Ashby + The Cognitive Integration
The Cognitive integrates with Ashby so AI interviewing and sourcing run alongside the workflow fast-growing startups and modern TA teams already use: you import active candidates from the Ashby stage you choose, invite them to a live AI interview, and write each score, summary and report link back to the candidate as a note. The connection is one of 60+ ATS integrations The Cognitive offers through a single integration. Ashby keeps every stage move and decision; The Cognitive never changes a candidate's stage or rejects anyone.
What does the Ashby integration do?
- Import from a stage: pick the Ashby stage to import active candidates from, run a sync, and they arrive in The Cognitive ready to invite.
- Back into Ashby: the score, summary and report link land on the imported candidate as a note, wherever Ashby takes notes through the integration.
- Your decisions stay in Ashby: the integration never changes a candidate's stage and never rejects anyone.
- Sourcing alongside: The Cognitive also finds people outside Ashby across ~900M public profiles; you choose who to contact and interview.
- Consistent first round: one fixed rubric per role, so screen outcomes compare like with like in Ashby's reports.
- No parallel system of record: Ashby stays the source of truth; The Cognitive adds the interview and evidence layer.
The Cognitive in an Ashby workflow
Ashby is the modern ATS known for native analytics and automation. The Cognitive adds the 2 things Ashby does not do itself: finding people outside your applicant pool, and running a live AI first-round interview whose result lands on the candidate as a note.
Ashby teams usually import from their recruiter-screen stage and invite that week's candidates in one batch.
Ashby teams tend to be the most metrics-driven ATS users, and a consistent first round helps that instinct: because every invited candidate is scored against the same rubric for the role, the screen stops being the stage where funnel data goes fuzzy. The decision to move someone forward is still made in Ashby, so its stage reporting stays the source of truth.
Reconsidering the ATS? Ashby alternatives separates the two cases: fill the pipeline next to Ashby, or replace it with Greenhouse, Lever or Gem.
How does candidate sourcing get into Ashby?
Candidate sourcing is the outbound half of recruitment: searching for people who have not applied, checking they fit the role, revealing contact details, and starting the first conversation. An applicant tracking system is inbound by design: it holds and moves the people who already found you, so sourcing is the step that decides whether there is anything in it worth tracking. Every system on this page is a system of record for applicants; none of them goes and finds candidates.
That is the gap The Cognitive's AI sourcing fills. A search brief written in plain English runs across ~900M public profiles with contact details enriched from 30+ sources; the role becomes a durable role pool that keeps everyone each search finds. Each candidate a search returns costs 1 credit, a personal email reveal 4 and a phone number 12, charged only on a successful reveal, so browsing a search result is cheap and only the shortlist you act on is not. People you source stay in The Cognitive's role pool and are not written into Ashby automatically; you decide who to interview and who to add to Ashby yourself.
Outbound is usually the stage Ashby's reporting cannot see, because sourcing happens in browser tabs and arrives as a manual candidate add. When the recruiter adds the sourced candidates they pursue to Ashby with the source recorded, outbound and inbound conversion sit in the same Ashby funnel report, and a TA lead can compare the two channels instead of guessing at one.
Where each step of hiring lives once Ashby and The Cognitive are connected
| Step | What happens | Where the record ends up |
|---|---|---|
| Search | A plain-English brief runs across ~900M public profiles; filters, seniority and location narrow it. Every candidate returned costs 1 credit | Role pool in The Cognitive |
| Verify | Each card opens with a "Why this match" line tied to the brief, so a match is something you can check rather than a claim to take on trust | Role pool in The Cognitive |
| Reveal | Verified emails (4 credits) and direct phone numbers (12 credits), enriched from 30+ sources and charged only when a reveal succeeds | The candidate's profile in The Cognitive |
| Outreach | Email sequences from Sourcing Pro up, sent from your own mailbox; a reply stops the sequence | The Cognitive |
| Import | A sync pulls active candidates from the Ashby stage you choose | Candidate stays in Ashby; a copy is ready to invite in The Cognitive |
| Interview | A live two-way AI video interview: fixed rubric, questions decided live and adapted to the answers given | Report in The Cognitive: scores, written feedback, transcript and recording |
| Write back | Score, summary and report link for imported candidates who interviewed | A note on the candidate in Ashby, where it accepts notes through the integration |
| Track and report | Stages, approvals, requisition reporting and compliance stay in Ashby | Ashby, which stays the system of record |
How does setup work?
