Workable Review
Table of Contents
Workable Pricing
- Pay-as-you-go with individual job postings at $50/month per posting.
- Starter Plan at $2500/year for 10 job postings.
- Pro Plan pricing based on hiring volume.
- Free 15-day trial, no credit card required
Workable Full Review
Workable is a contemporary applicant tracking system (ATS) that helps over 6,000 companies around the world find, evaluate and hire candidates. With a rich set of features, Workable streamlines the hiring process from candidate sourcing through to employment and onboarding, reducing the overall cost and time associated with recruitment.
The software’s intuitive interface makes posting job advertisements simple. Even users with no technical background will be able to adopt the software with ease. Workable connects with hundreds of different job boards (free and paid) and includes customized branding, social sharing and an employee referral program to increase your exposure.
Workable's customizable pipeline allows you to manage different stages of the recruitment process efficiently. Each applicant’s details are automatically exported into a rich applicant profile. Workable also streamlines communication with applicants and key stakeholders by integrating with Gmail or Office 365 Calendar, and allows you to schedule and manage interviews all from one central location.
The company has a different pricing structure compared to other ATS systems such as Breezy HR and Jobsoid. Workable offers a flexible pay-as-you-go plan, in addition to a range of monthly and yearly plans. For $50/month per job, businesses can gain access to customizable pipelines, a branded career page and collaborative interview scheduling for one-off position recruitment. This plan is perfect for companies that only require singular job postings per month. However, if you recruit regularly, the plans can become expensive, starting at $2,500/year for 10 active job postings. In this case, Breezy HR may be a better option, as they allow for unlimited job postings at a lower price point.
Key Features
Below are the key features of Workable and how they can benefit your business.
Candidate Sourcing and Job Advertising
When you’re considering an applicant tracking system (ATS), you want to ensure the software has a strong sourcing tool that enables you to find qualified applicants. Workable offers several ways to attract and source talent; from posting on the best job boards and a branded career page, to advertising on social media, and even through referrals.
Once your job posting is live, you have the option to automatically post on hundreds of job boards including LinkedIn, Indeed and Google Jobs. You can utilize the free job boards (approximately 20 available) or integrate Workable with Premium job boards to increase your exposure and find suitable candidates for industry-specific positions.
For example, Coroflot, a Premium job board, posts design jobs and focuses on creative professionals. Payments for Premium job boards can also be handled through the Workable system.
In addition to posting across multiple job boards, you can utilize social media to maximize your reach. Workable integrates with the Facebook Career Tab, allowing you to add available positions to your company’s page. Job ads can also be posted with one-click across multiple social networks including LinkedIn, Google+ and Twitter.
Careers Page
Workable has a customizable Careers Page that displays open roles and provides a streamlined solution to receive applications. The fully-responsive page makes it easy for candidates to apply on any mobile or tablet. New jobs that you post, or changes to existing positions, are automatically updated. You can also customize the page to reflect your branding by adding a logo, custom URL, company description, and even including a link to your company website.
While the Careers Page offers a simple way to display job openings and collect applications, it’s limited in the overall presentation. Workable doesn’t allow you to add sections and build your page into a standalone career site in the same way that Jobsoid does. For example, Jobsoid’s Career Portal will enable you to create different sections such as Company Culture, Office Images, etc., providing applicants with a more professional and appealing site.
Applicant Tracking
Workable has an intuitive applicant tracking process. Applicants move through various stages in your hiring pipeline (e.g. Sourced, Applied, Interview, etc.), enabling managers to keep track and clearly identify any bottlenecks. You can customize the pipeline to reflect your hiring needs. However, moving candidates through your pipeline isn’t as straightforward as using Breezy HR’s drag-and-drop interface. With Workable, you need to click into each stage and select the candidates you would like to move.
Once you start receiving applications, Workable will automatically compile all resumes, screening questions, social media accounts and other files into a comprehensive applicant profile. You can upload resumes manually, and Workable will extract key data to build a rich profile (Workable recommends only uploading 100 at a time). All tasks can be completed from a single screen, including scheduling an interview and emailing candidates (which requires the Gmail integration).
Interview Scheduling
Interviews can be scheduled directly from a candidate’s profile. You have the option to schedule a Call, On Site Interview, Meeting or Internal Meeting. With internal meetings, you can send a private invite to co-workers without notifying the candidate. You can also integrate third-party video conferencing software and conduct remote interviews in Workable.
Workable doesn’t come with a built-in calendar, but you can easily connect your Gmail or Office 365 Calendar and view/schedule interviews directly in your account. This is highly recommended, since you can visualize your upcoming day or week, and schedule interviews on your calendar using the drag-and-drop feature. However, if you don’t activate the calendar feature, you can still use the 'Agenda' feature to view upcoming interviews or events.
