Systems like "jobvite or whatever" are at odds with this approach, which, for lack of a better term, I'll call the "What Color Is My Parachute"† (WCIMP) Technique.
In the WCIMP mindset, you make a shortlist of specific companies you'd like to work for. You brainstorm a pitch about how you believe you'd like to add value to their company. Then, treating every step of the hiring process up to "interview with decision maker" as an obstacle, you run the ropes course for each company.
Jobvites and Resumorps and Interfleebs are all obstacles. Is there a system you know about that truly accepts the fact that HR is an obstacle between engaged hiring managers and engaged candidates? I don't know about it. For the most part, these tools all seem geared towards reducing the cost for companies of maintaining their existing obstacle courses.
And that's fine, because most people don't take the WCIMP approach to job hunting. Instead, they have a role in mind, and their overall goal is to hunt for a satisfactory place to practice that role. Those people are never going to think about your company and put you on a shortlist and devise a sales pitch, but are only marginally less likely to be awesome as the WCIMP candidates. Your job is only partly one of attracting candidates; it's also to filter them.
Personally, I don't see WCIMP tactics as evidence of the failure of obstacle course hiring; rather, they're just particularly graceful ways of navigating the course.
† Not endorsing the book, it's just the first one of its kind that I read, 15 years ago.
In the WCIMP mindset, you make a shortlist of specific companies you'd like to work for. You brainstorm a pitch about how you believe you'd like to add value to their company. Then, treating every step of the hiring process up to "interview with decision maker" as an obstacle, you run the ropes course for each company.
Jobvites and Resumorps and Interfleebs are all obstacles. Is there a system you know about that truly accepts the fact that HR is an obstacle between engaged hiring managers and engaged candidates? I don't know about it. For the most part, these tools all seem geared towards reducing the cost for companies of maintaining their existing obstacle courses.
And that's fine, because most people don't take the WCIMP approach to job hunting. Instead, they have a role in mind, and their overall goal is to hunt for a satisfactory place to practice that role. Those people are never going to think about your company and put you on a shortlist and devise a sales pitch, but are only marginally less likely to be awesome as the WCIMP candidates. Your job is only partly one of attracting candidates; it's also to filter them.
Personally, I don't see WCIMP tactics as evidence of the failure of obstacle course hiring; rather, they're just particularly graceful ways of navigating the course.
† Not endorsing the book, it's just the first one of its kind that I read, 15 years ago.