Do you know how professional recruitment agencies work from the inside? How do they analyze tons of CVs in such a short time?
The secret lies not only in supporting the recruitment and retention process through artificial intelligence and machine learning but also in improving the operation of an RMS – Recruitment Management System. It is recruitment software or recruitment CRM as some prefer. It provides a faster and more efficient process for both recruiters and job applicants.
The dynamically changing labor market forces recruitment agencies to constantly look for ways to optimize processes – they face the challenge of improving the recruitment process. Our client, Work Service, had a similar challenge.
Work Service is the largest HR company in Poland that provides innovative solutions in the field of human resources and cooperates with over 3,000 employers. It also specializes in services in the field of personnel consulting and restructuring in the area of HR, recruitment, and employee outsourcing.
One of their main business goals is standardization and acceleration of the path from reporting the need for new employees, to the moment of hiring an employee. You can learn more about it in: What Are the Pros of a Machine Learning Matching System for HR?
Work Service wanted the recruitment management system (RMS) – developed with Stermedia since 2013 – to be more intuitive and easier to use not only for candidates but, above all, for internal recruitment teams.
CHALLENGES
Most of the work on improving the RMS could be iterative and implemented directly into the production environment so that it was immediately available to all users. However, there were tasks where it was desirable to develop a certain larger set of extensions. They were made available to users only after the entire company was prepared for it. At the same time, we were working on further improvements that were to be continuously delivered to users.
Our development team faced the difficult task of simultaneously meeting the following requirements:
- Ongoing development and delivery of most functions to users
- Ongoing development of some, also larger, functions without providing them to users immediately, and only when the entire organization was prepared to implement them and when we received the green light to enable them
- Enabling an easy way to turn off selected functions, in the event that they cause unintended effects (whether in the system we were developing or in the operation of the organization)
- Dynamic introduction of changes in the system at the time of legal changes (e.g. introduction of GDPR)
- Easy integration of all the effects of the works
SOLUTIONS
The work of our team consisted of gradual modification of subsequent elements of the recruitment system while maintaining the continuity of its functioning throughout the entire period of work.
“When we started cooperation, our client already had an IT system for accepting and analyzing job applications,” says Maciej Michoń, software developer, Stermedia. “So we introduced the first changes with the help of technologies that were previously used in the project. However, when the changes were to cover a larger area of the system, we separated these areas into separate modules. This is how we were able to use newer tools that allowed us to achieve the desired results faster without affecting the rest of the system.”
With the first module that we thoroughly reworked, we thought about what tools to choose. We took into account, among others, JavaServer Faces (JSF). This framework was then (and it was before the critical assessment of ThoughtWorks experts) quite popular, and it was also part of the Java EE standard managed by Oracle. Ultimately, however, we decided on a completely different solution.
We combined the Google-supported AngularJS library that allows you to build Single-page application (SPA) applications with a comprehensive set of tools included in the Spring Framework from Pivotal Software. We would certainly like all application modules to use the latest toolset. Thanks to this, our work would be as effective as possible.
Tomasz Kozakiewicz, Software Developer, Java Tech Leader, Stermedia
In the end, only the new Angular framework was used. Compared to its predecessor – AngularJS – it allows you to achieve more in a much easier way.
When working on the first modules, only the older version of this tool was available. Luckily, the modular architecture of the system allows you to change it piece by piece. When making changes in one of the modules, you can use the new Angular in it.
A technique called Feature Toggles was used in the software development process. It provides an alternative to keeping multiple versions of the program simultaneously. This allows a software feature to be tested even before it is completed and ready for release. In the project for Work Service, this made it possible to easily turn on or off selected functions as needed. At the same time, the ease of coordination of all introduced changes has been maintained. Our development team also adapted the application to work on mobile devices.
The Stermedia team was in constant contact with the client. We used a common communicator, which greatly facilitates the cooperation of all people involved in the project in an asynchronous manner – regardless of the times of availability of the client and ourselves, communication was very effective.
RESULTS
The cooperation of Work Service and Stermedia brought the following results:
- Customization, module by module, of the entire application to better meet business goals
- Availability on mobile devices
- System integration with external websites, such as the Facebook application, mobile application, external websites implementing customer marketing campaigns
- Implementation of the possibility to publish job offers on one of the popular websites directly from the level of the application being developed
- Integration with machine learning matching system
- Ensuring continuous development of the application in accordance with the client’s further needs
- Future cooperation on new projects
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