Everybody knows the battle between candidates and recruiting software! You fill out endless application forms just to realise in the middle that the system didn’t save your data! We do not close our eyes to reality but we are still trying to make the online recruiting world a little better! The german blog Karrierebibel just published the post “Advices for the perfect online application”. This article shows us the bitter reality: Applying online for a job is often still annoying. But it also hit our “let’s-make-the-candidate’s-world-better”- gene and motivates us to get rid of some prejudices regarding online application forms. Believe us, it can be so easy to apply online!

In order to make your candidates feel comfortable during their online application we comment on some of the statements:

Take your time. An online application might last about an hour.
At softgarden we think an online application should not take more than 7 minutes. This is enough time to get all candidate’s information you need for making the right decision later on.

Read all advices beforehand.
An online application should be possible even without a complicated registration process. Because each candidate wants to take a look onto the application form to get an impression of what needs do be filled out and what kind of documents he has to prepare. This should be possible without being forced to go through a long registration process.

Write down your login data in case you have to setup an account.
This is actually an useful advice but we want to make clear that a professional recruiting software sends the login data automatically after having finalized the application.

Take care of a save and fast internet connection. Losing data because of a crashed internet connection can be very frustrating.
A good recruiting software will not be impressed by such technical problems. Even if you have a break (planned or not) and you continue later on with the application the fields you already filled out are still there.

Update all relevant documents – motivation letter, curriculum vitae etc. – before you start your online application.
Or much easier: Use your LinkedIn or XING profile to apply at your favourite company. On these profiles you already gathered all relevant data so why should you prepare these data every time again?

Make sure the size of your documents don’t exceed a size of two MB or even one MB.
We agree on the fact that personnel departments shouldn’t be overwhelmed with incredible big applications. But 5 MB should be possible for an upload especially if you are a professional and you need to hand in lots of certificates to prove your competences.

Check all your data before turning to the next page. Not all systems allow corrections afterwards.
If an application form consists of more than one page it should not be a problem to jump from one page to another without losing any data.

We do not give up and continue to work hard for making an online application not a horror but a nice experience. Do you want to join?