From 700 Applicants to a Ranked Shortlist: How Saicon Hit a 76% Client Submission Rate

Saicon runs onshore and offshore recruiting teams across several staffing brands, and every one of them works out of JobDiva. When Saicon came to Asendia, it wasn't looking for its first AI tool. It had already used one. It wanted AI that works inside the system its recruiters already live in, not next to it.

Within weeks of going live, Saicon had a placed candidate, 10 client interviews and more than 50 recruiters lined up to work the same way.

The cost of hand-sorting hundreds of applicants

High-volume roles have a sorting problem, and most staffing firms solve it with recruiter hours. Saicon was no different. One Data Scientist opening drew about 700 applicants, and recruiters sorted them by hand, which took hours per role.

Every candidate who made it through then needed a phone call to clear four knockout checks: work authorization, W2 eligibility, sponsorship and location. Only after that could a real conversation start. Working Saicon's existing database took more manual effort on top of that, since every search meant building a Boolean string in JobDiva by hand.

The previous AI vendor brought its own cost: a second system. The tool sat outside JobDiva, so recruiters copied results out of one platform and pasted them into the other, job after job.

"We're living in JobDiva... Going to a third-party platform, copying, pasting everything back and forth is painful," says Josh Murphy, Director of Recruiting - US at Saicon.

The result was a funnel that leaked at both ends. New applicants waited in the queue, and the passive candidates already in Saicon's database were largely untapped.

What Saicon put in place

Ava, Asendia's AI recruiting agent, runs entirely inside JobDiva. A recruiter switches the Asendia workflow on for a job, adds screening questions and evaluation criteria, and Ava takes over the steps that used to eat recruiter time.

• Finding and ranking candidates. Ava scores and ranks every new applicant against the job description and Saicon's own criteria, with Saicon's criteria taking priority. It also runs an automatic Boolean search of Saicon's database, surfacing up to 30-50 matches per job.
• Reaching them. Ava texts first, then calls. If no one picks up, it follows up by text and email, and candidates can reschedule.
• Screening them. An AI phone screen handles the knockout questions. Candidates who pass move to an in-depth AI video interview with built-in fraud checks.
• Handing off in JobDiva. The report, verdict, transcript and recording land on the candidate's JobDiva profile, and the recruiter gets an email.

Recruiters stay in control. They set and adjust the questions and criteria for every job, and they make the call on who goes to the client. If a recruiter submits a candidate first, Ava stops contacting that person automatically.

The return

Saicon started Ava on two to three jobs. Those first requisitions produced:

• A first placement in about three and a half weeks. Along the way, the first Ava-screened candidate was submitted to a major client.
• 76% of screened candidates sent to clients. Of 50 internal submissions, 38 went on to clients.
• 26% of client submissions turned into interviews. Those 38 submissions led to 10 client interviews and a placement. That works out to 13-19 client submissions and 3-5 client interviews per job.
• About 1% opt-out. Roughly 99 in 100 candidates stayed reachable through automated outreach.

Those results made the case for scale. More than 50 Saicon recruiters, across onshore and offshore teams, joined the training for the full rollout.

What's changed, and what's next for Saicon

The biggest change is where a recruiter's day starts. Instead of a pile of hundreds of applications, recruiters open a high-volume job to a ranked shortlist of people who have already cleared the knockout questions, with the report, transcript and recording on each profile.

The point was never fewer recruiters. It was handing them a stack-ranked list, so their time goes to candidates who already meet the bar. Josh puts the goal simply: "Help us move faster, efficiently, go to market faster."

The next phase of work with Asendia keeps moving in that direction, with each item taking another manual step off Saicon's recruiters:

• Chat-based agent. Recruiters will be able to work with Ava through chat.
• Recruiter dashboard with a daily digest. A daily summary of screening activity for each recruiter.
• Resume formatting for submissions. Resumes prepared in the right format for client submission

What Saicon looked for the second time around

Saicon's first AI tool taught it what to look for in the next one. Speed and screening quality mattered, but the deciding factor was where the work happens. When an AI tool lives outside the ATS, recruiters end up doing the integration by hand. Saicon chose an agent that does the work inside JobDiva, where its recruiters already spend their day.

Ready to put AI to work inside your ATS? Schedule a demo today.