Introduction
Most of your candidates arrive on their own, through your careers site. But plenty don't — the CV a hiring manager forwards you, the spreadsheet you inherited from an agency, the profile you spotted on LinkedIn. Recruitee gives you five ways to get those people into a job or talent pool.
They all start in the same place: the Add candidates button. This article walks through each method and helps you pick the right one.
Note: You need the Manage candidates permission to add candidates. If you don't see the Add candidates button, ask an administrator to check your role in Settings > Roles.
Choose how to add candidates
The Add candidates button opens a menu with the ways to add candidates, so you can start from wherever you already are.
You'll find the button in three places:
On a job's pipeline, at the top right.
On a talent pool, at the top right.
On the Candidates page, in the toolbar above the list.
Click it, and a Choose method menu opens with your options:
Method | Best for |
Job mailbox or Talent pool mailbox | Forwarding CVs by email, one candidate at a time |
CV file upload | A batch of CVs or resumes you already have as files |
Manually | A single candidate whose details you'll type in |
Import from CSV | A long list of candidates from another system |
Recruitee Chrome extension | Sourcing people from LinkedIn and other networks |
Note: The mailbox option only appears when you open the menu from inside a job or a talent pool, because the address is specific to that one job or pool. Open the menu from the Candidates page, and you'll see the other four.
Important: You can't add candidates to a draft job. Publish the job first, or add the candidate to a talent pool for now.
Add a candidate manually
Use this when you have one person and their details in front of you.
Open the job or talent pool you want to add them to, or go to Candidates.
Click Add candidates > Manually.
In the Add new candidate dialog, type the candidate's Full name. This is the only required field.
Fill in their email address and phone number.
To add social links, other links, or your company's custom fields, click Show more fields.
Under Jobs or talent pools, click Assign to put them in a job or pool. If you started from a job or talent pool, it's already filled in for you.
Add Tags and Sources so you can find and report on this candidate later.
Upload their CV and add a Cover letter — either as a file or as text you paste in.
Click Add.
Tip: Set the source while you’re here. It helps you track where candidates came from and which channels bring in the most relevant candidates. It can be harder to add later, once the candidate is in your pipeline.
Note: Applying a tag or source that already exists is open to anyone who can manage candidates. Creating a brand-new one needs the Manage tags and sources permission.
Upload CVs or resumes
This is a quick way to add multiple CVs to Recruitee. You upload the files, Recruitee reads each one and builds a candidate profile from it, and you check the results before anything is saved.
Start from a job or talent pool
Open the job or talent pool.
Click Add candidates > CV file upload.
The uploader opens straight away, with that job or pool already assigned.
Start from anywhere
Click the + button in the top bar.
Select CV or resume upload.
In the Upload candidates to... dialog, choose at least one job or talent pool. You can change this per candidate later.
Click through to the uploader.
Add your files and check what was read
Once the uploader is open, the steps are the same either way.
Click Upload files to pick individual CVs, or Upload a folder to take everything in a folder at once. You can also drag and drop files straight into the uploader.
Watch the list on the left fill up as each file is read. A checkmark means Recruitee got everything it needed; a warning triangle means something is missing.
Click a candidate in the list to review them. Their details appear in the middle, and the original CV on the right so you can compare.
Correct anything that came through wrong — name, email, phone — and change which jobs or talent pools they're assigned to.
Use the up and down arrows at the bottom right to move to the next candidate without going back to the list.
To remove a candidate from the batch, click the x next to their name.
When everything looks right, click Add all candidates.
Tip: Work through the warning triangles first. The most common message is "Candidate email could not be extracted from the uploaded file. Please add the missing data manually" — usually a CV where the email sits in a header, a footer, or an image. Adding it by hand is quick and can help you avoid a duplicate profile later.
Email CVs to a job or talent pool mailbox
Every job and talent pool has its own email address. Send a CV to it, and Recruitee creates the candidate for you in that job or pool, without anyone logging in. This method works well for a hiring manager who does not use Recruitee every day.
