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We’re excited to introduce the new Candidate Pipeline! This updated experience offers a cleaner, faster interface that makes it easier to review candidates, understand where they are in your hiring process, and take the next action quickly. The pipeline features simplified stage names, Column View and List View for In Progress candidates, and a slide-out drawer so you can review candidate details without leaving the page.

In this article we will cover:

• Pipeline Structure Overview
• Applied Stage
• In Progress Stage
• Pre-Hire Stage
• Hired & Declined Stage
• Candidate Communication
• Job Management
• Video Library
• Related Topics

Pipeline Structure Overview

The Candidate Pipeline brings candidate stages and job management into one view, with candidate details available in a slide-out drawer.

Updated Stage Names

The Applicants and Candidates naming convention has been replaced. Everyone who applies is a candidate. Candidates move through the core stages below; jobs can also include the optional Pre-Hire stage between In Progress and Hired.

• Applied — Candidates who have applied and are awaiting review.
• In Progress — Candidates actively moving through hiring steps such as interviews, background checks, and assessments.
• Pre-Hire — An optional stage for candidates completing final steps before hire, such as reference checks, background checks, and offer-letter preparation. Pre-Hire is configured in the job’s hiring steps and may not appear for every job.
• Hired — Candidates you’ve decided to bring on board, where you can continue with payroll or onboarding steps.
• Declined — Candidates you are not moving forward with, where you can manage disposition codes and rejection emails.

The Candidate Drawer

Select a candidate’s name to open the slide-out Candidate Drawer without leaving the pipeline. The updated drawer provides more room for the hiring workflow and includes quick comments and tags. From the drawer, you can:

• View the candidate’s documents, including resumes, applications, and survey responses.
• Review the candidate’s past applications.
• Review messages and continue communicating with the candidate.
• See tags, comments, and recent activity.
• Take actions such as advancing, declining, or moving between stages.
• Navigate between candidates without closing the drawer.

Applied Stage

The Applied stage helps you quickly understand who needs attention, what documents have been submitted, and what decision to make.

Key Features

• Candidate count: See how many candidates are in Applied in the stage header.
• New badge: Candidates who have not been reviewed are marked as New.
• Star: Flag standout candidates with a star.
• Document indicators: See which documents candidates have submitted and whether any are still pending.
• Pre-screen scores: View a candidate’s pre-screen score in the list and sort by the highest score.
• Filters: Filter the list to review candidates by their status, including the Needs Review workflow described below.
• Needs Review: Mark candidates as needing review, filter to those candidates, and share the list with hiring managers.

Reviewing and Taking Action on Candidates

To review a candidate’s documents, select a document indicator or the candidate’s name to open the Candidate Drawer. From the drawer, you can review documents and past applications, see messages, tags, comments, and recent activity, decline the candidate with a disposition code, or advance them to In Progress.

When taking a bulk action, you can choose whether it applies to candidates on the current page or across all pages. Review the selected scope before confirming.

Declining a Candidate

When declining a candidate, select a disposition code and choose whether to send a rejection email. Rejection emails can be sent immediately or scheduled for a future date and time. You can also send rejection emails later from the Declined stage.

Advancing a Candidate

Select Move to In Progress to move a candidate into active hiring steps. You can also choose a specific hiring step when moving the candidate. In Progress candidates can be viewed in Column View or List View.

In Progress Stage

In Progress is where candidates move after you decide to advance them from Applied. It is where much of the hiring work takes place, including interviews, background checks, assessments, offer letters, and more. Choose Column View or List View to see candidates in the layout that works best for your team.

Column View and List View

In Column View, hiring steps appear as columns, and each candidate appears under their current step. List View displays the same In Progress candidates in a list. You can switch between the two views.

Sub-Statuses

The candidate’s status shows what needs to happen next:

• Not Started: The candidate has been placed in a step, but no action has been taken yet. For interviews, this appears as Not Scheduled.
• Pending Candidate Action: You’ve sent something to the candidate and are waiting for them to respond or complete an action.
• Pending Completion: The step is waiting for a third party to complete it. For interviews, this can show as Scheduled at a date and time.
• Awaiting Decision: The step is complete, such as an interview that has been scored, and the candidate is ready to be advanced or declined.
• Ready for Review: A completed background check is waiting for a team member to review it. After review, the status changes to Completed and shows the reviewer’s name and review time.