Pro Workable users can schedule events and send them to applicants, allowing them to select a suitable interview time from your calendar. The software will ensure there are no conflicts, and shows times in both the interviewer’s and applicant’s time zone, making it easy to schedule remote calls or video interviews. Candidates will receive immediate confirmation, and your calendar will update automatically.
Team Collaboration
Workable includes a comment system which sits in each candidate’s profile and enables you to discuss and share feedback with co-workers. Comments are displayed on a timeline chronologically and provide a centralized approach to communication. All users can stay informed and see changes that have occurred on a candidate’s profile, like moving a candidate to a new stage or editing information. For a more structured approach, you can also implement Scorecards and request that your hiring team rate each candidate and provide relevant feedback.
If you need to send confidential information, you can assign specific roles to team members to restrict viewing access. One useful feature is the ability to set "Confidential Zones", and limit select users’ visibility in certain pipeline stages. For example, you can restrict a hiring manager’s view to just the comments from the interview stage and beyond.
Reports
Continuously analyzing your hiring processes is essential to reducing hiring time and associated costs. Workable has several pre-built reports that cover the status of open jobs and where candidates sit in your pipeline, in addition to historical reports such as candidate source, pipeline flow, and employee referrals.
Upgrading to the Pro Plan grants access to additional reports, which display metrics like productivity, time to hire and hiring velocity, which tracks the length of time candidates spend in each stage. Reports can be exported to CSV or PDF files, making it easy to analyze and share information, identify potential gridlocks and make data-driven decisions that improve your processes.
The Candidate Sources display shows how each application was sourced, so you can see if the majority of your candidates come from job boards, or if your most successful hires are from employee referrals, for example. Understanding where your best candidates come from can help you fine-tune your hiring strategy and focus your resources on the right avenue.
Workable vs. the Competition
We'll analyze how Workable stacks up against its competitors.
Workable vs. Jobsoid
Jobsoid is a leading applicant tracking system used by over 2,000 companies worldwide. Similar to Workable, Jobsoid is a feature-rich, cloud-based software with an integrated solution to recruitment that covers everything from candidate sourcing to hiring.
Both companies offer one-click posting to job boards, customized pipelines and strong candidate management functionality. Hiring managers can schedule interviews and send automated emails from a candidate’s profile, in addition to communicating with team members about potential hires through comments and scorecards.
Jobsoid has excellent analytics and reporting capabilities. Users can build custom reports using any data field. Workable does include custom reporting, although you will need to contact customer service to unlock this feature.
One difference that stands out is Jobsoid’s inbuilt video interview feature, which enables applicants to answer a series of screening questions in video format using their smartphone. Recruiters can ask any number of questions and send the interview out to multiple applicants, speeding up the screening process. Workable doesn’t have a native video feature, but users can still integrate third-party applications such as SparkHire or Jobma.
For small businesses, Jobsoid is appealing because of its forever free plan, which includes one job posting and unlimited candidates. The company also has a $99/month Standard Plan which includes up to 10 job postings, video interviewing functionality and smart filtering options.
On the other hand, Workable has a pay-as-you-go option at $50 per job/month, which provides the flexibility to recruit when you need with no lock-in contract. While Workable has a free 15-day trial for all plans, if you hire regularly the software can get expensive. The Starter Plan will set you back $2500/year and includes 10 job postings.
Workable vs. Breezy HR
Similar to Workable, Breezy HR is a clean and modern ATS with exceptional usability. Both companies have strong job advertising, interview scheduling, candidate management and collaboration tools.
However, moving candidates through your pipeline is much easier on Breezy HR due to the visual Kanban-style board. Users can build customized pipelines and drag-and-drop applicants from one stage to the next. Breezy also has automations which can reduce time-consuming administration tasks by sending out questionnaires, emails, or moving hires into your HRIS automatically when they reach specific stages. Workable does have automations, but only for Pro Plan users or through Zapier.
Breezy HR offers much better pricing for growing businesses. With unlimited positions and candidate pools, the $149/month Starter Plan is an excellent value. There is also a free plan where you can post one active position. Workable offers a free 15-day trial, although after this you have to pay-per-post ($50/month per job) or sign up to the Starter Plan for $2500/year (able to have 10 active job postings at one time).
As there are only small differences feature-wise between the two platforms, pricing would be the primary consideration for many businesses. If you only need to hire every now and again, Workable’s pay-as-you-go option might be best. However, if you’re looking to recruit on a more consistent basis, then Breezy HR would be ideal due to its unlimited postings.
Is Workable Right for you?
If you’re looking for a flexible and robust recruitment tool that your team will actually use, Workable should be at the top your list. However, Workable is not suitable if you want to manage all aspects of HR from one platform.
Workable simplifies all aspects of recruitment from sourcing candidates to managing them in your pipeline, scheduling interviews and gathering feedback from your team. The pay-as-you-go plan gives flexibility to new businesses that cannot accurately predict their hiring needs.
With an extensive range of features and excellent integrations, the software can be customized to meet the needs of nearly every business.