Open the job or talent pool.
Click Add candidates.
Copy the address shown under Job mailbox or Talent pool mailbox.
Send or forward an email to that address with the CV attached.
The candidate should appear in the job or pool after a short time, with the CV on their profile and the body of the email saved as their cover letter.
Note: Send one candidate per email. Recruitee reads the first CV it finds in the attachments and builds one profile from it.
Tip: Share the address with your hiring managers and agencies. Their CVs can then go straight to the right pipeline, without forwarding or asking you to add someone.
When an email doesn't become a candidate
Recruitee needs a name, an email address, and a readable CV attachment to create a profile. If any of those are missing — say, someone forwards a CV as a scanned image — the email is kept instead of discarded.
Go to your mailbox and open the Non-candidates folder.
Find the email.
Click Convert to candidate and fill in what's missing.
Import candidates from a CSV file
When you’re moving from another system or working from an agency’s spreadsheet, the CSV importer matches your columns to Recruitee fields (this is called mapping) and adds everyone at once.
Click Add candidates > Import from CSV, or go to Settings > Apps and plugins > Import.
Follow the three steps: upload your file, map the columns, and map the jobs and talent pools.
Click Finish import.
Note: Each row in your file must be one candidate. If an import goes wrong, you can revert it (undo it) to remove the candidates it added.
For the full walkthrough, see CSV Importer.
Source candidates with the browser extension
Recruitee Talent Sourcing is a Chrome extension (a small add-on for the Chrome browser) that saves a candidate’s details from LinkedIn and other networks into Recruitee, so you don’t have to copy fields by hand.
Click Add candidates > Recruitee Chrome extension to open the Chrome Web Store listing.
Install the extension and sign in with your Recruitee account.
Open a profile on a supported network and click the Recruitee button to save them to a job or talent pool.
For setup and supported sites, see Recruitee sourcing extension.
Three common ways to add candidates
Here are three common ways to add candidates to Tellent Recruitee.
Add a candidate from a forwarded CV
A hiring manager forwards you a CV. Instead of re-typing the candidate’s details, copy the job’s mailbox address from Add candidates and send it to the hiring manager. Ask them to forward one CV per email to this address. The candidate should be added to the right pipeline with the CV attached, and the email body is added as the cover letter.
Add multiple candidates from CV files
You come back from a careers fair with 40 CVs. Save the CVs in one folder, open a talent pool, click Add candidates, and select CV file upload. Choose Upload a folder and review the batch in the uploader. Check the details Recruitee read from each CV and correct anything that is missing or wrong, then select Add all candidates.
Import candidates from a CSV file
An agency sends you a CSV file with 200 candidates. Use Import from CSV to upload the file and map its columns to the relevant candidate fields. Then choose the right jobs or talent pools for the candidates and import them. If the mapping was incorrect, you can revert (undo) the import and try again.
Frequently asked questions
What happens if the same candidate is added twice?
You'll end up with two profiles, which you can merge into one. See Merging duplicate candidates.
Can I add a candidate to more than one job at a time?
Yes. In the manual form, click Assign under Jobs or talent pools and pick as many as you need. In the CV uploader, you can set the assignment per candidate while you review them.
Why can't I see the Add candidates button?
Three common reasons: you don't have the Manage candidates permission, the job is still a draft, or the job or talent pool is archived.
Can I edit what was read from a CV before it's saved?
Yes. Nothing is created until you click Add all candidates, so change anything you like first. Use Save changes to keep an edit while you carry on reviewing the rest of the batch.
I uploaded a file and it says "Unsupported file".
The file type isn't one Recruitee can read. Convert it to PDF and upload it again.
Does adding a candidate manually or by CV upload trigger the automatic confirmation email?
No, candidates uploaded manually and by CV upload won’t trigger the automatic confirmation email.
Which pipeline stage do manually added and uploaded candidates land in?
Both manually added candidates and CV-uploaded candidates land in the "Applied" stage of the job pipeline.