Taking Action from the Drawer

Selecting a candidate in In Progress opens the Candidate Drawer at the relevant hiring step. Depending on the step, you can take actions such as:

• Scheduling an interview: Send a scheduling link, offer multiple interview time options manually without a synced calendar, or manually add interview details. Panel interviews support multiple interviewers, who can be marked required or optional. You can resend scheduling-link reminders and view link expiration dates.
• Scoring an interview: Interviewers can access the candidate’s resume within the interview scoring experience.
• Ordering a background check: Select Order, choose a package, and confirm. Track the order in the drawer; a completed check awaiting review shows Ready for Review until reviewed.
• Sending an offer letter: Send an offer letter directly from the drawer. Offer letters can include a pay-rate range.
• Completing a checklist: Checklists can be added in both In Progress and Pre-Hire.

Other interview updates include optional cancellation emails, updated calendar invite titles and details, hiring-team members CC’d on interview emails by default, an improved rescheduling experience, manual recording of completed interviews, and improved time-zone handling. See the 2026 Product Release and Updates article for the release details.

Drag and Drop

In Column View, you can drag and drop candidates between hiring-step columns. This is useful if you prefer to manually track candidate progress without using integrated scheduling or ordering features. You can also complete a step at any time and work on multiple steps simultaneously; candidates are not locked into a linear progression.

Pre-Hire Stage

Pre-Hire is an optional stage for candidates who have completed interviews and assessments and are completing final steps before hire, such as reference checks, background checks, and offer-letter preparation. It helps separate final-stage candidates from candidates still working through earlier steps.

Adding Pre-Hire to Your Hiring Process

To add Pre-Hire to an existing job, select Edit job from the job menu and go to Hiring Steps. Select Auto move active hiring steps to automatically move applicable steps into Pre-Hire, or select Add Another Hiring Step to choose which steps belong there. When creating a new job, configure Pre-Hire in the Hiring Steps section. Interviews are supported in In Progress, not Pre-Hire. Save your changes.

Once Pre-Hire has been added to a job, it appears as a stage on the Jobs page and in the job’s pipeline header. You can move a candidate to Pre-Hire from the stage overview or the candidate view. Checklists are supported in both Pre-Hire and In Progress.

Hired & Declined Stage

The Hired and Declined stages focus on the actions and information that matter at each stage.

Declined

The Declined stage shows why a candidate was declined and whether a rejection email has been sent. Disposition codes appear on the candidate record, and a quick action lets you send an email if one has not been sent. You can schedule a rejection email for a future date and time or send emails to multiple candidates using bulk actions. You can filter Declined candidates by declined date. When selecting all for a bulk action, choose whether to apply it to the current page or all pages.

SCREENSHOT NEEDED — Replace Declined images with the current list showing disposition code, rejection-email status, declined-date filter, and bulk-action scope. Add the scheduled-email composer with its future date/time control.

Hired

The Hired stage focuses on the next steps after making a hire:

• Sync to payroll: Sync a hired candidate to a supported payroll or HRIS integration and review the sync status.
• Start onboarding: If onboarding is enabled, use the quick link to continue to onboarding, set a start date, and assign a workflow.
• Hired date: View and filter candidates by the date they were hired.
• Move back to In Progress: If needed, move a hired candidate back to In Progress.

Available payroll/HRIS integrations and setup requirements vary by account. Check the current integration setup guidance for the provider names and requirements available to your organization.

Candidate Communication

You can email or text candidates from any stage of the pipeline. In Applied, select the candidate’s name or use the Message, SMS, or email options on the candidate card. In In Progress, use the candidate menu’s Message action. From the Candidate Drawer, select the candidate’s email address or phone number, or select New Message.

The communication form lets you switch between Email and SMS, write a custom message, choose an available template, and use dynamic fields such as candidate name, company name, and job title. Rejection emails—not all email or SMS messages—can be scheduled for a future date and time.

From the drawer, review Messages, Documents, and Applications. In Messages, review sent and received messages, filter by message type or status, open a message, reply in the thread, or return to the message list.

Job Management

The job header displays key job information, and job-level actions are available from the job menu. You can view, edit, or share the job; manage job details; access requisition approvals if applicable; and add job comments or view comment history. The header includes the job name and status, location, hiring manager, open date, and sponsorship status. For a sponsored job, the header shows active job boards and links to job analytics. The parent-sponsored-job indicator was corrected in the August pipeline update; verify it against the current account UI.

Related Topics

• Candidate Pipeline: Applied Stage
• Candidate Pipeline: In Progress Stage
• Candidate Pipeline: Pre-Hire Stage
• Candidate Pipeline: Hired Stage
• Candidate Pipeline: Declined Stage
• Candidate Pipeline: Candidate Drawer and Communication
• Candidate Pipeline: Edit and Manage Jobs
• Hireology 2026 Product Release and Updates