For Agency Recruiters ·
What you'll accomplish
By the end of this guide, you'll have Carv set up to automatically transcribe and summarize your candidate phone screens — delivering structured ATS-ready notes within 30 seconds of hanging up, so you can stop taking notes during calls and focus entirely on the conversation.
What you'll need
Go to carv.com and sign up for a free trial. Use your work email — you'll want this tied to your professional account, not a personal one. Complete the onboarding flow, which takes about 5 minutes and includes setting up your profile as a recruiter.
What you should see: A Carv dashboard with options to connect your phone/meeting system and start your first session.
Troubleshooting: If your firm has IT or privacy policies around call recording, check with your manager before proceeding. Most staffing firms are comfortable with call recording for training purposes, but some clients or jurisdictions have disclosure requirements (California, for example, requires both parties to consent).
Carv works with several calling configurations — choose the one that matches how you make most of your candidate calls:
Option A — Phone conference mode (works with any phone): Add a Carv phone number to your call as a third-party. Carv listens and transcribes without any app installation. Best if you use a cell phone or desk phone for calls.
Option B — VoIP/Zoom/Teams integration: If your firm uses Zoom Phone, RingCentral, or Teams for calls, connect Carv via the integrations menu in your settings. This gives Carv direct access to call audio without needing a conference bridge.
What you should see: After connecting, a test recording option to confirm audio is being captured correctly.
In Carv's settings, find the Template or Note Format section. Select or customize the template for recruiter screens. The standard recruiter template captures: candidate name, current role and company, years of relevant experience, key skills, availability, compensation expectations, motivation for searching, interest level, and next steps.
If you use Bullhorn, check whether Carv has a Bullhorn integration enabled — it can push structured notes directly into the candidate record without copy-pasting.
What to customize: Add any fields your agency requires in ATS records (e.g., work authorization status, relocation interest, reference availability). Carv lets you add custom fields to the template.
Schedule or dial into your next candidate screen with Carv running. If you're using phone conference mode: start the call, then dial the Carv number to add it. If integrated: Carv starts automatically when you begin the call.
During the call — focus entirely on the candidate. Don't take notes. Ask your usual questions and listen. Carv handles everything else.
What you should see: After the call ends, Carv processes the recording and delivers a structured note document in 30–60 seconds. You'll receive a notification (email or in-app).
Troubleshooting: If the transcript quality is poor (lots of [inaudible] markers), check your audio setup. Speakerphone and poor cell reception are the most common causes. Earbuds or a headset significantly improve transcription accuracy.
Open the Carv summary. You'll see: a full transcript, a structured note summary organized by template field, and any action items Carv identified from the conversation. Review for accuracy — AI transcription is ~95% accurate but occasionally mishears technical terms or uncommon names.
Edit anything that's off, then:
What you should see: Your ATS candidate record updated with complete, structured notes within 3 minutes of ending the call — without any dedicated data entry time.
After reviewing a Carv summary, you can use these follow-up prompts in ChatGPT to convert the notes into other documents: