r/Recruitment

I used to be an internal recruiter at PP. Day one, I was told not to forward any non-white candidates. Management said the Kensington/Chelsea clients would complain if the engineer wasn’t white. Visible tattoos were also an automatic no.

If a CV passed, we’d do a phone screen, then a face-to-face. If they impressed, senior decision makers came in for the final call.

PP HQ is in Lambeth North, a multicultural area. Out of ∼250 staff, 99% were white.

I’d done agency recruitment for 9 years before taking this internal role as a stopgap. I was already burned out on the industry.

We say we want top talent. But our process might be rejecting them first.

A few things worth checking:

1. Your ATS is doing more screening than your team is.
   • If the keyword logic hasn't been reviewed in a year, you're rejecting people who can do the job. Tools that screen for skills rather than resume formatting can flip this dynamic; worth comparing skill‑based assessments with what you’re getting from your ATS.
2. Your job description is a wishlist.
   • "5+ years required" for a role that didn't exist 3 years ago. Every inflated requirement shrinks your pool and skews it toward credentials rather than capability.
3. Too many interview rounds.
   • Good candidates have options. They drop off. The longer the funnel, the more you're selecting for availability, not fit.
4. You're using the resume as a proxy for performance.
   • A well-formatted resume from a known school beats a messy one from someone quietly excellent. Every time. Unless you're actually testing for the job.
5. No feedback loop.
   • If you don't know why the last few hires didn't work out, you can't fix the process that hired them.

What would you add?

I am hiring for a communications role, so they need to be a strong writer and editor. These skills are more important to this job than the oral communication skills revealed through interviews, so I need to weight them more. I used to be able to assess this through written assignments but that’s now out the window. Candidates are using AI a lot, making it hard to tell if they have those foundational good written communication skills needed for a communications manager position. I want to figure out a writing test that AI won’t be effective for - unfortunately I cannot do in person as some applicants are from out of town. What are your tips for “AI-proofing” written assignments? Is another option screen-shared written assignments? If you’ve tried that, how did it go? Are there other ways to AI-proof a written assignment? Thanks for any insights you have to offer!

We’re a small business looking to expand our remote team and bring on someone overseas.

The challenge is figuring out the cleanest way to do global hiring without having to set up a business in another country.

So far I’ve come across:

• Hiring as an independent contractor
• Using an employer of record for full time roles

It seems like both are valid, but each comes with trade offs around compliance, cost and control.

If you’ve been through this what did you choose and why?

Hello all

I am preparing to go back into law after getting my MBA. I would love some guidance on CV’s that are appropriate in form, format and content. I see the trend is to do double columns and a picture but doubt this is good for law. Any examples or links to resources would be greatly appreciated.

Much appreciated.

At smaller scale, manual processes and flexible evaluation work fine. But when hiring crosses hundreds or thousands, things start breaking.

What systems, workflows, or structures are needed to handle hiring at that scale without losing speed and quality?

Hi everyone,

I’m currently in the background verification stage with a US-based company, and I’ve run into a situation that’s making me a bit anxious.

Around ~5 years ago, I worked at a small startup in India. The company has completely shut down since then — no website, no LinkedIn page, and none of my old colleagues or founders are reachable anymore.

At that time, things were pretty informal:

• I didn’t receive structured payslips
• I was paid monthly via bank transfers
• I don’t have PF/official HR documentation

What I do have:

• Bank statements showing regular salary credits from the company
• Some old emails and project-related communication

Now HireRight is handling my background check, and I’m worried this might cause issues since there’s no official way to verify the company anymore.

I had a thought (not sure if it’s a bad idea):
Would it make sense to recreate a basic website/email for that startup just to establish some presence for verification, and do that myself? Or would that backfire?

I obviously don’t want to do anything unethical or risky, but I’m unsure how strict/verifiable these checks are when companies shut down completely.

My questions:

1. Has anyone gone through a similar situation with a defunct startup?
2. What kind of proof worked for you in absence of formal documents?
3. How does HireRight typically handle cases where employers no longer exist?
4. Is there anything else I should prepare proactively to avoid failing verification?

Would really appreciate any advice or experiences — feeling a bit stuck here.

Thanks in advance 🙏