Overview
Sorting through inbound applications can be daunting, burying recruiters and hiring teams in busywork. Gem’s Application Review is designed to simplify and speed up the process, empowering your team to effortlessly sort through stacks of applicants and surface top talent in record time. Now you can focus on hiring, not hassle — because great talent shouldn’t get lost in the stack.
Gem AI takes the guesswork out of application review by ranking thousands of candidates based on the criteria you set. Instead of sifting through every resume manually, AI scores applicants and prioritizes the best matches, ensuring top talent rises to the top of your stack. AI-powered ranking can be toggled on for individual job requisitions in Gem’s Application Review, where resumes are evaluated against your chosen criteria to generate an overall score. Gem AI simply orders applications for efficiency; it does not automate advancements or rejections.
How AI scoring works
Gem AI evaluates applicants by analyzing their submitted resumes—with all personally identifiable information (such as name, email, and LinkedIn profile) removed for an unbiased assessment.
- Resume analysis: The AI reviews the resume content only, comparing it against the criteria you’ve provided
- Scoring process: The AI assigns a score based on how well the resume aligns with your specified qualifications
- Weighted ranking: Criteria marked with a ⭐ receive 5x the weight, influencing the final weighted average percentage score (e.g., 90% Match)
This process ensures Gem AI ranks applicants objectively, helping you quickly identify the strongest candidates.
Admin setup
To streamline Application Review setup, Gem automatically includes a rejection template, an “advance” template, and a send-from name, all of which team admins can customize.
Under Team Settings > Customization in the Application Review settings, admins can:
- Edit the default rejection message
- Edit the default reject + nurture message
- Edit the default advance message
- Update the send-from alias
Getting started reviewing
Navigate to the Jobs tab in Gem’s left-hand menu to jump into Application Review.
From the Jobs home page, there are two ways to begin reviewing applications:
- Select the “✦ Start reviews” button beside the name of the relevant job:
- Select the specific job page, and then “✦ Start reviews” from within the Talent pipeline view of that role:
Viewing applications
The Application Review view is divided into three sections, providing a structured and intuitive layout for evaluating candidates efficiently.
Note: Gem caps application counts at 500+. If an application has a count of more than 500 applications, Gem displays 500+.
The left panel displays a list of applicants , which can be sorted in four ways:
- Application age: Sort from oldest to newest, or newest to oldest.
- AI ranking: Arrange from highest to lowest, or lowest to highest based on AI match scores.
- Internal referrals: Candidates who are a referral from an existing employee will have that noted on their card.
Note: If you prefer not to use AI-based ranking, you can toggle the “AI Ranking” switch off in the top-right corner of the screen. Additionally, you can select the edit (pencil) icon to customize the criteria Gem AI uses to score and rank inbound applications based on the best match.
The center panel showcases the selected applicant’s profile, including their Gem AI match score. Hover over the icons next to the score to see a breakdown of the factors influencing it.
From a candidate’s profile, you can access key details to help you assess their fit:
- Work experience: A summary of the candidate’s career history, including job titles, companies, and tenure.
- Resume: the applicant’s uploaded resume for a more detailed look at their skills and qualifications.
- Activity feed: A centralized timeline of your engagement with the candidate, including emails, InMails, assigned Projects and Sequences, and team notes.
- Applications: A history of the roles the candidate has applied for, helping you track their engagement with your company.
The right panel showcases the Gem Extension, where you can take key actions such as adding candidates to a Project, sending a one-off message, or setting a note or reminder for future follow-ups. (The Gem Extension can also be hidden from view.)
Taking action on an application
You have five key actions available for managing applications in Application Review:
1. Advance to stage: Move the candidate forward in the hiring process by selecting a specific stage — initial interview, hiring manager phone screen, assessment, onsite, or offer. This action updates the candidate’s status without sending them a message.
2. Advance & message: If you decide to include a message when advancing a candidate, you can choose from a team template (shared templates created by your admin), a canned response (templates you create in Gem’s Canned Responses), or a multi-stage Gem Sequence.
3. Reject without message: Decline the candidate’s application without sending a notification (Gem will prompt you to select a rejection reason).
4. Reject with message : If you’d like to send a rejection message, you can choose from a team template (shared templates created by your admin) or a canned response (templates you create in Gem’s Canned Responses).
5. Reject & nurture: Send a rejection message while keeping the candidate engaged for future opportunities. You can also set a reminder, add a note, or assign them to a Project to revisit them for upcoming roles.
Bulk advance and reject applications
You can advance or reject multiple applications at once by selecting the Bulk action option from the App review page.
The page updates with checkboxes next to each application. Select individual checkboxes, or select the Select all option to choose which applications to take action on.
Select the option Bulk reject with message or Bulk advance at the top to complete this action on all selected applications.
Have any issues or questions on this topic? Please feel free to contact your dedicated Gem Customer Success Manager directly or our Support team at support@gem.com.