Understanding Buckets and their usecases
Understanding buckets in Best Talent ATS.
Buckets are a core concept in Best Talent ATS for categorizing and managing different types of candidates. Not all candidates are the same in your ATS workflow.
Some candidates are a strong fit but are not ready to switch right now. Some are interested in joining, but there is no open position yet. Some are not a fit and should be archived so your team does not repeatedly review the same profiles.
Best Talent ATS keeps this concept at the center of the product and organizes candidates into buckets.
Alumni
Candidates who previously worked at your company. This helps maintain relationships with former employees who may return in the future or refer new candidates.
It is also useful for new recruiters to understand prior employee history and avoid duplicate outreach.
Archive
Candidates who are not a fit for your company. Archiving keeps active views clean so teams can focus on stronger candidates.
Champions
Candidates who passed interviews and received offers but did not join. This keeps high-intent profiles visible for future opportunities.
Contractors
Candidates you have worked with as contractors. This gives recruiters a reusable pool for future contract or full-time opportunities.
Employees
Current employees. This prevents accidental sourcing or outreach to people already working at your company.
Hot
Candidates who have applied to current openings and are actively moving through review.
This bucket can also be used as an intermediate quality check before moving profiles into interview pipelines.
Icebox
Candidates interested in joining but without a current role match. This preserves strong profiles for future openings.
Candidates in Icebox are recycled after six months by default, with support for custom recycle dates.
Inbound
Candidates referred by employees, partners, or inbound channels. These candidates often have stronger context and can be prioritized.
Incomplete
Candidates who started but did not complete an application. This helps teams follow up and recover partially submitted applications.
It can also be used for profiles waiting on updated information, such as resumes.
Joinings
Candidates who accepted offers and are in the joining process. This helps HR and people teams plan onboarding.
Leads
Candidates who applied through the Best Talent ATS career portal.
Nurture
Candidates you want to keep warm for future onboarding when timing or conditions improve.
Pipeline
Candidates currently being evaluated for a role. This tracks progress through hiring stages and highlights bottlenecks.
Recent
A fallback bucket for candidates that do not fit any predefined category.