Car mechanics can teach us an important lesson. They always carry a handy toolbox with everything they need to troubleshoot common auto problems. Similarly, recruiters can benefit from having their own toolbox of critical assets to make hiring seamless and quick.

Tasks like screening, interviewing, and providing feedback require you to have the right tools at your fingertips. Creating a shared work folder with these resources will help your recruiters speed up hiring, deliver a great candidate experience, and convert the best talent. Let's dive in!

1. Interview kit

Start by categorizing the roles and departments you hire for, then create a questionnaire and talking points for each role. This will serve as a guideline for each recruiter as they navigate candidate evaluation for different roles and seniority. It keeps interviews structured, bias-free, and easy to evaluate.

2. Job description templates

Create customizable templates for different functions and seniority levels. Each template should list a framework of roles, responsibilities, and skills required. Be sure they're innately compliant with the relevant anti-discrimination, equal employment opportunity, and pay transparency laws in the region. All a recruiter should need to do is pick the most applicable template and tinker with it to get to their ideal job description.

Pro tip: Use Zoho Recruit's AI Assist to generate job description content by entering just the key fields like job title, experience, location, and others.

3. Offer letter templates

Get pre-approved offer letter templates ready for different roles, employment terms, and employment types (permanent, contract, etc.), and add legally approved disclaimers and statutory requirements to each one. Ensure consistency across all templates while allowing for some degree of customization.

Pro tip: Send personalised and approved offers to candidates with offer letter templates in Zoho Recruit.

4. Email and SMS templates

Create emails and SMS content for the most common use cases, such as acknowledgement of application submissions, interview scheduling and reminders, and rejection and acceptance communication. Having these templates not only ensures faster communication from recruiters, but it also guarantees consistent and professional communication on all fronts from each recruiter. Plus, it builds a recognizable brand voice.

Pro tip: Create templates for emails and SMS. Trigger them automatically in Zoho Recruit.

5. Pre-screening tests

The first stage every applicant passes through is pre-screening, and this stage always demands a high volume of work from recruiters. Having pre-screening tests ready for different roles helps qualify candidates quickly and without bias. Add qualifier questions like "Are you willing to relocate?" and "How many years of relevant experience do you have?" Keep the questions specific and short to avoid excessive candidate drop-offs.

Pro tip: Use the pre-screening bot in Zoho Recruit to let candidates take assessments via email, the candidate portal, or the career site.

6. Assessments

Design assessments for different roles and departments. When a recruiter is hiring for a specific role, they should know exactly which assessments to use from your folder. Using the same tests for a specific role ensures data-driven decisions and bias-free hiring practices that focus on skills. Here are a few different types of tests you could create:

• Skill-based tests for each role that test the candidates' practical knowledge in their fields of expertise
• Situation-based questions to see how they would handle a real-world scenario on the job
• A common psychometric test for all candidates to assess their personality traits and test culture fit

Pro tip: Use the Assessments module to design tests with objective and explanatory questions for different competencies.

7.  Employer brand assets 

It isn't enough to convince a good candidate just about the job. You should also inspire confidence in them about the company's vision, growth trajectory, and culture. Create employee branding videos and collect video testimonials from employees. Make templated presentation decks outlining the company's work culture and possible career trajectories for a potential employee. A great example is the popular culture deck built by Netflix. Make a constant effort to build an employee brand on social media.

8.  Onboarding checklist 

An onboarding checklist comes in handy if you are a recruiter who hires for your own company. Categorize them as pre-boarding (IT setup, document collection, access provisioning) and first day essentials (team introductions, HR paperwork, I-9 submission, etc.). It should also include training plans. A well-planned onboarding process reduces attrition, sets an employee up for success, and strengthens the employer brand.

Pro tip: After an employee accepts an offer on Zoho Recruit, trigger an onboarding workflow in Zoho People.

Create these assets and put them in a shared folder that's accessible by all recruiters. Your hiring will become faster, consistent, and of higher quality!