For one example of a hiring pipeline built around a single candidate record, see the Radius ATS.
On this page: What should you settle before you compare recruitment workflow software? · Which recruitment workflow questions should you ask every supplier? · Why does ownership come before software? · Common mistakes before buying software · What does this look like at an agency? · How Radius helps · FAQ
What should you settle before you compare recruitment workflow software?
Four things for each handoff, agreed in writing. They come from the six rules for better handoffs in Radius Hire's 2026 research paper on frontline hiring handoffs:
- One named owner. At any point, one person can answer: "Where is this candidate, and what happens next?"
- A deadline, and someone to tell. When the deadline is missed, a named person hears about it.
- The minimum information to pass on. A short, fixed note written for the person receiving it.
- What the candidate is told. What happened, who has their file and when they will hear next.
You do not need new software to agree these. The paper's audit uses records you already have, such as stage dates, planners' lists and message timestamps. A recruitment lead and an operations lead run it for one role at one site, over about two weeks. The method is set out in How to Map Your Recruitment Process in Two Weeks.
If you are a staffing agency, the same four points become an agreement between two companies. Agree who owns each step with your client before either of you buys anything; staffing agency responsibilities, step by step shows how. Once it is written down, you have a brief that any tool has to meet.
Which recruitment workflow questions should you ask every supplier?
These six, sent in writing before the demo. The paper lists them and says to ask every supplier, including us. Ask to see each answer on a real candidate record rather than a slide.
1. Does it show one named owner for each candidate at each step?
If the tool cannot show who owns a candidate right now, the rules you agreed have nowhere to live. A good answer: a named person on every record, at every step, and a clear way to hand it to a stand-in.
2. Does it record when each handoff was sent and when someone first acted on it?
That gap is the waiting time. Without both times, you cannot see where candidates wait. A good answer: both are recorded for every step, and you can export them.
3. Can the next person see the evidence behind a recommendation, not only a label or a number?
The paper puts it in one line: "Oversight that approves by default is a queue, not a control." A good answer: the reviewer can open the answer, note or document behind each recommendation.
4. Does it reuse information the candidate already gave, for a stated purpose?
Ask once, and reuse with care. A good answer: the supplier can say which information carries forward to which step, and why.
5. Does it log which decisions a person made and which the system suggested?
A clear log shows where a person decided. A good answer: every decision shows who made it, when, and what the system suggested. For what real oversight looks like, read The Tool Should Never Be the One Saying No.
6. Can it delete candidate data on a fixed schedule?
A tool that keeps everything forever adds risk, not control. A good answer: you set the retention period, deletion runs on schedule, and you can see that it ran. Agree the right periods with your privacy adviser.
These six are about workflow and handoffs. They do not cover the AI itself, such as whether anyone is rejected without a person's review or how candidates are told they are dealing with AI. For those, use How to Choose AI Recruitment Software: 10 Questions to Ask Any Provider. Ask both sets.
Why does ownership come before software?
Because a tool can only carry rules that someone has agreed. The paper is clear about where software helps at a handoff and where it does not.
| What software can do | What people must decide |
|---|---|
| Keep one shared record instead of five | Who owns each handoff |
| Remind people when a deadline passes | How to settle a disagreement between agency and client |
| Show who owns a candidate | Whether a candidate's doubt about night shifts matters |
| Stop candidates being asked for the same document twice | What the agency and the client agree to pass on |
In the paper's words, a system that moves candidates on automatically can also remove the moments where a person would have spotted a problem. Its conclusion about its own worked example is short: none of the fixes needs a particular product, and most need the agency and the client to agree who owns each handoff.
Evidence from another field points the same way. In the I-PASS study at nine teaching hospitals, medical errors fell 23 percent after junior doctors adopted a standard handover structure. The programme also included training, observation of real handovers and a campaign to keep the habit going (Starmer and colleagues, 2014).
Read the new Radius paper. The Radius Papers 02: The Hidden Cost of Frontline Hiring is Radius Hire's white paper for operations directors, HR managers, recruitment leaders and staffing agencies in the Netherlands. Enter your name and work email, choose English or Dutch, and Radius emails it to you: Get The Radius Papers 02.
Common mistakes before buying software
Booking demos before owners are agreed. The demo then shows you features, not whether the tool fits your process. Fix: write down the four points for your three most important handoffs first.
Judging answers on slides. A slide can show any answer. Fix: ask to see each of the six on a real candidate record.
Asking only one set of questions. Workflow questions miss the AI risks, and AI questions miss the handoffs. Fix: ask both sets.
Automating a step where a person used to look. Fix: keep a named person at the steps where judgement matters.
What does this look like at an agency?
It is the last Friday of a bad month. The operations director of a staffing agency in Breda has three supplier websites open and three demos booked for next week. Two client sites complained about starters with no name on the gate list. A good candidate took another job while waiting for the planner's call.
Every website promises to close the gaps. None of them asks the question her own branch cannot answer: who owns the step between the screening call and the planner?
She moves the demos back a week, agrees owners for three handoffs with her branch managers and one client, and sends the six questions in writing. The demos then become a test against her own brief.
This scene is a composite, not a documented case.
How Radius helps
Radius Hire is an AI hiring platform for frontline roles, built in Amsterdam for staffing agencies and employers who hire for the work floor; it is built to source, interview and verify applicants, while a person makes every hiring decision. The Radius ATS is built to run one pipeline from applied to signed, per role, site and client, with messages, notes, the interview, offers and contracts on one candidate record, and it can run alongside your existing ATS. Radius never rejects a candidate on its own, candidate data is hosted in the EU, and you should put the six questions to us as well. If you run a staffing agency, see Radius for staffing agencies.