The words we use

How to use this chapter

This is a chapter to look things up in, not one to read from end to end. The words are in alphabetical order. Each has a sentence or two, and most end with the chapter to read if you want more.

A word in bold inside an explanation has an entry of its own.

Most of these are ordinary words. They are here because HiMatcher uses each of them for one thing only, and always the same thing. Once you know that a stage is where a candidate has got to and a band is how good one answer was, the screens explain themselves.

Words that are easily confused

A few pairs are worth a moment before the list, because mixing them up causes most of the muddles people get into.

These two	The difference
Candidate and application	A candidate is a person. An application is that person's form for one campaign. Somebody who applies for two jobs is one candidate with two applications
Job description and person specification	The job description says what the job is: Its purpose, its responsibilities and what success looks like. The person specification says what the person must be able to do, and how you will know. The first is drafted from the briefing, and the second from the first
Stage and band	A stage says where a candidate has got to, such as App Form Completed. A band says how good one answer was, such as Met most. A candidate has one stage, and a band for every answer
Archive and reject	Archiving takes somebody off your working lists, and tells them nothing. Rejecting is something you do with an email. Most people you let go should get the email first and be archived afterwards
Note and summary	A note is for your team, and no candidate or client ever sees it. A summary is written for a client to read
Email and team message	An email goes to a candidate. A team message goes to a colleague, and no candidate ever sees it
Template and pipeline template	A template, on its own, is the standard wording of an email. A pipeline template is a set of stages kept for new campaigns to copy
Proposal and band	A proposal is what Digital Nancy suggests. It counts for nothing until a person accepts it. A band is what a person decided
Admin and operator	An admin runs HiMatcher for your organisation. An operator works for HiMatcher itself, and looks after the platform for every organisation

A to C

Word	What it means
Acknowledgement	The email a candidate gets, by itself, when they submit their form. It tells them the form has arrived. See The application form
Admin	The role of whoever runs HiMatcher for your organisation. An admin manages the team, the settings and every campaign, and sees Config, Team, Rubric and AI runs under Settings. A hiring manager can do all of it too: The two differ in name only. See Your team and who can do what
Advertised title	The job's name as candidates and clients read it: On the advertisement, the job description, the application form and in emails. A campaign's other title is its working title. See The briefing
Advert	A public page for one campaign: What the job is, with a button into the application form. It is the address you give a job board or put on your own website, and what Google and the job sites list. See The application form
AI	On its own, the account that pays for Digital Nancy's work: The key, what she has cost this month, and the AI runs page. See Digital Nancy and your own key
Digital Nancy	The artificial intelligence built in to HiMatcher, named for Nancy Slessenger, whose method she drafts and proposes under. She drafts and she suggests, and a person checks every draft and makes every decision. See Digital Nancy and your own key
AI runs	The page that records every request made to Digital Nancy: What was asked, who asked, whether it worked, and what it cost. Only admins and hiring managers see it, under Settings. See Digital Nancy and your own key
Answer	What one candidate wrote, or uploaded, for one question on the application form. Answers are what your team reads and bands
Application	One candidate's form for one campaign, with everything that gathers round it: Their answers, bands, notes, emails, interviews and stage
Application form	The questions every applicant to a campaign answers. It is built from the person specification, so that each question tests one criterion. See The application form
Archive	To set an application aside, with a reason. It leaves your working lists, and nothing is deleted. It can be brought back. See Managing candidates and the pipeline
Area	The heading a criterion belongs under, such as Organisation or Customer care. It is a label for your convenience, and is not scored
Band	The judgement a person gives one answer, by comparing it with what the person specification said a good answer would contain. There are five: Met all (MA), Met most (MM), Met some (MS), Failed some (FS) and Failed all (FA). There are no points and no totals. See The method in ten minutes
Be able to	The heart of a criterion: One thing the successful person must be able to do, in the hiring manager's own terms
Booking	A candidate's choice of one of the times you offered for an interview. Candidates book for themselves, from a link in their invitation. See Interviews
Bounced	Said of an email address that an email came back from as undeliverable. HiMatcher stops writing to it. See Emails to candidates
Briefing	What a campaign starts from: The client's written answers, the briefing sheet, and the recorded conversation with the hiring manager. The job description and the person specification are drafted from it. See The briefing: Before the conversation and The conversation
Briefing document	Something the client sent in writing for a briefing: Their answers to the opening questions, a document of their own, an email. It is kept with the briefing, and the job description and person specification are drafted from it as well as from the transcript. See The briefing: Before the conversation
Briefing sheet	The first draft of the person specification, drawn from the client's briefing documents before the conversation: Under each opening question, what the client said, the question to put to the hiring manager about it, and the feedback a candidate would be sent who fell short on it. Read from during the conversation, and given to Digital Nancy with the transcript. See The briefing: Before the conversation
Campaign	One piece of hiring: One job, with its own briefing, person specification, application form, pipeline, candidates and emails
Candidate	A person who has started or submitted an application. HiMatcher also uses the word for the list of people who have submitted, as against those Still filling in the form
Client	Whoever outside your team has to say yes to the candidates you suggest. It may be a customer you recruit for, or a manager elsewhere in your own company. For an organisation that recruits for clients, also whose job a campaign is: The client is named as the employer to candidates, unless the advert keeps the name back. See Your clients
Client interview	The interview the client holds themselves, after the long interview. The specification says which criteria are left for it. The pipeline calls it the final interview
Client review	The suggested candidates you share with a client. You choose the candidates and how much of each is shown, and the client clicks Approve, Reject or Unsure beside each name. See Suggesting candidates to your client
Client viewer	The role of a client who signs in to read their reviews. They see the reviews they are named on, and nothing else. See Your team and who can do what
Closed	Said of an application form that takes no new applicants. People who have already started can still finish. Also said of a client review on which no more decisions can be made
Criteria	Two things. The plural of criterion; and the column of a criterion that says what a good answer contains, written as things an answer either has or has not. It is what makes two scorers reach the same view. Earlier spreadsheets call that column Evidence, and HiMatcher reads it under either name
Criterion	One line of the person specification: One thing the person must be able to do, the question that tests it, the criteria a good answer meets, and what each band looks like. The plural is criteria. See The method in ten minutes

