Overview
This is the setting that gets configured wrong most often, and it is the most annoying to unpick later. It decides which profiles live in your database.
This article is for administrators setting up intake and onboarding.
1. What counts as screening?
Whatever stands between someone applying and someone being active.
It can be nothing at all, a couple of questions, or a full onboarding sequence with documents, training and a background check. All three are normal.
2. How do automations take me out of the middle?
Based on how someone answers a specific question, they can be assigned to an onboarding sequence or straight to an opportunity, with no admin touching the application.
An automation can sit at three levels:
- Form level. On submission, or based on a specific answer, assign the person to a sequence or an opportunity.
- Step level. Part way through an onboarding sequence, assign them to another sequence or another opportunity.
- Sequence level. When they finish the sequence, assign whatever comes next.
Together these mean an application can arrive, be routed, be onboarded and end up approved for the right opportunity without an admin opening it once.
3. When should a profile be added to my database?
It depends on whether you screen.
- No screening? Auto-add on the first form someone ever submits. Everyone who applies is someone you want on the list.
- You do screen? Do not auto-add on the form. Add at the end of the onboarding sequence instead, so applicants in progress never mix with active profiles. The list then stays clean on its own.
- Adding manually gives you maximum control, and costs one click per person.
4. What is the risk of adding manually?
Forgetting.
This is the option people most often forget to action, and a database missing half your active people is worse than one that is slightly over-inclusive. Choose it only if someone owns the habit.
5. Why does this matter so much?
Because your database should read as your list of active people, not everyone who ever filled in a form.
Unpicking a database that has collected every applicant since launch is slow, manual work. Getting the rule right at the start costs nothing.
Summary
- Screening is whatever stands between applying and being active, from nothing to a full sequence.
- Automations sit at form level, step level and sequence level, and can route someone end to end untouched.
- No screening: auto-add on the first form submission.
- Screening: add at the end of the onboarding sequence, not on the form.
- Manual adding gives the most control and is the easiest to forget.
- Aim for a database that reads as your list of active people.
Where to go next