How to build your candidate overview
Your Applicant Tracking System (ATS) only works if the data inside it is structured. Once job titles, skills, industries, and locations are classified correctly, the next step is deciding how recruiters view that data. A clear candidate overview becomes the daily workspace for sourcing, screening, and matching. It removes clicks, reduces guesswork, and gives instant context about each profile.
The foundation: structure before search
Step 1. Define the key columns
Start by choosing the fields that matter most in your workflow. These are the details recruiters check every day. A typical set includes:
Name
Phone number
Email
Job title
Company
Location
Job category
Job specialty (your standardised job title)
Skills
Industry or company type
Years of experience
Degrees
Languages
Employment type
These fields only work if they are complete and up to date. Without clean inputs, the overview becomes noise. Keep the list short. Eight to twelve columns is usually enough to give context without clutter.
Step 2. Put the columns in a logical order
Once you know what to show, decide how to show it. Order the columns to match how your team reads a profile. A simple sequence works well:
Name, phone number, email
Job title, company, job category, job specialty, skills
Industry or company type, years of experience, degrees
Location, employment type, languages
This flow gives recruiters the core professional context first, then supporting details. Consistent ordering reduces hesitation and makes handovers faster because everyone scans information in the same way.
Step 3. Make the view identical across the team
Your entire agency should use the same columns in the same order with the same terminology. This only works when all fields inside the ATS follow one taxonomy. Standardised data lets teams communicate clearly. When someone asks about a candidate’s specialty or industry, everyone looks at the same field and interprets it the same way. Inconsistent views slow teams down and cause mistakes.
Step 4. Review and refine the layout
Roles shift, niches evolve, and client needs change. The candidate overview should keep pace. Review it every few months with your team.
Ask simple questions:
Which fields are checked in every shortlist?
Which ones never get used?
Do new niches require additional context?
Small adjustments can improve the speed and quality of daily screening. These improvements only work if the underlying data stays current.
Conclusion
A good candidate overview turns the ATS into a reliable workspace. It surfaces the right information at the right moment, as long as the data behind it is clean, complete, and consistently classified. Define your columns, put them in order, and make the layout standard across the team. Daidalo keeps the fields enriched and current so the overview stays accurate and usable every day.