D to I

Word	What it means
Dealbreaker	A requirement that nothing else makes up for, such as the right to work or living within reach of the office. It has a question of its own early on the form, and an answer scored Failed all there ends the application, however good the rest is. On the person specification its criteria begin with QF. Your team sees a Dealbreaker label on the scoresheet, and candidates are never told. Your organisation may call it by a word of its own, such as quick fail, under Settings, Words. See Scoring the application forms
Decision	A client's Approve, Reject or Unsure on one candidate in a client review, recorded with their name and the time. Approving and rejecting move the candidate along the pipeline. See Suggesting candidates to your client
Default template	The pipeline template that new campaigns copy their stages from
Department	Whose job a campaign is, for an organisation that recruits for itself: The team the job is in. Your team sees it; candidates never do, and the organisation is the employer. See Settings: Who you recruit for
Draft	Something written and not yet in use. Digital Nancy's job description is a draft until you approve it, a person specification until you publish it, a follow-up question until it is sent
Extra question	A question you add to the application form by hand, which tests no criterion. It is scored like any other, but has no descriptions of the bands. See The application form
Failed	Said of an email that was not sent, or of a request to Digital Nancy that produced nothing. The reason is printed beside it. Not to be confused with the bands Failed some and Failed all
Feed	A list of your open jobs that a job board collects by itself, at an address you give it once. Each board has an address of its own, in the layout it reads, and every public advert that is listed on search engines is on it unless the advert's page keeps that job off that board. See Settings
Feedback to send	A campaign's list of candidates who asked for feedback, each with a letter prepared from the person specification for you to read and send. See Turning candidates down, and feedback
Grid	A question that asks the same thing of several subjects at once: A row for each subject, the same few choices across the top, and one choice to make on every row. It is one question, and its answer takes one band. See The application form
Follow-up question	A further question put to one candidate after their form is in, either about one of their answers or on its own. You write it on their scoring page, and it reaches them when you send the Follow up questions email. Their reply appears beside the answer it was about. See Scoring the application forms
Hiring manager	In the method, the person the new recruit will work for, whose needs the briefing records. In HiMatcher it is also a role: Somebody who runs campaigns, from the briefing to the candidates suggested to the client, and who manages the team and the settings as an admin does. The two roles differ in name only
Hiring manager meeting	The conversation with the hiring manager that a briefing is built round, recorded and written out; some call it the kick-off meeting. It has a part of its own on the briefing page, with the questions to read from and the times offered for it. It is never called an interview: An interview is held with a candidate. See The conversation
House notes	A few facts about your organisation that Digital Nancy reads whenever she drafts for you, such as your hours, your locations and how you describe yourselves. They are kept on the Rubric page. See Digital Nancy and your own key
Interview	A conversation with a candidate at a time they booked themselves. A campaign has the interviews its pipeline gives it, and the standard pipeline has three: Short, online and final. See Interviews
Interviewer	Whoever holds a particular interview. Also a role, for somebody who only holds interviews: They see the interviews that are theirs, and may band what they heard
Invitation	Two things. An email asking a candidate to book an interview, and an email asking a colleague to join your team. Each carries a link of its own

