Selecting an ATS for multiple offices

Two offices know the same candidate. One recruiter has an earlier interview on file; another has a new vacancy that might fit. Sharing the record is useful, but it doesn’t decide who should call or whether the old preferences still apply.

When selecting an ATS for multiple offices, consider shared information and responsibility together. Establish which agreements apply across the agency, what can differ locally and how colleagues hand work over. Then assess how records, pipelines and permissions support that arrangement.

Key takeaways

• Share person and client information where the work requires it.
• Assign ownership of vacancies and applications separately.
• Keep local process differences when they involve different work.
• Complete a handover with a responsible colleague and an agreed next action.

Which information should offices share?

Share the information colleagues need to recognise the same person or client and manage that relationship well. Keep vacancy-specific terms with the vacancy. A planner’s salary range should not become a general client agreement, and a rejection for one role should not become an assessment of the candidate for every other role.

Consider the fictional Dutch agency Brug Recruitment, with offices in Utrecht and Eindhoven. Both work for the same client. Eindhoven knows candidate Samira from an earlier intake. Utrecht receives a planner vacancy that could suit her preferences.

The Utrecht recruiter can use the earlier introduction, but needs to know whether the information remains current and who will make contact. A shared name and CV don’t answer that. Equally, Eindhoven needn’t email a copy of the whole record to Utrecht if the relevant colleagues are authorised to use it.

Information	Where does it belong?
Samira’s current contact details	Her person record
Client contacts	The client relationship
Planner vacancy salary range	That vacancy, with payment period and working-hours basis
Samira’s progress for this role	Her application to this vacancy
Who calls her tomorrow	The specific follow-up action

Who owns the work when two offices are involved?

Assign responsibility to the work rather than assuming one office owns every interaction. One recruiter may manage a client relationship while a colleague elsewhere handles a vacancy. The person who first spoke to a candidate needn’t manage every later application. Agree who maintains contact and who confirms decisions when both offices are involved.

At Brug Recruitment, Iris in Eindhoven manages the client relationship. Lotte in Utrecht runs the planner vacancy. They agree who will contact Samira and what Lotte needs beforehand. Iris stays involved with the client without having to conduct every conversation herself.

Don’t treat this as an automatic allocation of revenue. If offices share placement income or fees internally, that is a separate business agreement. An ‘owning office’ field doesn’t explain the financial split your agency has agreed.

Should every office use the same pipeline?

Use the same stages where they mean the same thing. Retain a difference when the work is different, such as an additional technical interview for specialist roles. A local label for an otherwise identical stage mostly creates translation work. A separate step with a different responsible colleague can serve a useful purpose.

Eindhoven uses a technical assessment for its engineering assignments. The Utrecht planner role doesn’t need that step. Both offices still want to distinguish a scheduled client interview from a confirmed placement. Agree those shared meanings without sending every vacancy through the same additional assessment.

Simply’s ATS and CRM lets you configure relationships and custom fields and work with multiple pipelines. This supports shared records alongside processes suited to the work. Agree the setup your offices need with the administrator; another office doesn’t automatically require another database.

Which local fields and permissions are needed?

Add a local field when it answers a useful working question. Give shared fields the same meaning across offices. Access then follows the task: a colleague taking over a vacancy needs different information from someone checking progress. The office name alone doesn’t establish that boundary or explain who needs a sensitive detail.

The fictional planner vacancy has a salary range up to €4,200 gross per month for forty hours. Utrecht and Eindhoven need to interpret that figure in the same way. If one office records monthly amounts and the other annual amounts, sharing a field without a payment period won’t solve the problem.

Simply supports permissions for records and fields. A colleague may be allowed to open a candidate record while a sensitive salary field remains restricted. Discuss who needs to collaborate separately from what information that collaboration requires. Don’t grant broad administrator access merely to make one handover possible.

What makes an office-to-office handover complete?

A handover is complete when the receiving recruiter understands the agreement, knows which information is current and can identify the action now assigned to them. Moving a record or changing its owner is insufficient. The candidate and client also need to know who their contact will be for the work ahead.

Iris passes Samira’s earlier introduction to Lotte. The preferred hours recorded at intake still need confirming. Lotte takes responsibility for discussing the Utrecht vacancy, while Iris keeps the commercial client relationship. They agree who updates the client if Samira is interested.

Review open actions after the handover. Does Iris still have a promised call that Lotte is taking over? Close or transfer that old action visibly. Preventing duplicate follow-up needs this working agreement even when everyone uses the same ATS.

How do you choose an ATS for this way of working?

Have both offices work through the situation that matters to the buying decision. One colleague opens the client and vacancy; the other takes over follow-up. Assess whether they understand the same agreements and can still use their local steps. This shows where software helps and where an internal agreement needs clarification first.

At Brug Recruitment, use Samira’s unconfirmed hours preference. Can Lotte distinguish it from the vacancy’s salary range? Is it clear that Iris retains the client relationship? A tidy screen only helps when the colleague can act on it.

Make the decision with someone from each office and the person responsible for configuration. Discuss your offices in a Simply demo. Bring one shared client, a local process difference and a handover. You can then assess the setup against everyday cooperation across the agency.

Simply is an AI-native ATS and CRM for recruitment teams.