Automating Tasks for SAP SucessFactors Recruiting

Introducing automation in a customer’s configuration brings incredible value due to the overwhelming volume of manual tasks for each Recruiting process. Automation can help recruiters work more efficiently and effectively by reducing the time spent on repetitive tasks and allowing them to focus on more important tasks such as building relationships with qualified candidates.

When configuring the Recruiting module, there are various tools to help introduce automation into a customer’s configuration. Some Recruiting features have built-in automation capabilities, while others require more creativity using the automation tools available in the Admin Center.

You can see how different automation tools can be used to help streamline the different recruiting processes.

Some of the Recruiting tools have built-in functionality to help automate Recruiting processes. Some examples of the product features that support automation are:

• Pre-Screening Questions: By nominating questions as disqualifiers, the system can automatically move a candidate’s application to the Automatically Disqualified status in the Talent Pipeline if they answer a question incorrectly.
• Recruiting Posting and Intelligent Services: When using the Recruiting Posting feature to advertise job postings to job boards, customers can use the standard Intelligent Services job to automate the posting process. In addition, recruiters can select how many times the job should be reposted in Recruiting→Job Postings→Recruiting Posting Actions. This helps to automate the posting (and reposting) of job requisitions to various job boards.
• Position Management Integration with Recruiting: This helps populate the position data directly into the Job Requisition form once the Job Requisition is created.

Integration Center and Intelligent Services are two powerful tools that enable you to automate HR processes and integrate SAP SuccessFactors within the SuccessFactors modules, or with other systems. They provide a user-friendly interface for creating integrations and automating HR processes without requiring any coding skills.

Integration Center provides an easy-to-use interface to help you create powerful integrations. You can quickly map fields to update data or create an integration with a third-party vendor to send data on a scheduled or recurring basis. Integration Center recognizes some user-based actions in the system to trigger an integration job (for example, if a recruiting user uses the "Initiate Background Check" action in the candidate’s application, the background check integration will trigger). However, most jobs created in the Integration Center require scheduling.

The data entities that can be used to create integrations for SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting are:

• Job Requisition : To bypass the validation of required fields on the Job Requisition, use the isDraft field and set the value to true
• Application : To bypass the validation of required fields on the Application, the following role-based permission should be enabled for the Administrator role: Recruiting Permissions→OData API Application Create and Update Validation Bypass for Required Fields
• Candidate Profile (or CandidateLight) : To bypass the validation of required fields on the Candidate Profile, use the "CandidateLight" data entity. This data entity only requires the first and last name, phone number, and primary email address fields to be completed.
• Job Offer

For example, when using the Multi-Stage Application environment, we can configure recruiter-specific or candidate-specific fields to be required in different statuses of the Talent Pipeline. If we are using the Integration Center to configure a third-party assessment integration, we will need to enable the appropriate role-based permission to bypass required fields on the Application. If we do not enable these role-based permissions, the integration between SAP SuccessFactors and the third-party will fail if any of the required fields on the application have not been completed.

For a complete list of the data entities that can be used when creating integrations, please visit the API Reference document in the SAP SuccessFactors Platform guide on the SAP Help Portal.

Intelligent Services provides the ability to create more powerful integrations. Using Intelligent Services, you can use event-based triggers and rules to specify when an integration should occur (instead of a scheduled timeline). You can also use Intelligent Services to create a workflow, listing multiple integrations in a specified order of operations. When the desired event occurs, the integrations will trigger in the order you specify. This allows you to create an automated process rather than a single integration activity.

The following events can be used when creating Intelligent Services integrations for Recruiting:

• Update of a Job Requisition (a job requisition is created and/or saved)
• Initiate Job Posting (used for the Recruiting Posting automation)
• Update of an Application (a candidate’s application is created and/or saved)
• Update of an Application’s Status (a candidate’s application is moved into a new status)
• Update of a Candidate Profile (a candidate profile is created and/or saved)
• Approval of Offer Detail (the final offer approval step is complete)

A common use case for using Integration Center and Intelligent Services is configuring a background check process for SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting. This configuration traditionally requires an integration with a third-party vendor. When configuring the integration between SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting and a third party, you can configure the integration by using Integration Center only, or you can create the integration using Intelligent Services and Integration Center.

When configuring the integration using the Integration Center, the recruiting user will have to manually trigger the initiation of a background check in the candidate’s application. The application feature permission controls who can initiate a background check and when (in the Talent Pipeline).

When configuring the integration by using the Intelligent Services and Integration Center, the system will automatically trigger the initiation of the background check when the candidate’s application is moved into the background check status in the Talent Pipeline. The background check feature permission must be configured to the appropriate background check status for the system to recognize when to initiate the integration job.

The configuration with Intelligent Services reduces the number of steps that a recruiting user has to complete to initiate a background check. While Intelligent Services adds a layer of automation to the background check configuration, it is important to thoroughly understand a customer’s process and requirements before implementing a solution. While some customers will appreciate the fully automated solution, others will want more control over when a background check is initiated due to costs associated with the order.

It is important to remember that while there are multiple tools to help you create automation within SAP SuccessFactors Recruiting, there isn’t a right or wrong way to configure a solution. The flexibility these different tools provide helps you to customize a solution that is right for your customer.