J to P

Word	What it means
Job description	What the job is: Its purpose, what the person is responsible for, the working pattern, and what success looks like after three months, six months and a year. Digital Nancy drafts it from the briefing, and you approve it before anything else can be drafted. See The job description
Key	A long password that lets HiMatcher use the account Digital Nancy runs on. Your organisation can connect a key of its own, and her work is then billed to you directly. See Digital Nancy and your own key
Long interview	The specification sheet's name for the online interview
Link	A private address made for one person. A candidate has one for their form, one for booking an interview and one for their follow-up questions. A client may have one for a review. Anybody holding a link can use it, so links are sent only to the person they are for
Marker	An amber or green stripe you can give a stage, to pick it out on the pipeline board
Merge field	A word in curly brackets in an email template, such as {{first_name}}, which HiMatcher replaces with the candidate's own details at the moment of sending. See Emails to candidates
Method, the	The way of hiring that HiMatcher is built on: Decide what the job needs, ask everybody the same questions, and judge each answer against what was written down. See The method in ten minutes
Note	A few lines about a candidate, written by your team for your team, signed and dated. No candidate or client sees a note. See Managing candidates and the pipeline
Note in square brackets	A reminder to yourself inside an email's wording, such as [Insert the terms, start date and next steps.] in the job offer. HiMatcher refuses to send an email that still contains one, so that a reminder never reaches a candidate. See Emails to candidates
Operator	Somebody who works for HiMatcher itself and looks after the platform for every organisation. Operators keep the method up to date. They are not part of your team
Organisation	Your company's own HiMatcher, at its own address, with its own team, campaigns and settings. Nothing is shared between one organisation and another
Online interview	The second interview, for those who pass the short interview. It goes into skills and experience, and follows up what a candidate wrote on the form. The specification says which criteria it tests, and in what order. See The person specification
Person specification	The document a whole campaign runs on: The list of criteria the successful person must meet. The form, the scoring, the interviews and the candidates you suggest to the client are all made from it. See The person specification
Pie chart	The small picture of one candidate's bands on the scoresheet, one slice to a band. In lists the same thing is drawn as a bar chart. It is what HiMatcher shows you in place of a score. See Scoring the application forms
Pipeline	The list of stages a campaign's candidates move through, from App Form Started to Start date confirmed. Every campaign has its own copy, which you can change. See Managing candidates and the pipeline
Pipeline board	The campaign seen as a list of stages, with the candidates inside each. It is the quickest way to see where everybody is. See Managing candidates and the pipeline
Pipeline template	A set of stages kept for copying. A new campaign starts with a copy of the default template. See Managing candidates and the pipeline
Proposal	The band Digital Nancy suggests for an answer, with her reasons. It is outlined on the answer, and is not a band until a person accepts it or chooses another. See Scoring the application forms
Publish	To put something into use. A published person specification is the one the form is built from. A published form is live, and its link accepts applicants

