Interview with Sutter LOCAL MEDIA: Faster and More Up-to-Date Thanks to an Applicant Tracking System

Why is it worthwhile for every HR department to think about purchasing an applicant tracking system? Talention was in contact with Jennifer Wildschütz, personnel manager at Sutter Telefonbuchverlag GmbH, on this topic. Find out here which daily challenges led to the acquisition of Talention and which advantages an applicant tracking system brings along in the everyday life of a recruiter.

Jennifer Wildschütz, personnel manager at Sutter Telefonbuchverlag GmbH

Talention: "Hello Mrs. Wildschütz. Why don't you start by telling us something about the company and the role you play there?"

We are Sutter Telefonbuchverlag GmbH located in Essen, with further offices in Stuttgart, Potsdam and Detmold. Together with other companies that belong to us, we present ourselves under the umbrella brand Sutter LOCAL MEDIA as a full-service provider for local marketing. We advise small and medium-sized companies individually on all questions regarding success-oriented advertising. Our portfolio includes high-reach directory advertising, e.g. with Yellow Pages, mobile-friendly websites, as well as performance-based advertising via Google, Facebook & Co.

I am 33 years old and have been part of this company for 13 years now. I already completed my training as a publishing manager here and was then able to gain a foothold in human resources. The areas of training and recruiting are my focal points here. I was one of the main contributors to the decision for Talention in the project team for the introduction of an applicant tracking system.

Talention: "What were your daily challenges in HR before Talention?"

One of the particular challenges was the coordination of new recruitment measures. Several specialist departments and thus also employees had to be involved until a job advertisement could be created and published. As you can imagine, this led to delays and made the process sluggish and costly.

The entire administrative work involved in filling a position made the workflow even more difficult: Applications received via e-mail had to be sorted to the corresponding advertisement, and all communication with the applicant was handled manually. The review and exchange with responsible superiors was also too time-consuming.

When the management decided to expand our field sales force, it quickly became clear that we would not be able to manage the additional effort without a suitable applicant tracking system.

Talention: "What were the most important criteria for you at that time that an applicant tracking system should ideally fulfill for you?"

Of course, we had a catalogue of criteria with many requirements, with must-haves and some nice-to-have points. For example, the creation of job advertisements with the help of templates, i.e. templates that are structurally and optically uniform and can be adapted to the job profiles and requirements with just a few clicks, was of great importance. The automated embedding of job advertisements on our career page was also important to us. With these and other largely automated processes, we can now save time and conserve resources in other departments such as graphics. Talention fulfilled the essential criteria right from the start. It's great that the success team from Talention continues to support us at all times.

Talention: "What has changed with Talention in your recruiting?"

With Talention, the overall process has been significantly trimmed and simplified. We are therefore always up to date and can give our applicants direct feedback on the application with the help of the automatic and personalised receiving notices. The candidate journey and -experience are supported enormously and without larger effort from our side.

Talention: "Do you use the analytics of Talention?"

For us, for example, it is important which devices (desktop or mobile) candidates and potential candidates use to access our job ads. This enables us to understand the target group better and to optimize the individual channels even faster.

Talention: "Do you organize events to get in touch with candidates?"

We do not currently organise any in-house events ourselves. Thanks to some cooperations with the chambers of industry and commerce and the Federal Employment Agency, we are prominently represented at many trade fairs and speed dating events.

Talention: "What do you think will become more and more relevant to the recruiting market in the future?"

Everyone is talking about the upcoming war for talents. We already have the feeling of being right in the middle of it, as the job market is almost exhausted, especially in the urban areas. The passive applicant market is becoming increasingly important. Therefore, topics such as employer branding and sourcing are important topics for the future. We need to draw the attention of suitable candidates without concrete intentions to change jobs and convince them that Sutter LOCAL MEDIA is the right employer for them. The classic tactic of placing job advertisements and hoping for applications loses relevance, but continues to be an important part of our overall strategy.

We are also convinced that the classic resume will soon lose its status quo. Many applicants have already started to simply submit their CV or link their XING profile. The application process of the future will become more mobile, faster and easier for the candidate - but more and more demanding for us HR professionals.