Recruit Candidate Communication Plan

---
name: recruit-candidate-communication-plan
description: Builds a candidate communication plan with a promise per stage (who writes, by when), a "no update yet" message and a close-the-loop rule, plus keep-warm notes from offer to first day. Use for "run recruit-candidate-communication-plan", "candidates are ghosting us", "stop ghosting candidates", "candidate update email", "no update yet message", "how often should I update candidates", "keep the candidate warm until start date", "candidate communication plan", part of the AI for Recruiting Pack by Polar Bear.
---

# Candidate Communication Plan

## When To Use
Candidates hear nothing for weeks, and the ones you want go silent too. Use this when a search is opening, or when one is already leaking people, to answer one question: what have we promised each candidate at each stage, who keeps that promise, and by when?

## When Not To Use
If you only need the invitation, reminder or reschedule wording, run Interview Scheduling Messages. If a person has already decided no and you need the words, run Rejection Email. If you are still deciding the stages and where candidates hear from you, run Hiring Process Plan. This plan writes the promises; those skills write the specific messages.

## Inputs
- The stage map and candidate touchpoints from the Hiring Process Plan, or a list of stages
- Who owns candidate contact at each stage, and the deadlines you can actually keep
- The hard parts of the job and how long the whole process takes
If you have none of this, I start from a five-stage process with [placeholder] owners and dates and mark the output as a first draft.

## Approach
The CIPD selection methods factsheet (https://www.cipd.org/en/knowledge/factsheets/selection-factsheet/) says to tell candidates what to expect and follow up in good time. A realistic job preview at first contact (Premack and Wanous 1985, https://doi.org/10.1037/0021-9010.70.4.706) adds the hard parts of the job, so nobody learns them at offer. The judgment is that silence is a message: the candidate who was told "you'll hear by Friday" and hears nothing reads it as a no, takes the other offer, and your team calls it ghosting.

## Workflow
1. Ask three questions: what are the stages, who owns contact at each one, and what is the longest wait a candidate faces today? If an owner is "the team", push for one name.
2. Write one row per touchpoint from the Hiring Process Plan: what the candidate is promised, who sends it, and the deadline in [days] you set, after the internal deadline it depends on. Set deadlines you will hit on a bad week, not a good one.
3. Draft the "no update yet" message, sent on the deadline even when nothing has changed. It says there is no decision, why in one line if you can share it, and the next date they will hear from you.
4. Write the close-the-loop rule: everyone who reached interview gets a decision from a named person, never silence. Mark who checks it is done and when.
5. Draft the first-contact preview: the length of the process in stages and weeks, and the two or three hard parts of the job, stated as they are.
6. Plan keep-warm touches from offer to first day: owner, timing as [placeholders], and what each one gives (a practical detail, a meeting with the team, a name to call).
7. Check every message is sent by a person. Nothing here triggers an automated rejection.

## Output Format
```markdown
# Candidate Communication Plan: [Role title]
## Promise per stage
| Stage | What the candidate is promised | Who sends it | Deadline |
|---|---|---|---|
| [Stage] | [Promise] | [Name] | [n] working days after [event] |
## "No update yet" message
[Draft, with the next date as a placeholder]
## Close-the-loop rule
[Rule, who checks it, when]
## First-contact preview
[Process length and the hard parts of the job]
## Keep-warm touches, offer to first day
| When | What | Owner |
|---|---|---|
| [Timing] | [Touch] | [Name] |
## Decision
[Hiring manager and recruiter agree the deadlines by [date]; recruiter shares the preview with the first candidates.]
```

## Done When
- Every stage has one named owner and a deadline in days
- The "no update yet" message carries a next date
- The close-the-loop rule covers everyone who reached interview
- Keep-warm touches run to the first day, each with an owner

## Quality Bar
- Deadlines are ones the team keeps on a bad week; a missed promise does more harm than no promise
- The preview names real hard parts, not a list of perks
- No message promises feedback the team will not give
- Every message is sent by a person; no automated rejections
- Owners are names, never "HR" or "the team"

## Next
Run recruit-interview-scheduling (Interview Scheduling Messages) to write the logistics messages that keep these promises.

## About the makers

This pack is made by Polar Bear, a consultancy built by ex-McKinsey founders with a dream to make AI work for People, not instead of them. We help our clients build people systems and AI-first ways of working, and we run our own company on Claude. If your team has outgrown the self-serve version, message Pauline (linkedin.com/in/paulinebertry).