Recruiting terms, defined

45 terms recruiters, hiring managers and candidates meet, each defined in a sentence or two you can use on its own.

A

Adverse impact

A substantially lower selection rate for one group, defined by race, sex or ethnicity, compared with another at a step in the hiring process. In the US it is often first checked with the four-fifths rule.

Adverse impact can happen without any intent to discriminate, which is why outcomes have to be measured rather than assumed. Check each stage of the process separately, and be careful when the numbers are small.

AI voice screen

A first-round interview in which an AI interviewer asks a fixed set of questions by voice and each answer is rated against a rubric the hiring team wrote. In Emoti, a recruiter reviews the results and makes every decision.

Candidates usually take it from a link at a time that suits them. A well-designed screen tells candidates an AI is asking the questions, explains who reviews the answers, and offers a way to ask for an adjustment.

Anchored rating scale

A rating scale in which each point is described by an example or description of the answer that earns it, so interviewers rate answers against the same standard.

Reviews of the research find that anchored scales make structured interview ratings more reliable and more valid. Anchoring every point on the scale, not only the ends, gives raters the most guidance.

Applicant tracking system

Software that stores job openings, applications and each candidate's progress through the hiring stages, often called an ATS. It is usually the system of record for hiring decisions.

Automated employment decision tool

A term from New York City's Local Law 144 for a computer-based tool that uses machine learning, statistical modeling, data analytics or artificial intelligence to substantially assist or replace discretionary hiring or promotion decisions.

Employers using one to assess candidates for jobs in New York City must have an independent bias audit done within a year before use, publish a summary of the results, and notify candidates who live in the city 10 business days before use.

B

Bias audit

An impartial evaluation of a hiring tool's outcomes by group. Under New York City's Local Law 144, an independent auditor calculates selection or scoring rates and impact ratios by sex, race and ethnicity, and their intersections.

Boolean search

A search that combines keywords with operators such as AND, OR and NOT, and quotation marks for exact phrases, to find profiles or resumes.

It is precise but literal: it finds the words people used, not necessarily the skills they have.

Related: sourcing, talent pool

C

Calibration

Aligning interviewers, or a recruiter and a hiring manager, on what a good candidate looks like, usually by rating the same examples together and discussing the differences.

In sourcing, calibration often means reviewing the first few profiles together before searching further.

Related: debrief, rubric, intake meeting

Candidate experience

How candidates perceive an employer's hiring process, from the first message to the final decision, including its speed, clarity, fairness and respect.

Competency

A skill, behavior or kind of knowledge the job requires, defined clearly enough to be assessed, such as owning production systems or negotiating contracts.

Counteroffer

An offer a candidate's current employer makes to keep them after they receive or accept another offer, usually more pay or a new role.

D

Debrief

The meeting after interviews where interviewers share their ratings and evidence and the hiring team decides. It works best when every interviewer has recorded ratings independently beforehand.

E

Evidence

In Emoti, the line of profile or transcript text behind each judgment, shown next to the judgment so a person can check it.

In sourcing, every criterion on the fit strip carries an evidence line, such as the employer where a skill was used or a note that the skill isn't in the profile. In interview notes, evidence is a quote linked to its moment in the call.

F

First line

In outreach, the opening sentence of the first message, written for one person from their own work. Emoti drafts one per person and a recruiter approves it before anything is sent.

Fit strip

Emoti's row of marks, one per search criterion, showing whether a candidate meets, partly meets, misses or lacks information for each criterion, with the evidence behind each mark.

Met is worth 1, partly met 0.5, not enough information 0.25 and missing 0. Must-haves count double, a missing must-have caps the score at 54 out of 100, and a partly met must-have caps it at 74.

Four-fifths rule

A guideline in the US Uniform Guidelines on Employee Selection Procedures: a selection rate for any race, sex or ethnic group below four-fifths of the highest group's rate is generally regarded as evidence of adverse impact.

It is a rule of thumb, not a legal verdict. The guidelines note that smaller differences can still matter when they are statistically and practically significant, and larger ones may not when they rest on small numbers.

H

Hiring brief

A short, plain-language description of who a team wants to hire and how it will recognize them: must-haves, nice-to-haves, evidence, location, level, pay range and deal-breakers.

I

Intake meeting

The meeting where a recruiter and hiring manager agree on a role before the search starts: what the person will do, the must-haves, where to look and the interview process.

J

Job description

A document describing a job's purpose, responsibilities and requirements. It is usually written for candidates and internal records, and is broader than a hiring brief.

