Managing and shortlisting applications

Carmarthenshire County Council are adopting a ‘anonymous’ approach to recruitment. The anonymous recruitment solution enables the recruiting manager to screen candidates without seeing any personal information on the application form that may cause unconscious bias. Anonymous recruitment is gaining traction as an effective way to recruit more diverse staff.

The anonymous recruitment solution removes any identifying factors from a candidate application form such as name, pronouns, email address, etc. This information will be hidden and will appear as ‘Restricted Data’ until the shortlisting has been completed.

Once you have made your shortlisting decision, all applicant details will be made visible to the recruiting manager.

You have the option of shortlisting when applications are received, and you can place the shortlisting decision in a ‘holding’ status, or you can complete all your shortlisting after the closing date. However, you should not notify any applicant of your shortlisting decision until the closing date has passed.

You can view applications received various ways:

Option 1: Applications to be Shortlisted dashboard

1. Click on the ‘Applications to be Shortlisted’ dashboard. This will take you to the dashboard where you can see an overview of the applications received including the applications with ‘flags’ that have been raised within the candidate’s application form. 
2. To open an application, double click on the selected row.
3. This will take you into the Application Summary page. You will then be prompted to complete the Shortlisting Form.

Option 2: Active Vacancies Dashboard

1. Click on the Active Vacancies dashboard. This will take you to the dashboard where you can see an overview of your live vacancies and the number of applications received.
2. Double-click on the vacancy in the table and the system will take you into the vacancy.
3. Click on the ‘Applications’ tab to view all applications received and the status of each application.
4. You can view more detailed information on each application at a status by clicking on the blue number in the Total column or by selecting the ‘View All’ button in the left-hand corner.
5. A list of applications will appear, and you can see any ‘flags’ that have been raised within the candidate’s application form. To open an application, double click on the selected row.
6. This will take you into the Application Summary page. You will then be prompted to complete the Shortlisting Form.

As part of the application form, applicants will be asked to make relevant declarations to support their application:

• Are they an internal member of staff “at risk” of redundancy
• Do they have a disability and want their application to be considered under the Disability Confident Scheme
• Are they an armed forces Veteran and want their application to be considered under the Armed Forces Community Covenant.

When you come to review all your applications, you will be able to see if the applicant has answered “yes” to any of these questions.

If so, there are certain considerations you need to give when screening their application form:

Applications from Redeployees

Staff who are “at risk” will be able to apply for vacancies via the Applicant Centre. As part of the application form, they will be asked to confirm if they are on the Council’s Redeployment Register.

If an applicant has incorrectly stated they are “at risk” and on the Redeployment Register, the Recruitment Team can change their status, and the flag will be moved from their application form.

However, having been confirmed by an HR Advisor that the applicant is “at risk”, if the applicant meets the essential criteria, or they may be able to do so after reasonable training and support, they should be given ‘prior consideration’ for the role. Which means, you will be obliged to offer a trial period of at least four weeks to the employee (which can be extended up to twelve weeks in certain circumstances, (e.g., the manager and employee agree that appropriate training and induction would take longer than four weeks).

Redeployment policy

For further guidance on managing applications from redeployees please speak to your HR Advisor.

Applications from Guarantee Interview Scheme candidates

If applicants wish to be considered under either of the Guarantee Interview schemes, if they meet the essential criteria for the post, then you must include them in your shortlisting outcome and ensure they are invited to attend an interview. You must also be mindful whether the applicant has requested reasonable adjustments which they may need to attend interview.

If an applicant creates more than one account, when they submit multiple applications against the same vacancy, the system will flag up potential ‘duplicate candidates’.

By double-clicking on the application in the list or searching by the Application ID number you will be able to open the Application Summary page. Before deciding on whether to reject or progress the application, click on the forms tab to view the application form.

You will note, the Applicant’s status has changed to ‘Duplicate – Potential’.

Click on the ‘Application Form’ it will open the Applicant’s application form.

Having reviewed the content of their application, you can make the decision to:

Reject (is a duplicate)

This will place the candidate’s application on a list of potential duplicate applications.  You can confirm it is a duplicate by clicking on the ‘Confirm Duplicate’ button.

You will then be prompted to ‘Submit’ your decision.  The application will still appear in the Application Summary list, but their status will be changed to ‘Duplicate – Confirmed’.

