Candidate Evaluation
TOOLS · EXPERTINI ATS

Candidate Evaluation

A structured scorecard for a panel's own judgement calls, distinct from and complementary to the CMS evidence score.

2 min read · Updated July 2026 · Expertini Editorial

A structured scorecard for evaluating a candidate against defined criteria — a consistent, comparable format for a hiring team's own judgement calls, distinct from, and complementary to, the CMS score.

CMS scores evidence against stated CV requirements; it doesn't and can't capture things a panel only learns in real conversation — communication style, how someone actually engages with a follow-up question, team fit as genuinely observed rather than assumed. This scorecard is built specifically to hold that second, equally real category of judgement.

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01What it does

Define evaluation criteria for a role and score candidates against the same scorecard consistently, keeping subjective panel judgement in a comparable, structured format rather than free-form notes.

02Who it's for

Hiring panels making a final decision where interview-based judgement genuinely matters alongside CV evidence, and teams that want that judgement documented consistently rather than as scattered personal impressions.

03What makes this different

It's explicitly complementary to CMS rather than competing with it — CMS covers evidence against stated requirements, this scorecard covers the panel's own structured judgement on dimensions that genuinely require a human conversation to assess.

04Why it matters

CMS scores evidence against stated requirements; a scorecard captures a panel's own judgement on dimensions that aren't purely CV-evidence-based — both belong in a defensible hiring record, and neither replaces the other.

05Pricing and what's included

Included from the Business plan upward, with a 14-day free trial available to evaluate whether that tier fits your process.

06Support

The Help Center covers scorecard criteria design; support@expertini.com is available for anything else.

Engineering notes

Platform architecture & operations

A1Architecture: where it sits in the platform

Candidate Evaluation is a first-class module of the Screening & Evaluation suite inside the authenticated Expertini ATS workspace. The platform is deliberately server-rendered: every view is prepared by the application server and shipped as complete HTML, with no client-side framework, no third-party CDN scripts, and no build pipeline between the data and the page. What renders is what the server computed — the property that makes the interface auditable.

All persistence runs on a single search-native document store; every query carries the organisation's identifier as a mandatory filter at the lowest query layer. Tenant isolation is therefore structural — a property of how every request is composed — rather than a policy that relies on application code remembering to check.

Availability is governed by the platform's tool registry: this tool is registered from the Business plan, and access is enforced server-side by the registry gate on every request — never by hiding a button. Plans also carry a monthly distinct-tool quota (3 / 5 / 15 / 30 / 45 across Trial→Business, unlimited on Enterprise), counted at the same chokepoint. The pricing page states both honestly: what is available, and how much of it the month includes.

A2Data model and dependency map

In production the tool reads and writes pipeline applications (ats_applications), the candidate database (ats_candidates). Documents are plain, explicitly-mapped fields — mappings are provisioned ahead of first write, so term filters and aggregations behave deterministically instead of depending on inferred types.

Every distinct open is journalled to the tool-activity store — and that journal, not a parallel analytics system, is what the Reports section aggregates. The usage numbers you see are the numbers the platform actually recorded.

Anything that leaves the request path — notification fan-out, webhook delivery, activity journalling, mail — runs in fire-and-forget background threads. A slow external endpoint can never make the interface hang, and a failed side effect is logged rather than silently retried into inconsistency.

A3Operational considerations

Organisation-level settings, destructive actions, and connections are gated to owner and admin roles; recruiters operate the tool on the records they can see. Role changes apply on the next request — enforcement is at the route, not in the menu.

Scoring in the screening suite is deterministic and published: the same inputs produce the same outputs every time, hard requirements act as blockers rather than being averaged away, and no generative model invents a number — AI is used for extraction and drafting, humans decide. The methodology is public on the research page, where legal and data-science teams can interrogate it before buying.

Everything written is yours to take: CSV exports and the Data Export app cover the same stores the product itself reads. The exit is as open as the entrance — by design, not concession.

A4Interaction contract

The interface follows the platform's search-and-select convention: any field that names a real record — a candidate, client, or job — is a type-to-search picker over live data, never a free-typed string, which is what keeps activity trails and deduplication trustworthy. Static choices are filter-as-you-type combos rather than native dropdowns, and state transitions give explicit feedback: server confirmations surface as toasts, validation errors name the exact field, and nothing is shown as done that the server has not confirmed.

The wireframe and flow below document the structural contract of the surface — what panels exist, what order the states occur in, and what happens at every edge — rather than pixels. The layout is composed with native CSS grid and flexbox and adapts from wide desktop to a single column without separate mobile views.

Dependency map

Reads / writesats_applications, ats_candidates
Access gateBusiness plan and above — enforced server-side by the tool registry
Monthly quotadistinct tools per month: Trial 3 / Starter 5 / Growth 15 … unlimited on Enterprise
Usage journalats_tool_activity (per open)
Tenancyevery query filtered by organisation id at the query layer
Side effectsbackground threads — never on the request path

Interface blueprint

Structural schematic of the surface — panels, hierarchy, and interaction affordances. A contract, not a screenshot.
metric
metric
delta vs prev.
delta vs prev.
Aggregation canvas — computed at request time
CSVPDF — regenerated per request
Fig. 1 — Candidate Evaluation: structural interface schematic. Panels and states are the contract; data shown is placeholder.

Interaction flow — states, validations, feedback

Every state below is enforced server-side; the interface reports it, it doesn't decide it.
Open viewregistry gate: plan + monthly quota
Aggregatedynamic org-scoped aggregations at request time — no stale rollups
Renderserver-built SVG charts; deltas vs the previous equivalent period
Drill / exportCSV / PDF regenerate per request
No data yet → the chart says so; nothing is interpolated or inventedPeriod with no comparison → delta omitted rather than fabricatedExport → regenerated from the live store at click time
Fig. 2 — interaction flow: navy = states, gold = server-enforced gates, green = confirmed outcomes; tags list the edge cases and their feedback.

Data canvas — how metrics render

Interactive sample with illustrative data (not live metrics). In the product, series are computed by org-scoped aggregations at request time and drawn as native SVG — no chart libraries, nothing client-invented.

Frequently asked questions

How is this different from the CMS score?
CMS scores CV evidence against stated job requirements; this scorecard captures a panel's own structured judgement on dimensions like communication and team fit, genuinely assessed through conversation.
Does this replace Skill Assessment?
No — Skill Assessment grades a specific skill test against a fixed rubric; Candidate Evaluation is a broader scorecard for overall panel judgement across a candidate's profile.
Can multiple panel members use the same scorecard?
Yes — the same defined criteria are applied consistently to score every candidate for the role.
What plan includes this tool?
Business and above, with a 14-day free trial available.

At a glance

  • Included from the Business plan upward
  • Structured, comparable panel judgement alongside CMS evidence scoring
  • Keeps subjective evaluation consistent across candidates
  • Captures dimensions CMS structurally can't — communication, observed team fit
  • Complementary to, not a replacement for, CMS scoring
  • 14-day free trial available

See candidate evaluation on your own hiring.

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