InterviewStream Hire vs. Lever

I always recommend this product to companies of all sizes who are looking for a reliable way to add virtual interviewing to their assessment strategy. There are 50+ vendors in this space right now but none of them have been around as long as InterviewStream. Their product is especially good for high volume scenarios but we've used it for all levels from executives down to hourly employees. We even used it internally for succession planning interviews and internal mobility

Incentivized

Managing pipeline and candidate communication is easy through lever. Keeping it all in one place allows the hiring teams to be in the loop real-time. The reporting is clunky and basic, however, and without a 3rd party tool, sourcing from the lever database is difficult. Also, it is very easy to have duplicate candidates since the alerts Lever gives are often incorrect

Incentivized

• Simple interface. It's not a flashy product with claims of artificial intelligence or machine learning, etc. It just gets the job done for a fair price.
• Reliable. While we have had some minor issues from time-to-time with live interviews, the recorded interviews have worked fine in several countries around the world.
• Support. Our customer success person was always available and helpful.

Incentivized

• Great integration: Keeps a list of Outlook email communication along with LinkedIn and other data sources
• Is fairly lively, not too much lag between screens even though it is looking through a lot of data.
• Has excellent reporting on how well each email message is working.

Incentivized

• Reporting could be better. Would love to see more stats around where our users are dropping off, invited vs. completed metrics and ROI numbers as well.
• A better database of technical interview questions.

Incentivized

• It would be nice if we were provided a more detailed summary of why our referrals were not selected for a position.
• The feedback feature that interviewers can give on candidates is great, but it is sometimes hard to find again after completion.
• If there is a mobile version, better marketing/awareness on this would be helpful.

Incentivized

It isn't difficult to use for the applicant processing, but [I feel] if you want to pull reports or use their tools, good luck!

What support? - Add a ticket and get links to [I believe] their unhelpful user guide. Add a charge if you want better support - afterward just got those links faster...

We looked at several video interview companies when we made a purchase decision. With the exception of HireVue, they're all about the same. We just went with InterviewStream because they had the most experience in the industry and their pricing was fair. HireVue is a premium product who tries to distance themselves from the video interview space by claiming that they are a collaboration/training tool or an AI assessment tool. They're wayyyy overpriced for what they offer if you just want video interviewing. And their sales process is high pressure and a little bit slimy to be honest. If you need a proven tool that has been around, InterviewStream is good.

Incentivized

I think Lever stacks up fairly well and is right above the midpoint. iCIMS and Greenhouse provide a larger, more Enterprise style product for huge scale, so I'd put the two of them above Lever at this time, but we chose Lever over Greenhouse for a reason. I just don't know if we'd be able to scale to the size we'd want to long-term with their product suite. Compared to the others listed here, and many others, I would take Lever every time.

Incentivized

• We took a 7 step interview process in one of our high volume areas down to 3 steps. This saved 2 weeks in time to hire and increased our conversion rate with top candidates by 20% (presumably because we moved faster).
• We saved $100,000 minimum in travel expenses in the first year. We don't know the exact amount because much of these costs are hidden in the business, but we could track at least $100k in hard costs.
• Negatively, I'd say we lost a little bit of street credibility on sites like glassdoor where people would vent that they didn't like recorded video interviews. Over time that feedback dwindled as this strategy has been adopted by more companies.

Incentivized

• We have an ATS now and did not have one before
• LinkedIn integration is better than others I've seen
• Spend too much time researching unhelpful user guides since their support is terrible
• Lots of frustration with post implementation support
• Integrations break, tools don't work and settings fail which could lead to other issues