Q to Z

Word	What it means
Question	One item on the application form. Most questions come from a criterion. One that does not is an extra question
Queued	Waiting its turn. Emails to many candidates, and requests to Digital Nancy, are queued and dealt with in the background, usually within seconds
Recording	The sound of an interview, kept with the application. Candidates are asked for their consent to it when they book, and the answer is shown at the top of the interview page. A recording can be turned into a transcript. See Interviews
Recovery codes	Single-use codes that let you sign in if you lose the phone you use for two-factor authentication. Keep them somewhere safe. See Your team and who can do what
Reminder	An email HiMatcher sends by itself: To a candidate whose form is still unfinished, and to a candidate the day before their interview
Reply	An email a candidate sends in answer to one of yours. It comes back into HiMatcher and is filed on their Emails page, with any files they attached. See Emails to candidates
Reset	The button that takes a band off an answer, as if it had never been scored. See Scoring the application forms
Role	What somebody in your team is allowed to do. There are five: Admin, Hiring manager, Scorer, Interviewer and Client viewer. Everybody has exactly one. See Your team and who can do what
Rubric	The written method that Digital Nancy drafts and proposes under. It is the same for every organisation, and is kept up to date by its author. Your own house notes are kept on the House notes page under Settings, which says what your hiring runs on; an organisation that works on the method with its author reads the method itself there, and the page is called Rubric. See Digital Nancy and your own key
Scoresheet	The page where application forms are scored: One row to a candidate, one column to a question, and an answer in every square. See Scoring the application forms
Scored	Said of a form when every question the candidate was asked, and that has a criterion behind it, has a band, whatever the bands are. The candidate then moves to App Form Scored by themselves. See Scoring the application forms
Scorer	Somebody who reads and bands answers. Also a role, for a colleague who scores forms, writes to candidates and may hold interviews
Source	Where a candidate found the job, such as Indeed or Our website. It comes from the link they followed to the advert, and is shown on the campaign page as via Indeed. See The application form
Short interview	The first interview: A conversation about how a person's work style fits the team and the role. It tests the values the manager described. The specification says which criteria it tests, and in what order. See The person specification
Stage	Where a candidate has got to in the pipeline, such as App Form Completed or Invited to final interview. A few moves between stages happen by themselves. Every other move is a person's decision. See Managing candidates and the pipeline
Still filling in the form	The list of people who have started the form and not yet submitted it. You can read what they have written so far, and no more
Suggested candidates	The candidates you put in front of a client for their yes or no. In HiMatcher they are always a client review, and the client sees them as Suggested for you. See Suggesting candidates to your client
Summary	An opening line and a few points about one candidate, written for a client to read in a client review. Digital Nancy can draft it, and you edit it. See Suggesting candidates to your client
Task	A piece of work set to a candidate to show a skill, numbered on the person specification and scored with bands like a form answer
Team message	Something one colleague writes to another about a campaign, inside HiMatcher. It is addressed to the people it is for, can link to the candidate, answer, question or criterion it is about, and stays on a record that can be searched. See Team messages
Template	The standard wording of an email, with merge fields where the candidate's details go. Some templates belong to a stage: Sending one moves the candidate there. See Emails to candidates
Transcript	The words of a recorded interview, written out by a transcription service your organisation chooses in Settings, Config. Digital Nancy writes her interview notes from it. See Settings
Two-factor authentication	Signing in with two things: Your password, and a six-digit code from an app on your phone. Your organisation can require it of everybody. See Your team and who can do what
Unsure	A client's third choice, beside Approve and Reject. It moves nobody, and tells you the client wants to talk
Version	Person specifications, application forms and house notes are numbered each time they are changed and saved, so that you can always tell which one a draft or an application belongs to
Work patterns	How a person goes about their work and what moves them, read from the way they talk: Whether they move towards a goal or away from a problem, judge their own work or look to others, want options or a procedure, and so on, over fifteen traits. The specification carries the pattern the profile wants under each trait, in the recruiter's shorthand, and the long interview's transcript is marked against it, passage by passage. See Interviews
Working title	What your team calls a campaign, such as "Development Director 1". No candidate or client sees it. A campaign's other title is its advertised title. See The briefing

The example in this guide

Every picture in this guide comes from one invented campaign. Northbridge Guitar School is hiring a Studio Administrator, and you can follow it from the first questions to the client to the offer in A quick tour. The school, its staff and its candidates do not exist, and any likeness to real people is accidental.