- 1. Connect: the dashboard opens one integration window; select Ashby and authorize the connection there.
- 2. Choose a stage: pick the Ashby stage whose active candidates should be imported for AI interviews.
- 3. Sync, invite, write back: run a sync, invite the imported candidates, and push the score and report link back to Ashby as a note once they have interviewed.
- Ashby stays in charge of stages and decisions; The Cognitive adds the interview and the note.
Recruiting metrics Ashby can report, and the one it cannot
| Metric | What it measures | Available from Ashby alone? |
|---|---|---|
| Time to fill | Days from requisition open to accepted offer | Yes, it is a count of stage dates |
| Cost per hire | Total recruiting spend divided by hires made | Partly: the sourcing and screening time components usually sit outside the ATS |
| Stage conversion and drop-off | Share of candidates surviving each stage | Yes, per requisition |
| Source of hire | Which channel produced the hire | Yes for inbound; outbound only if sourced candidates are pushed in with their source recorded |
| Quality of hire | How hires actually perform, and whether they stay | No, it needs pre-hire evidence the ATS never collected |
Recruiting metrics are the numbers that describe how a hiring pipeline behaves: how long a requisition takes to fill, what each hire costs, how many candidates survive each stage, and how good the people you hire turn out to be. Four of the five come straight out of an applicant tracking system, because they are counts of things the system already records.
Quality of hire is the exception, and it is the one hiring managers actually argue about. It needs evidence about how a candidate performed before they were hired, and a resume plus a recruiter's written impression is not evidence you can correlate against anything later. A scored interview report, with a 1 to 5 rating per criterion, overall written feedback and the transcript, is what makes the correlation possible at all. We publish no benchmark figures for any of these: a number drawn from someone else's funnel predicts nothing about yours, so measure your own for a quarter and compare against that.
Why teams add The Cognitive to their ATS
Tracking candidates is what Ashby does; finding and evaluating them is the gap The Cognitive fills. Search ~900M public profiles from a plain-English brief, then invite the people you pick, or the applicants you import from Ashby, to a live AI interview that books itself into their calendar. AI Sourcing and AI Interview each start at $99/month.
Frequently Asked Questions
Does The Cognitive integrate with Ashby?
Yes. The Cognitive imports active candidates from the Ashby stage you choose, you invite them to a live AI interview, and the score, summary and report link go back to Ashby as a note. It is one of The Cognitive's 100+ ATS integrations.
Can The Cognitive source candidates into Ashby?
The Cognitive sources candidates alongside Ashby: it searches ~900M public profiles from a plain-English brief and enriches contact details from 30+ sources. Sourced people stay in The Cognitive's role pool and are not written into Ashby automatically. Search results cost 1 credit per person shown; a personal email reveal costs 4 credits and a phone number 12, charged only on a successful reveal.
Does Ashby find candidates who have not applied?
No. Ashby is an applicant tracking system: it stores, moves and reports on people already in a hiring process. Finding candidates who have not applied is outbound sourcing, a separate job that teams either do by hand in LinkedIn and job boards or hand to sourcing software such as The Cognitive.
Which Ashby stage should feed AI interviews?
Ashby teams usually import from their recruiter-screen stage and invite that week's candidates in one batch. You choose the source stage in The Cognitive, each role can use its own rubric, and every decision after the interview stays with your team in Ashby.
Do I need engineering help to connect Ashby?
No engineering is needed: an Ashby admin authorizes the connection from The Cognitive dashboard and picks the source stage.
Which plans include ATS integration?
ATS integration comes with the Interviews Pro, Max and Business plans. Plans bill monthly or yearly, and you can cancel anytime.
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