Last updated on November 17th, 2023 at 12:38 pm

With three-quarters of the global workforce considering remote working to be the “new normal” (a phrase we’ve heard countless times in recent years), it’s clear that for many workers, there’s little desire to return to their workplaces full-time. Once thought of as a rare perk (or, more recently, a temporary solution to enforced lockdowns), remote work is now considered a standard across most industries, leading to a rise in the need for HR management tools to handle large numbers of remote employees.

While on the one hand, this is seen as a good thing for businesses (reducing overheads and widening the available talent pool, for instance), it has also created a recruitment landscape where candidates hold the power and employers can struggle to attract and retain top talent — particularly if the business is new to or unfamiliar with remote working.

In a candidate-led market, then, it’s important that employers looking to hire remote staff adopt a streamlined and efficient hiring process — unnecessary delays caused by poor communication or clunky recruitment software are likely to turn off prospective candidates who likely have a raft of alternative options to choose from. 

With that in mind, we’ve researched the 7 most powerful HR management tools that will help your business seamlessly recruit and onboard the best remote talent quickly.

Top 7 HR Management Tools

To automate the remote hiring process, use: Gohire

One of the most effective ways of streamlining the candidate experience is by automating certain steps of the hiring process; this in turn will reduce the time spent manually sifting through applications and scheduling interviews. GoHire’s automation tools are reportedly helping clients achieve up to a 500% increase in candidate application rates!

With automated pre-screening helping employers to ensure only the best applications make it through the first stage, Gohire also has an automatic interview scheduling tool which makes it easier to align calendars between candidates and hiring managers. To streamline communication, their award-winning chatbots can take care of disseminating information at each important stage of the process.

Top features of Gohire:

• Application pre-screening
• Automated interview scheduling
• Chatbot communication

To hire freelancers remotely, use: FreeUp

If you’d prefer to take on a remote freelancer in favor of a permanent remote hire (for example, if you need some temporary support with a specific project or you don’t have the budget to recruit full-time staff), a tool such as FreeUp is great at sourcing and onboarding temporary talent. Often when it comes to hiring a freelancer, time is of the essence, but FreeUp guarantees to match you with a suitable freelancer in just 24 hours.

FreeUp is home to a community of thousands of talented freelancers, and they’ll only accept the very best applications (the top 1%, in fact) based on their skills and experience — therefore you’ll have access to the top freelancers in the business (although of course, this does mean they’ll typically charge high rates for their services) and you’ll find it easier to source the perfect match for your task or project. 

Top features of FreeUp:

• Access to the “top 1%” of freelancing talent
• Accurate business-to-freelancer matching
• Guaranteed first “match” within 24 hours

To recruit internationally, use: Remote

Of course, one of the primary benefits of remote work is that it removes geographical barriers to recruitment, meaning your business theoretically has access to a far wider talent pool than if you were recruiting based on location. You may even consider hiring from overseas (in a country that has ample expertise in a particular industry sector, for example), and that’s where global HR management tools like Remote can help. 

To hire remote staff from another country, you typically need to use an employer of record service (more information on that here: Employer of Record (EOR) Services | Remote), which effectively acts a ‘local’ employer in any overseas location your company doesn’t already have its own legal entity. To streamline the process of hiring internationally (which can otherwise be complex and time-consuming), Remote will take care of all legal requirements, as well as ensuring payroll, benefits and taxes are managed effectively. 

Top features of Remote:

• Industry-leading employer of record service
• Streamlines the global onboarding experience
• Ensures 100% legal compliance when recruiting overseas

To screen remote candidates, use: Toggl

If you don’t have the budget (or the need) for an all-in-one automation tool like Gohire, skills-based screening tool such as Toggl can at least reduce the time it takes to manually screen applications to assess their suitability for a role. It’s one of the parts of the hiring process that often takes up the most of a recruiter’s time, and therefore leaning on an automated screening tool can help you find the right candidate quicker and more objectively.

Toggl includes a library of over 150 pre-built, role-specific tests and assessments designed to measure a candidate’s suitability before proceeding their application to the interview stage — potentially saving ample precious time which might otherwise be spent interviewing unsuitable candidates whose applications could have been filtered out earlier in the process. It also makes for a more objective hiring process, since the assessments mean that candidates can demonstrate their skills rather than just talking about them. 

Top features of Toggl:

• 150+ pre-built assessments for a range of roles
• The ability to create multi-level assessments
• Automated next-step invites and instant feedback

To interview remote candidates, use: Whereby

An essential tool in any remote-based recruitment process is video interviewing software. Of course, we’ve all become aware of the myriad teleconferencing tools available in recent years (increasing our use of these tools in both our professional and personal lives), but Whereby provides one of the most seamless and straightforward ways of connecting with remote candidates over video. 

With Whereby there’s not even a requirement to download software or an app, and guests can join without having to login first: you simply share a meeting link and get started. Already used by giant companies such as Spotify and Netflix, Whereby is preferred to Zoom by 86% of people according to a survey featured in The New York Times. To create a professional feel that will impress candidates, you can personalize your Whereby meeting room with custom names, URLs and company branding.

Top features of Whereby:

• No installs, downloads or logins required
• Customizable meeting rooms
• Integrations with Google Docs, YouTube, Slack and more

To capture interview insights, use: Screenloop

Of course, while video interviewing tools have come a long way in just a few short years, conducting an interview remotely can still make it harder to gauge a candidate’s suitability for a role; it can be more difficult to pick up on body language, for example, which can give important clues as to whether a candidate would be a good fit. To aid in gleaning more insight from a remote interview, you can use an intelligent hiring tool such as Screenloop. 

Screenloop helps recruiters and hiring managers make more informed, non-biased hiring decisions by recording candidates’ interactions during remote interviews and providing real-time feedback and insights. Among other features, the tool measures elements such as talk ratio (how often the candidate spends talking vs. listening) and words per minute (the speed at which they speak) to help you measure interview performance and make smarter decisions about candidate suitability. 

Top features of Screenloop:

• Records and measures candidate interactions
• Provides real-time performance insight
• Automated post-interview feedback surveys

To onboard remote staff, use: BambooHR

Once you’ve successfully sourced, interviewed and secured your ideal candidate, the next step is to successfully onboard them. In a remote environment it’s essential this is done as seamlessly as possible, so you need a comprehensive tool to manage all aspects of the onboarding process. BambooHR is an all-in-one HR management tool (encompassing time tracking, payroll and more), but one of its most impressive features is its onboarding software, which makes it easier (and quicker) to get new remote recruits up and running. 

To ensure your new hire’s onboarding period is as seamless as possible, you can personalize their experience, with customizable templates that can be tailored for different job types, departments and more. Plus, you can automatically send onboarding tasks for them to complete in their own time, reducing the time spent completing endless paperwork and helping you focus on making their first few days as pain-free and engaging as possible.  

Top features of BambooHR:

• All-in-one HR management tool
• Customizable templates to personalize the onboarding experience
• Automated onboarding task assignment

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