ATS and recruitment glossary

An ATS is the software that receives your application before any recruiter does. Around that one word sits a couple of dozen terms that career advice uses without ever defining, and understanding them changes concretely how you write a resume and prepare for an interview. This glossary defines them one by one.

Every entry stands alone. Read only the one you are missing.

ATS

An ATS, short for Applicant Tracking System, is the recruitment software a company uses to receive, filter and track applications. It reads your document, extracts the text, looks for the terms in the job advert and ranks candidates before a human sees a single one.

The most widespread systems are Workday, SAP SuccessFactors, Taleo, Greenhouse and Lever. They do not all parse alike, which is why no score can promise you will "pass every ATS".

ATS score

An ATS score is a mark out of 100 estimating how well recruitment software can read and interpret your resume. It measures three things: the presence of the expected keywords, recognition of the structure, and legibility of the format.

It is an estimate, not a decision. A high score does not guarantee an interview, but a low score almost always explains silence.

Match score

A match score measures the fit between one specific resume and one specific advert, as a percentage. It answers a narrower question than the ATS score, which judges the resume alone.

The same resume gets very different match scores across adverts. That is the expected behaviour: the score measures a correspondence, not the quality of the document.

Missing keywords

Missing keywords are terms present in the job advert and absent from your resume — the skills, tools, certifications or titles the recruiter wrote and your document does not echo.

Adding them is the highest-return action on a resume, provided each one corresponds to real experience. A keyword with nothing behind it survives until the first technical interview.

Must-have and nice-to-have

A must-have is a requirement without which an application is screened out. A nice-to-have is an advantage that separates you from an otherwise equal candidate.

Adverts almost never label them. The difference shows in the wording: "essential", "proven command of" on one side; "a plus", "ideally", "would be appreciated" on the other.

Parsing

Parsing is the automatic extraction of your resume's text and its distribution into structured fields: name, roles, dates, education, skills.

This is where a resume fails silently. A two-column table, an image header, a non-standard font or a PDF exported as an image all produce a resume a recruiter sees on screen and the machine reads empty or scrambled.

ATS-friendly resume

An ATS-friendly resume is one the recruitment software can read in full. In practice: a text PDF rather than an image, standard section titles, a single column, no text in headers or footers, and no information carried only by an icon.

It is not an ugly resume. It is a resume whose layout carries no information the text does not already carry.

Standard section title

A standard section title is a heading the ATS recognises without ambiguity: "Work experience", "Education", "Skills", "Languages".

Creative variants like "My journey" or "What I can do" are readable to a human and invisible to the machine, which then does not know which field to file the following content under.

Screening

Screening is the initial filtering stage, automated by the ATS and then completed by a fast human pass.

The time spent on a resume at this stage is measured in seconds. That is why the top half of the first page decides most of the outcome.

Targeted cover letter

A targeted cover letter is written for one specific advert and sets that advert's requirements against verifiable parts of your background.

What separates it from a template letter is not the company name in the right place, but the explicit correspondence between what is asked for and what you have already done.

Speculative application

A speculative application goes to a company that has published no matching vacancy.

It often escapes automated filtering but loses the reference point an advert provides. With no advert to align to, the standard job description for the target role becomes the keyword reference.

STAR method

The STAR method — Situation, Task, Action, Result — is the expected structure for answering a behavioural question, meaning any question that starts with "tell me about a time when".

It turns an anecdote into a demonstration. The Result, quantified where possible, is the part candidates most often omit and the only part that proves anything.

Behavioural question

A behavioural question probes past behaviour to predict future behaviour. "Tell me about a conflict with a colleague", "Describe a project that failed".

It contrasts with the hypothetical "what would you do if" question, which trained recruiters use less and less because it mostly measures imagination.

Structured interview

A structured interview asks every candidate for a role the same questions, in the same order, against a scoring grid defined in advance.

It is the format that best predicts future performance, and the one most worth practising against, since the questions are largely predictable from the advert.

Salary benchmark

A salary benchmark compares a salary with what the market pays at equivalent sector, region and experience.

Its output is a range and never a single figure, because two companies do not pay the same for an identical profile.

Salary range

A salary range is the interval between the minimum and maximum a company is prepared to pay for a role.

In a negotiation, the top of the range is what anchors and the bottom is your walk-away floor. Arriving with a single number is arriving with no room.

Anchoring

Anchoring is the effect by which the first figure stated steers everything that follows, even when both parties know it is arbitrary.

It is the central mechanism of salary negotiation, and the reason naming your expectation too early turns it into a ceiling.

Total compensation

Total compensation is the whole package: base salary, variable pay, bonuses, profit-sharing, benefits in kind, equipment, extra leave.

Comparing two offers on total compensation without first comparing base against base is the most common late-stage mistake.

Variable pay

Variable pay is the portion of compensation conditional on hitting targets.

Its real value depends on three things an offer rarely states: the average attainment rate actually observed, who sets the targets, and whether it is capped.

Soft skills and hard skills

Hard skills are verifiable technical abilities: a language, a tool, a certification. Soft skills are behavioural: communication, conflict handling, autonomy.

A resume that asserts soft skills demonstrates none. A resume that describes a situation where they produced a result demonstrates them all.

Action verb

An action verb opens a line of experience with what you did rather than what you were assigned. "Led", "cut", "shipped", "negotiated" rather than "responsible for" or "involved in".

It is the cheapest and most visible rewrite available on a resume.

Quantified achievement

A quantified achievement pairs an action with a measurable result: a percentage, an amount, a volume, a deadline.

It is what distinguishes a resume line from a job-description line. Without one, the recruiter reads a list of duties rather than evidence of competence.

FAQ

What is an ATS in recruitment?

An ATS, or Applicant Tracking System, is the application-management software that receives and filters resumes before the recruiter. It extracts your document's text, searches it for the advert's terms and ranks the applications.

What is the difference between an ATS score and a match score?

The ATS score judges your resume alone, on machine legibility and structure. The match score judges your resume against one specific advert. A resume has one ATS score and as many match scores as adverts you compare it to.

How do I know if my resume is ATS-friendly?

Three checks cover most of it: does your PDF contain selectable text, are your section titles standard, and does your layout fit a single column. A free ATS test tells you which of the three is costing you points.

Should I add keywords I do not actually have?

No. A keyword with no real experience behind it improves automated filtering and gets paid for at the first technical interview. Echo the advert's terms only where your background justifies them.

What does nice-to-have mean in a job advert?

A nice-to-have skill is wanted but not required. Its absence does not eliminate you; it separates you from an otherwise equal candidate. The phrases "a plus", "ideally" and "would be appreciated" signal it.