Recruitment tech that gets used: start with process and data

Kamal Ladwa on The Staffing Ring, with Jason Lawson (Ringover)

Kamal joins Jason Lawson on Ringover's The Staffing Ring podcast to talk about what makes recruitment technology work in practice. Drawing on running his own agency and on years of consulting to recruitment businesses, he covers how to get consultants to adopt new tools, why understanding your processes comes before automation, how to choose a CRM and why good data underpins everything else.

Chapters

1. 1:11Welcome and Kamal's background
2. 5:43Empathy and getting teams to adopt new tools
3. 10:33Where to start: understand your processes
4. 13:52What prompts agencies to bring in help
5. 17:24Using AI and Clay to enrich CRM data
6. 23:40Automation that earns its keep
7. 27:12All-in-one platforms or best of breed
8. 29:18Choosing a CRM: document your requirements
9. 33:31Why leaders hesitate to bring in outside help
10. 36:11Career lessons and mindset
11. 40:15AI and staying ahead
12. 43:04The foundation: data, process, then tech

What Kamal covers

• Why adoption is a mindset change as much as a technology change, why it needs to come from the owners and leaders, and why consultants need a clear answer to what is in it for them
• Where to start: map your current processes across sales, resourcing and the back office, then target the areas where automation will save the most time
• What tends to prompt agencies to bring in outside help: manual compliance processes, not knowing what to automate or in what order, and wanting to segment data for marketing
• A worked example of using AI and Clay to research companies and add the tags a CRM was missing, so teams can be assigned sectors and campaigns targeted. In one project, around 40 percent of previously untagged company records could be coded accurately from their websites
• Starting automation where it earns its keep, such as re-engaging lapsed candidates and clients, before rolling it out more widely
• Balancing the functionality built into a CRM with dedicated tools you integrate
• Choosing a CRM by documenting your requirements, must haves and nice to haves, and speaking to peers about the tools they use
• Why data, process and technology come in that order, and why automating on poor quality data causes more headaches

Who this is for

Recruitment agency owners and operations leaders who are planning a technology change, struggling with adoption or deciding where to start with automation and AI.