The Challenge

UCHealth is Colorado's only academic health system – a nonprofit network of 15 acute-care hospitals and thousands of physicians spanning three states. It is also one of the most desired healthcare employers in the region. Attracting applicants was never the problem.

Reaching them before competitors did was.

Ryan Toedtman, Manager of Talent Acquisition & Human Resources AI Integration, has spent 11 years at UCHealth – long enough to watch it grow from 14,000 employees to more than 37,000. When UCHealth set out to bring AI into its recruiting operation, his team started not with a vendor list but with a problem statement. And the problem at the top of the list was clear.

"Improving our candidate experience was our number one priority."

— Ryan Toedtman, Manager, Talent Acquisition & Human Resources AI Integration, UCHealth

The math of the old process worked against that priority at every step. A large share of UCHealth's open nursing roles are night-shift positions – but recruiters work eight to five. A night-shift nurse applies, works a shift, sleeps through the recruiter's callback, and the two sides can play phone tag for days. Add a hiring manager running a busy unit – for whom recruiting is, as Ryan jokes, "their PRN job" – and the gap from application to clinical interview stretched into weeks.

In a market this competitive, that gap has a price. By the time UCHealth got a candidate on the phone, that candidate had often applied to three other health systems. It showed in the funnel: UCHealth was getting roughly eight candidates per RN hire, double the national benchmark of four.

The demand was there. The process was getting in the way of it.

The Solution

Ryan's team ran a deliberately rigorous evaluation – six vendors, dozens of demos – anchored to the problem statement rather than the technology. Take2 stood apart on two counts: AI agents built exclusively for healthcare hiring, and a partnership approach that extended to the hardest part of any deployment.

"We're on an Infor ATS, and historically I've done a lot of technology integrations with Infor. It's been a challenge. [Take2's] team went above and beyond to not only make the solution work for us, but to make it seamless."

— Ryan Toedtman

UCHealth went live in 45 days, starting with registered nurse roles across Acute Care, ICU, and Women & Infants.

Here's how it works:

• Seconds after applying, every candidate receives a text message inviting them to complete an on-demand screening call – no scheduling, no waiting for a recruiter's callback. Candidates take the call whenever suits them: after a night shift, on a weekend, on their own schedule. The median time to complete a screening call after application is 81 minutes.

• The call is a real conversation, not a script. Take2's AI Interviewer, "Melissa," conducts a structured screen built on evidence-based behavioral questions tailored to each UCHealth role – covering licensure, shift and logistics fit, prior experience, and behavioral prompts about patient care and advocacy. The conversation is natural enough that candidates routinely comment on it.

"We evaluated a lot of AI screeners and they can sound robotic. [Take2's] screener is very human."

— Ryan Toedtman

• Every completed screen flows straight into Infor – a scorecard, an interview summary, and a full recording – so recruiters and hiring managers evaluate candidates on far more than a resume, inside the system they already use.

• Because the AI Interviewer is available on-demand, 24/7, candidates complete screens when they're actually available – which is exactly when UCHealth's recruiters aren't at their desks.

See why healthcare's leading talent acquisition teams recruit with Take2. Book a free demo →

The Results

Candidates get engaged the second they apply. The invitation to screen arrives moments after the application is submitted, and the median candidate completes their full screening call 81 minutes later – notes, score, and recording already in the ATS.

"Now 81% of candidates have a UCHealth touch point the second they apply. That is a game-changing statistic."

— Ryan Toedtman

The night-shift problem is solved. UCHealth's biggest vacancy category – night-shift nursing – was precisely where the 8am–5pm recruiting model failed.

"60% of our screens are being completed outside of business hours. Where we were playing phone tag, we've completely eliminated it."

— Ryan Toedtman

Recruiters start every day ahead. This is the workflow change recruiters feel most.

"Our recruiters walk in the door in the morning with a list of completed screens – work that would have taken them the first half of their day."

— Ryan Toedtman

Instead of stacking screening calls, recruiters review scored, screened candidates and decide who moves forward – and hiring managers see a short list of evaluated candidates rather than 10–15 raw resumes.

Quality signals hold up. Candidates who receive offers score 5 points higher on Take2's screen than dispositioned candidates – a statistically significant gap that gives recruiters a consistent, auditable signal for prioritizing the funnel.

And the experience delivers – for everyone. Candidate satisfaction sits at 4.7 out of 5, from external applicants and, notably, from internal candidates too – employees exploring their next role at UCHealth get the same immediate, structured touch point, supporting the system's career mobility and retention goals.

Why It Matters

For UCHealth, the gains aren't just an efficiency story – they're an experience story, on both sides of the process.

Candidates who once waited days in a black hole now hear from UCHealth the second they apply, complete a respectful, conversational screen on their own schedule, and move to a clinical interview in days instead of weeks. For the most desired health system in Colorado, the recruiting process finally matches the brand.

Recruiters, freed from a morning's worth of screening calls, spend their time as strategic consultants – advising hiring managers, building pipelines, and finding homes for "silver medalist" candidates who are strong fits for a different role. No candidate left behind.

And UCHealth is widening the aperture: after proving the model with nursing, the team has already expanded to radiology and sterile processing, with more role groups on the roadmap.

"UCHealth is now showing up for our candidates... We're showing up on day one, from the second of application, for the people that want to influence people's lives."

— Ryan Toedtman

WATCH: Inside UCHealth's Agentic Recruiting Playbook

In this session, Ryan Toedtman and Take2 co-founder Yaniv Shimoni walk through how UCHealth evaluated, deployed, and scaled AI agents across its talent acquisition function.

See how Take2's AI agents can transform your recruiting operation. Book a 30-minute call → We'll walk through projected impact based on your role types, requisition volume, and recruiter capacity.