Job post

A public advertisement for an open role, published on a careers page or job board and written to attract applicants. Some places require it to include a pay range.

California, for example, requires employers with 15 or more employees to include the pay scale in job postings.

L

Look-alike search

In Emoti, a search that builds criteria from one person's profile, such as the same discipline, region, years of experience and top skills, and ranks others against them.

The criteria are visible and editable, which matters because copying the shape of one profile can also copy its blind spots.

M

Market map

In Emoti, a view of where people in one discipline and region work, grouped by company, with how many there are, how many are senior, their median years of experience and their most common skills.

Must-have criterion

A requirement a team would turn down an otherwise excellent candidate for lacking. In Emoti, must-haves count double, and missing one caps a candidate's score at 54.

Keep the list short: each extra must-have shrinks the pool. A good test is to ask whether you would really turn down a strong candidate who lacked it.

N

Nice-to-have criterion

A requirement that would make a candidate stand out but whose absence wouldn't rule them out. In Emoti, nice-to-haves count once and never cap a score.

Notetaker

Software that joins a call, records and transcribes it, and drafts notes. Emoti's notetaker writes notes in the template chosen for each kind of call and, by default, tells everyone the call is recorded.

Notice period

The time a person must work, or be paid for, after resigning from their current job before they can start a new one, set by their contract or local law.

O

Offer acceptance rate

Offers accepted divided by offers made in a period, leaving out offers still waiting for an answer.

Outreach sequence

A planned series of messages and tasks, such as emails, LinkedIn messages, calls and waits, sent to a candidate over days or weeks until they reply or the sequence ends.

In Emoti, any reply stops the sequence for that person, and emails go out only on weekdays, within a sending window and under a daily limit per mailbox.

P

Panel interview

An interview in which several interviewers meet a candidate together, or a set of interviews with different interviewers. Each panel member should rate the candidate independently before any discussion.

Pass-through rate

The share of candidates at one stage of hiring who move to the next, for example people advanced after a screen divided by people screened.

Comparing pass-through rates by group at each stage is one of the simplest ways to spot adverse impact.

Passive candidate

A person who isn't actively looking for a new job but might consider the right one. Sourcing and outreach are how teams reach them.

Phone screen

A short first conversation that checks a candidate's motivation, must-haves and logistics before a full interview. It can be run by a recruiter or as an AI voice screen.

Q

Quality of hire

A measure of how well hires turn out, using signals such as performance ratings, hiring manager satisfaction or retention after a set period. There is no single standard definition.

R

Reasonable adjustment

A change to a hiring process or job that removes a disadvantage for a disabled person, such as extra time, a different format or a human interviewer. US law calls it a reasonable accommodation.

Great Britain's Equality Act 2010 places a duty on employers to make reasonable adjustments, and the US Americans with Disabilities Act requires reasonable accommodations for qualified applicants unless they would cause undue hardship.

Reply rate

Replies divided by people contacted in an outreach sequence or campaign. Teams should decide whether bounced messages count as contacted and use the same rule every time.

Requisition

An approved request to hire for a role, usually with a budget, level and headcount, often shortened to req. Time to fill is usually counted from the day it opens.

Rubric

A written guide for rating answers: for each question or competency, what a strong, middling and weak answer contains.

S

Scorecard

The record of one interviewer's or one screen's ratings for a candidate, competency by competency or question by question, with the evidence for each rating.

Source of hire

Where each hire came from, such as sourcing, referrals, the careers page, job boards or agencies, usually reported as each source's share of hires.

Sourcing

Finding and identifying people who could fit a role, especially people who haven't applied, through searches, referrals and research.

Structured interview

An interview in which every candidate is asked the same job-related questions and every answer is rated against the same written standard.

Research consistently finds that structured interviews predict job performance better than unstructured conversations, and a 2022 re-analysis ranked them first among common selection methods.

T

Talent pool

A saved group of potential candidates, such as past finalists or people found in sourcing, kept for current or future roles.

Time to fill

The time from opening a role, usually the day the requisition is approved, to the day a candidate accepts an offer.

Time to hire

The time from the day the eventual hire entered the pipeline, by applying or being sourced, to the day they accepted the offer.

Read it next to time to fill. A long time to fill with a short time to hire means the right person arrived late, which usually points to sourcing rather than the interview process.

Transcript highlight

In Emoti, a marked moment in a call's transcript with a type (strength, concern, question, logistics or motivation), a short title, a quote and a time that opens the transcript at that moment.

Read more. Related: notetaker, evidence, debrief