The applicant will also receive an email advising them that they have submitted a duplicate application.

Progress(Not a duplicate)

This will move the applicant on to the new stage – Shortlisting Form – in the recruitment process.

There will be instances where you need to share applications with people who do not have access to the applications via Oleeo.

You can share applications by accessing the information on the Application Search results list, which you can view from the vacancy (Opportunity) page. From either the ‘Active Vacancies – Live on Web’ or the ‘Active Vacancies – Closed to Applications.

Step-by-Step Guide

1. Click on the vacancy you want to print or share the applications.
2. Click on ‘Applications’ tab.
3. Click on ‘View All’ (or from the summary table, click on the application status your want to print or share).
4. If you want to share all the applicants that appear on the list, in the tool bar select ‘Select All on Page’ and they will become highlighted. Alternatively, if you only want to select specific applications, click on each individual application so they become highlighted.
5. From the top tool bar, select the ‘Print’ icon
6. Select ‘Quick Print and you will be taken to an Application Print Book page.
7. Select the ‘Download/Open Print Book’. This will generate a zip file for you, which you can save to your directory.

The ‘Type of Shortlisting’ you chose when you created the vacancy, will determine the Shortlisting Form you will be required to complete as part of the shortlisting process e.g., competency-based, criteria-based, or shortlisting decision only.

Understanding Shortlisting Status

In the shortlisting Feedback form, you must make a shortlisting decision against each application. The decision will change the status of the candidate’s application.

Shortlisting Decision

From the Applications to be Shortlisted dashboard you will see the list of applications that require screening, and if will identify those which are called 'Flagged’. These are the applications should be given prior consideration as they are possibly Redeployees, or they have requested to be considered under either of our Guarantee Interview schemes, if they meet the essential criteria (see below).

Step-by-step guide

1. Click on the row for the application you want to shortlist. This will take you into the Application Summary page for each applicant.
2. Click the ‘Complete Shortlisting Form’ green button. A shortlisting form will appear.
3. To make completing the shortlisting feedback form easier, click on ‘Launch Another Form’ to have the application form alongside the shortlisting form.
4. From the dropdown menu, select ‘Application Form’ and press ‘Select Form’. The application form will appear alongside the screening form.
5. Assess what level of evidence the applicant has provided to demonstrate how they have met the competencies/criteria for the post and assign a rating against each one.
6. Once you have assessed and rated each competency/criterion a total score will be generated for each applicant. Note: For shortlisting decision only, you will be prompted to select a ‘Decision’ from the drop-down menu, and you will be required to add comments for any applicants who you are moving into the ‘Reject’ status.
7. Select your shortlisting decision.

1. Progress – You want to invite to interview
2. On Hold – You are unable to make a final decision
3. Reject – You do not want to invite to interview

8. Add comments if you feel it will be useful.
9. Press submit.

Notifying your Applicants

Once you have submitted your shortlisting decision, the applicants status will change to ‘New Application – Results Complete’. You must notify your candidates of the outcome of the shortlisting process.

Step-by-Step Guide

1. Click on the ‘Shortlisted – Waiting to inform Applicant’ tab.
2. A table of all applicants you have shortlisted will appear together with the Shortlisting decision (Progress, On Hold or Reject) and shortlisting score for each application.
3. You can use the ‘Whole Table Filter’ to filter the table. We recommend you filter the table for each status e.g. filter only ‘reject’ applications.
4. For all applications you have decided not to shortlist (Reject) press the Red Reject Candidate button. An email notification will be automatically sent to the candidate. A copy of the email will appear in the right-hand side of the Summary page. The applicants status will change to ‘Screened – Rejected’.
5. For all applications you have decided to delay shortlisting (On Hold) press the On Hold button. The applicants status will change to ‘Screened – On Hold’. Once you are ready to resume shortlisting, you will need to contact the Recruitment Team to ask them to change the application status back to New Application.
6. For all applications you have decided to shortlist (Progress) press the Progress button. The applicants status will change to ‘Interview Rd 1 – Selected’.
7. You are now ready to invite the applicant to interview. Please refer to the module on ‘Interviews and Decisions’ for the next step.

Now that you know how to review your applications, the next step is to invite the candidates to interview.

To find out what to do next, please look at the ‘Setting up interviews schedules’ section.

For any queries, please remember you can always contact your Departmental Superuser or the Recruitment Team.