Managing a Hiring Pipeline with Spreadsheet.com

Managing a hiring pipeline can be a complex process. From receiving and processing incoming applications to scheduling interviews and extending candidate offers, hiring processes involve multiple parties, lines of communication and stages. Without an effective pipeline management system, the hiring process can quickly become an inefficient one for recruiters and an unpleasant experience for applicants.

In this guide, we’ll take a look at an applicant tracking workbook built to manage a hiring process end-to-end and explain how key Spreadsheet.com features like Related rows, Form views, data types, and Automations can be combined to create an all-in-one hiring pipeline management solution.

Creating Relationships between Worksheets with Related Rows

Related rows, one of Spreadsheet.com’s data types, let you link rows in multiple worksheets so that your sheets can work like tables in a relational database where editing one changes the data in another.

For our Applicant Tracking workbook, Related rows connect our Applicants, Departments, and Interviews worksheets so that the three can share information with one another.

Departments worksheet connected to other worksheets with Related rows
Use Related rows to link Applicants with Departments and Interviews

Our applicant tracking workbook has three worksheets – Applicants, Departments, and Interviews. Underneath the raw data, all of these sheets have relationships with one another; each applicant has a scheduled interview, each interview is conducted by the hiring manager of a department, etc. With Related rows, we can create links between these three sheets to represent those relationships.

Column E - Department in our Applicants worksheet and Column C - Applicants in our Departments worksheet are connected by a Related row with a 2-way link. With a 2-way link, the relationship between records is reflected in both sheets; the Applicants worksheet shows the department to which each applicant has applied, and the Departments worksheet shows all of the applicants that have applied to each department.

Similarly, Column D - Interviews in our Departments worksheet and Column D - Department in our Interviews worksheet are connected by a Related row with a 2-way link, as are Column N - Interview in our Applicants worksheet and Column B - Application in our Interviews worksheet.

By using Related rows with 2-way links, we can use additional Related row data types like lookups and rollups in both sheets.

Use Related row lookups to collect data from other records

Column E - Hiring Manager in our Interviews worksheet is a Related row lookup column that “looks up” the User data in Column B - Hiring Manager from our Departments worksheet for each related record in the adjacent column.

By using a Related row lookup, we can automatically assign the appropriate hiring manager whenever a new interview row is created.

Collecting Incoming Applications

By adding a Form view to our workbook, we can collect new application submissions from applicants and automatically add the responses as new rows in our Documents worksheet, as well as automatically generate new interview records.

Use a Form view for applicants to submit applications

By adding a Form view to our Applicants worksheet, we can collect incoming applications directly from applicants whether or not they have a Spreadsheet.com account or access to our workbook.

Form view through which candidates can submit applications

Form view fields adapt to the data types that are associated with their corresponding rows. Because Column F - Resume and Column G - Cover Letter are Attachment columns, applicants can upload document files when submitting a form response.

Form views also allow you to designate questions as optional or required responses. In our Form view, we’re requiring applicants to upload a resume file while leaving the cover letter upload as an optional response.

The Form view has a shareable link that can be distributed to applicants. Or, forms can be directly embedded in any website or app that supports iframes.

As applicants use the form to submit applications, each response is added to our Applicants worksheet as a new row.

Automatically log information with System data types

When new applications are submitted via the Form view, Column M - Date Submitted in our Applicants worksheet automatically logs when the response was submitted with the Created at data type.

Create interview records and notify hiring managers with Automations

By adding an automation to our workbook, we can automatically create a new row in our Interviews worksheet when a new application is submitted via our form. In the Automations dialog, the Create row action lets columns from a source worksheet be mapped to a target worksheet so we can selectively choose which information is carried over from the Applicants to Interviews sheet.

Automation configured to create a new interview record when an application is submitted

Here, we only want to bring essential information from one sheet to the other. When a new form response is submitted, the Application #, applicant Name, and Department will be logged in a new row in our Interviews worksheet. The rest of the columns from the Interviews worksheet can be filled manually as needed later.

We’ll also create a second automation that automatically notifies the appropriate hiring manager when a new interview record is created.

Automation configured to notify hiring managers when they are assigned new interviews

Now, when an applicant submits a new application via the Form view…

  1. A new application record is added to our Applicants sheet
  2. The Applicants worksheet logs the date and time of the submission
  3. A new interview record is created in our Interviews sheet via an automation
  4. The application is automatically linked with the Departments and Interview sheets with Related rows
  5. The hiring manager assigned to the incoming applicant is notified that new applicant and interview records have been created

…all without any manual data entry or additional user input.

Managing Interviews and Hiring Decisions

Use a Calendar view to schedule upcoming interviews

Once interviews have been added to our Interviews sheet via an Automation, we’ll schedule them in Column F - Interview Date with the Date and time data type. Then, we’ll add a Calendar view to our Interviews sheet so we can lay them out on a calendar.

Calendar view showing scheduled interviews

Calendar views take Date or Date and time columns into account. With a Calendar view added to our sheet, we can edit interview details from either our Calendar view or our primary Sheet view.

Use the Select and Rating data types and Conditional Formatting to mark applicants’ status

Once interviews have been conducted, hiring managers can log the feedback directly on the Interviews sheet with the Select and Rating data types. Column I - Applicant Rating uses the Rating data type to score each applicant on a five-star scale and Column J - Recommendation uses the Select data type to record a candidate recommendation.

Interviews worksheet with conditional formatting and data types like Rating, Select, and User

The Select column is used to define our conditional formatting rule that changes the row color based on the applicant’s status. When a hiring manager decides to extend an offer to a candidate, their row will be colored green.

Apply Row Grouping and Filters to quickly categorize applicants

By creating an additional Sheet view in our Interviews worksheet and using filters and row grouping, we can easily categorize applicants that require follow-up. The “Follow-Up” view groups rows by Column D - Department and filters out those where a hiring decision has already been made.

Interviews worksheet grouped by Column D - Department and filtered by Column J - Recommendation

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