beats a better-paying role at a slower company more often than agency principals expect. The second thing that changes is consistency: every candidate for a requisition answers the same questions, is scored on the same competencies, and is assessed by people who read the same prep pack. That makes your debriefs shorter and your decisions defensible.

The third change is quieter and compounds. Because every rejection carries a stage and a reason, and every withdrawal carries a cause, you learn where your process actually breaks. If a quarter of your candidates withdraw between task sent and task returned, your task is too long, and now you can see it. And because strong near-misses go to a talent pool with a revisit date rather than into the bin, your second hire for a role starts from a warm list rather than a cold job post.

What to measure

• Time to acknowledge - should be minutes, and it is the single cheapest thing to fix.
• Time in Recruiter Review - the real bottleneck in most agencies. Watch the median and the worst case.
• Time to first conversation - application received to phone screen held.
• Total time to offer and time to fill, by requisition.
• Stage conversion rates - applied to screen-pass, screen to task, task to panel, panel to offer, offer to accept. A collapse at one stage tells you exactly where to spend your attention.
• Withdrawal rate by stage, with reasons. Withdrawals after the task stage are an indictment of the task.
• Scorecard compliance - share of interviews with a scorecard filed within 24 hours. Below 90 per cent and your hiring decisions are being made on vibes.
• Source quality - hires per channel, not applications per channel. The job board that produces 200 applications and no hires is costing you review time.
• Offer acceptance rate, and the reasons behind declines.
• Candidate experience score from the post-rejection survey, split by the stage they reached. Rejected candidates talk to other candidates.
• Talent pool conversion - hires sourced from the pool rather than from a fresh post.
• 90-day retention of hires, tied back to their panel_score_avg and task scores, which is how you find out whether your scorecard predicts anything.

Prerequisites

• A real job description per role with four to six competencies written down before any automation is built. The scorecard and the screening questionnaire are both derived from these, so vague competencies produce a useless pipeline.
• A named hiring manager and a named recruiter or screener per requisition, with agreed service levels: review within 2 working days, scorecard within 24 hours of an interview.
• A written skills task per role, with an honest time budget, a statement that it is paid, and a marking rubric the two reviewers both use. Decide the payment mechanism before launch, not when the first submission arrives.
• A careers FAQ document covering working pattern, location expectation, the interview process and what the task involves. This is the only source BO answers from.
• Interviewer availability actually published to calendars. A collective-availability panel calendar over three people who do not keep their calendars current will offer slots that do not exist.
• Agreement on how long you keep candidate data and what the talent pool consent looks like.

Integrations

• Google Calendar or Outlook two-way sync for every interviewer. Non-negotiable.
• Job board and LinkedIn application forwarding into the pipeline, by native connection where one exists and by a Zapier or Make step parsing the application email where one does not. Every route must land in the same pipeline or the whole premise fails.
• Slack or your team chat for the hiring channel.
• Your e-signature tool for the offer, with a signature webhook moving the stage to Hired without a human remembering to.
• Your payroll or HR system for the hired record, and your task or project tool for the equipment and access checklist.
• Zoom, Google Meet or Teams links generated automatically on every interview booking.

Numbers and messaging compliance

• Provision a dedicated recruitment number and complete A2P 10DLC registration before sending candidate SMS. Register a campaign that describes the use case accurately: transactional recruitment messaging to applicants who supplied their number on an application form. Start the registration in week one; it is the longest-lead item in the build.
• Identify the agency by name in the first SMS of every thread. Carry opt-out language on the first message of each sequence, honor STOP, UNSUBSCRIBE, CANCEL and QUIT automatically, and make the suppression global. A candidate who opts out of SMS must still receive the email decisions.
• Set quiet hours in the candidate's own time zone, 08:00 to 20:00. Candidates are usually employed elsewhere, so avoid daytime calls to a current workplace number unless they have told you it is fine.
• Keep do_not_contact as the first condition in every workflow.

Fairness and record-keeping

• Knockout questions must be genuine job requirements, documented, and the same for every applicant to a requisition. Keep the knockout list in version control so you can show what was asked and when.
• Do not collect protected characteristics in the application or screening forms. If you run diversity monitoring, collect it separately, voluntarily, anonymously, and keep it out of the pipeline record and out of every scoring rule.
• Keep scorecards, task scores and decline reasons for the retention period your jurisdiction requires. They are your evidence that decisions were job-related.
• Automated scoring here is a deterministic rule set over job-related answers that routes a record for human review. Keep it that way, and keep a human decision at every gate that advances or rejects a candidate.

Data protection

• Candidate data is personal data, often including CVs, portfolios and references. Set an explicit retention period, a defined deletion routine, and a separate consent for holding someone in the talent pool beyond the live process.
• If you recruit in the UK, EU or other regimes with data-protection or employment law, confirm your lawful basis, your privacy notice on the application form, your retention schedule and your position on automated decision-making before go-live.
• None of this is legal advice. Have your own employment counsel, and the client's where you are building this for a client, confirm the screening criteria, the consent wording, the retention schedule and anything touching automated decision-making in your jurisdictions. To scope a build, book a call at bookings.appbo.io.