How Unanet uses AI to Review Applications Over 3x Faster and Hire Competitive AI Talent

Company Overview

Unanet is a leading provider of project-based ERP and CRM solutions purpose-built for government contractors, architecture, engineering, construction, and professional services. More than 4,000 project-driven organizations depend on Unanet to turn their information into actionable insights, drive better decision-making, maintain regulatory compliance, and accelerate business growth.

Unanet has experienced rapid growth, growing revenue over 400% since 2020, and earning a spot on the Inc. 5,000 list of fastest-growing private companies in America 8 years in a row. In the past 5 years, Unanet has grown its loyal customer base by over 250% to 4,000 customer organizations and its workforce from approximately 175 to 450 employees.

The Challenge

In today’s fierce labor market, with unemployed workers exceeding the number of available jobs and significant workforce shifts in the technology sector, talent acquisition teams are inundated with an extremely high volume of inbound applications. That has prompted companies to revisit how long they advertise jobs for and how best to approach evaluating candidates.

“We receive tens of thousands of applications every year,” says Unanet’s Vice President of Talent, Nick Larche, “and we’re on track to having over 60% more applications in 2025 than we experienced in 2024. At the same time, we’re facing heightened expectations from those navigating the job market and not increasing our own team’s headcount. So, we have to work smarter, not harder.”

Talent acquisition requires balance in where you invest your time. If you over-index on reviewing applications, you have less time for activities such as strategic sourcing, hiring team collaboration, and candidate relationship management. With the increase in application volume, as well as emerging trends such as candidate fraud, the talent acquisition team at Unanet identified this as a challenge worth solving.

The Solution

Unanet partnered with Endorsed to reimagine how they review inbound applications. To date, they’ve decisioned thousands of candidates using the platform. The team at Unanet is estimated to have saved over 13 hours of application review time per month per recruiter since going live.

“When selecting a solution, we were adamant of not being the organization that’s impersonal in its approach, but highly responsive to those that best meet our job criteria. It’s critical that top talent not be lost-in-stage, but identified and advanced quickly.”

Nick Larche

Vice President, Talent & AI Enablement Lead at Unanet

One of Unanet’s recent hiring pushes was for talent experienced in Artificial Intelligence. For a recent software development role focused on AI, they experienced over 3,600 applications in less than two weeks. Nick and his two team members, Jessica Taylor and Brent Cannon, agreed: it’s simply not feasible to keep pace with that kind of volume using traditional means. Unanet was able to leverage Endorsed’s AI-powered applicant reviewer to advance its top candidate within 2 days of them applying and extend an offer to that candidate over twice as fast as typical hiring timeframes for an engineering role.

"I see AI as a powerful tool, but it’s not a replacement for the recruiter. It’s here to empower us. I use Endorsed to efficiently review applications, while my expertise guides and shapes the decisions. That balance means candidates move through the process faster, while still experiencing the human connection that matters most.”

Jessica Taylor

Senior Talent Partner and Program Manager at Unanet

Results

• Improved Application Review Time: Resume reviews performed over 300% faster. With over 13 hours of review time saved per month per recruiter, the team could reinvest their time in higher-value activities such as sourcing and candidate relationship management.
• Accelerated Hiring for AI Talent: With the newfound ability to identify high-relevancy talent faster, the team was able to find their top candidate amongst thousands of candidates in 2 days and offering the position twice as fast.
• High Responsiveness, Human Reviewed: With human-set-and-reviewed criteria yielding greater context on applications, the team was able to respond to candidates faster and more confidently – regardless of the outcome.