Workday vs Taleo vs iCIMS vs Greenhouse: What Each ATS Does to Your Resume

You cannot choose which ATS screens you, but you can recognise it from the application URL and adjust. Here is how the four systems most job seekers encounter actually behave.

How do I tell which ATS I'm using?

Check the URL of the application page:

• myworkdayjobs.com - Workday
• taleo.net - Oracle Taleo
• icims.com - iCIMS
• greenhouse.io - Greenhouse
• lever.co - Lever
• smartrecruiters.com - SmartRecruiters

Workday

The strictest parser of the group and the one that most often re-asks for your entire work history in a form. It maps your resume into structured profile fields, so extraction failures are highly visible to recruiters.

What breaks it: columns, headers/footers, tables, ambiguous dates. Do: upload a single-column text PDF, then correct every auto-filled field by hand. That manual pass is the highest-value ten minutes in a Workday application.

Oracle Taleo

Older, keyword-driven, and unforgiving of unusual formatting. Many Taleo deployments still favour .doc/.docx and choke on graphical PDFs.

Do: upload DOCX when offered, keep section headers extremely conventional, and repeat critical keywords in both the skills section and experience bullets.

iCIMS

Better parsing than Taleo, but heavy on knockout questionnaires. Most iCIMS rejections happen on the form, not the resume.

Do: answer every screening question carefully, give salary as a range, and do not leave optional certification fields blank if you hold them.

Greenhouse

Recruiter-friendly and much lighter on automatic filtering. Human reviewers read a lot more of the pile, and custom application questions carry real weight.

Do: actually answer the "why this company" question. In Greenhouse it is often read before the resume.

Lever and SmartRecruiters

Similar to Greenhouse: modern parsing, less aggressive auto-filtering, more emphasis on the recruiter's own review and on referrals attached to your profile.

What format survives all of them?

One resume, built to the strictest common denominator:

• Single column, reverse chronological
• Standard headers (Summary, Experience, Education, Skills, Certifications)
• Contact details as plain text at the top of the body
• Mon YYYY - Mon YYYY dates
• No tables, icons, text boxes, or graphics
• Text-based PDF by default, DOCX where the portal prefers it

Then adapt behaviour, not format: manual field correction in Workday, keyword density in Taleo, questionnaire care in iCIMS, written answers in Greenhouse.