Across industries, organizations are currently crushed by an avalanche of applicants vying for a limited number of positions. High volume hiring is as much a blessing as it is a curse: you know candidates with incredible potential are somewhere in that digital mountain of applications, but reviewing them all can feel like finding a needle in a hiring haystack.
An HR system flooded hundreds (or even thousands) of applicants causes problems throughout the recruitment funnel. Recruiters struggle to sift through and find the best candidates to move forward, hiring managers get bogged down by the time it takes to effectively evaluate each candidate, teams burn out waiting for new hires to join fill the gaps, and candidates feel left in the dark about the status of their applications.
Without the proper tools and processes in place, high-volume hiring can overwhelm even the most seasoned HR team.
To navigate a sea of candidates, implementing the best practices for high-volume hiring at every point of recruitment ensures that you’re moving forward with the cream of your crop.
At the Application Stage
Create accurate and relevant job descriptions
Improving your quality of hire starts before your first applicant ever applies. Get your hiring journey started on the right foot by carefully considering the job requirements and most essential skills for success and working them into the job description. Once you’ve crafted a description focused on job-relevant skills, it’s time to post it!
Reduce Spam with Knock-Out Questions
To weed out spam applications, include a few basic knock-out questions that will limit the number of bot-sent applications. This can mean including a simple Captcha and adding a couple of personalized questions to the initial application form. With generative AI enabling smarter bots, simple knock-out questions are a good way to reduce the number of non-viable applications you’ll receive.
Gather objective insight with assessments
Use objective assessments early on in your hiring process to reliably evaluate the skills and competencies of the candidates apply. With Criteria’s comprehensive suite of candidate-friendly assessments, you’ll gain valuable insights that can help you determine which applicants have the highest potential to succeed at your organization.
At the Interview Stage
Swap phone screens for early video interviews
Phone screens are an outdated way to vet candidates. The average phone screen takes 10-20 minutes and those call times add up fast when recruiters are juggling a large volume of candidates. Even if you miraculously slashed call time down to just 5 minutes and only had 100 candidates to screen, that would add up to 8 hours of straight call time (not to mention dialing, taking notes on candidates, and updating the ATS). And what if the best candidate for the job misses your call? Oof!
Enter early-stage interviews with Criteria’s Interview Intelligence (IIQ). Asynchronous video interviews allow candidates to answer questions on their own time and for reviewers to gain deep insight without the heavy time investment upfront. IIQ then reviews all candidate submissions immediately, equally, and as accurately as an expert human review. 
With IIQ, no hidden gems will go undiscovered by your hiring team. Once applications are closed, you’ll get a shortlist of the top candidates to focus your time and energy on.
Use structured interviewing during live interviews
Once you’ve narrowed your list of candidates, it’s time for a more in-depth interview. Structured interviews are twice as predictive as standard conversational interviews, creating a fairer and more objective interview process for your candidates while helping your organization hire the strongest talent. This approach involves asking each candidate the same job-relevant questions in the same order, grading their responses with the same rubric.
Structured interviews were previously thought to require a heavily lift to implement (especially for high-volume recruitment), but the Criteria platform makes it easy to conduct tightly structured interviews at scale. With Live Interviewing from Criteria, you can use our extensive question library to build out a job-relevant interview, access a tailored interview guide, and evaluate candidates with easy-to-use scoring rubrics that will give your hiring team the clarity they need to make great hiring decisions.
At the Selection Stage (and Beyond)
Trust the data, not your gut
Objective data is essential for fair, consistent, and predictive hiring. The Criteria platform equips your team with validated, science-backed assessments and AI-powered scoring, moving hiring decisions beyond instinct. With real-time reports and intuitive analytics, you can easily compare candidates to benchmarks or top performers, ensuring decisions are evidence-based.
This data-driven approach reduces bias, lowers the risk of mis-hires, and streamlines hiring, making it easier to spot high-potential candidates. Ultimately, using objective data leads to better hires, improved retention, and a stronger workforce.
Regularly reevaluate the process
High-volume hiring is always evolving, so it’s important to continually review and refine your approach using Criteria’s analytics and reporting tools. Track key metrics like time-to-hire, source effectiveness, and candidate quality to identify bottlenecks and improve processes. Collect feedback from candidates and hiring managers for a complete view of the experience.
Use these insights to test new strategies or adjust assessments as needed. With Criteria, generating actionable reports and visualizing trends is simple, helping your team stay agile and candidate-focused as hiring needs change. Continuous improvement, powered by real-time data, keeps your hiring process effective and competitive.
Key Takeaways for Successful High-Volume Hiring
Ultimately, your organization’s hiring goals are to quickly, fairly, and predictably choose the strongest contenders in your talent pool. Leveraging the latest advancements in hiring technology, from best-in-class assessments and AI-assisted interview scoring can make all the difference with a full candidate pipeline,
And remember: high-volume hiring can still be human-lead hiring. You just have to equip your team with the tools to save them time, improve their objectivity, and identify the strongest candidates.
Ready to see how the Criteria platform can streamline your hiring process from top to bottom? Start a Free Trial today!
