Adam Godson brings a rare combination to the recruiting world: a poetry background, entertainment industry experience, and deep expertise in design thinking and digital transformation. Working at Recruiting Advisors, he challenges assumptions about how we build and buy recruiting technology. This conversation rips apart the broken procurement process that gives us systems nobody wants to use, and offers a pragmatic path forward using design principles that actually work.

In this episode we talk about why most ATSs fail their users, how to apply design thinking to recruiting operations, the critical difference between user experience and candidate experience, and why sometimes making things harder to use actually improves outcomes. Adam shares real examples from his work at Viacom/Paramount and explains how asking better questions upfront prevents expensive tech disasters down the road.

Key Takeaways:

➡ Turning off LinkedIn Easy Apply reduced applications by 86% (from 14,000 to 2,000 per month) but dramatically increased pass-through rates and candidate quality.

➡ Most ATS implementations fail because companies select technology before defining actual user requirements and workflows.

➡ Design thinking isn't about making everything easy. Sometimes friction is intentional. The goal is making things intuitive for your intended user.

➡ Your target user might not be everyone. Good design can deliberately exclude the wrong people (like unqualified mass applicants).

➡ The best time to apply design principles is before you buy the system, not after when you're trying to fix what's broken.

➡ User experience (recruiter-facing) and candidate experience (applicant-facing) are different problems requiring different solutions.

➡ Poetry and recruiting have more in common than you'd think. Both require telling compelling stories with as few words as possible.

➡ Most technical requirement checklists are backwards. They focus on features the vendor offers rather than problems the business needs to solve.

Chapters:

00:00 – Intro and Meet Adam Godson

Sound Bites:

"I don't like saying that I'm a thought leader. It just irks me. I like to say that I'm a thought provoker."

"We went from 14,000 applications per month, half of which were duplicates, to less than 2,000 applications per month. The pass-through rates went up and the number of qualified candidates went up."

"Your user base or your target user may not be everyone. If you want certain people not to interact, you want to limit the scope of who's coming in as opposed to broadening it."

Guest Info:

Name: Adam Godson
Company: Recruiting Advisors
LinkedIn: [Connect with Adam]
Expertise: Digital transformation consultant specializing in design thinking, recruiting operations, and systems optimization. Former Viacom/CBS/Paramount talent leader with a unique background in poetry and screenwriting.