Side-by-side · Rubric v1.0
Handshake vs Paylocity
Handshake
Handshake is an early-career recruiting network whose employer tools use AI to rank applicants against employer-set criteria, find and message matching students and graduates, and target job promotions.
Substantial gaps
Screening
Paylocity
Paylocity is a cloud-based HCM and payroll platform whose talent suite includes an applicant tracking system with generative-AI job-description and invite drafting, one-way video interviews, candidate self-scheduling, and a conversational "AI Assistant."
Substantial gaps
ATS-integrated
The result
Handshake leads Paylocity on 6 of the 7 criteria.
Handshake scores 50 and Paylocity 43 under rubric v1.0, a 7-point gap across the Screening and ATS-integrated cohorts. Handshake leads 6 of the 7 criteria and the remaining criterion is level, so Paylocity is ahead on none of them; the closest of the 6 Handshake leads is Customer Documentation, Handshake 60 to Paylocity 58. One criterion, Bias Audit Transparency, is both the widest raw gap (Handshake 52, Paylocity 33) and the heaviest weighted swing, and at 18% weight it makes up 53% of the weighted advantage Handshake holds across the 6 criteria it leads.
Criteria won
7 criteria
- Handshake6
- Paylocity0
- Level1
- Widest raw gap
- Bias Audit Transparency52 vs 33
- Heaviest weighted swing
- Bias Audit Transparency18% weight
The record
Categories, scope and company facts.
Handshake is filed under Screening AI, Paylocity under ATS-integrated AI. They record no secondary category in common.
Both are in scope of
Only Paylocity is in scope of
| Record | Handshake | Paylocity |
|---|---|---|
| Price tier | Mid | Mid |
| Headquarters | US | US |
| Founded | 2014 | 1997 |
What decides it
The criteria that move the gap, heaviest swing first.
- 1
Bias Audit Transparency
18% weight53% of the movement so far
Handshake52Paylocity333.4 weighted points to Handshake
- 2
Human Oversight Design
12% weight67% of the movement so far
Handshake58Paylocity501.0 weighted points to Handshake
- 3
Article 11 Technical Documentation
20% weight80% of the movement so far
Handshake48Paylocity440.8 weighted points to Handshake
- 4
Post-Market Monitoring
12% weight91% of the movement so far
Handshake48Paylocity420.7 weighted points to Handshake
- 5
Data Governance Disclosure
15% weight98% of the movement so far
Handshake57Paylocity540.4 weighted points to Handshake
- 6
Customer Documentation
8% weight100% of the movement so far
Handshake60Paylocity580.2 weighted points to Handshake
Weighted delta is the raw difference times the criterion weight, so the 6 figures above sum to +6.5 — the difference between the two totals before either is rounded. Shares are of 6.5 points of movement counted without direction. The table below rounds each side to a whole number first, so its Δ raw total reads +7 beside that +6.5.
Category-by-category
Raw score per criterion, with weighted delta.
Δ is Handshake minus Paylocity, coloured for whichever of the two it favours.
| Category | Weight | Handshake | Paylocity | Δ raw | Δ weighted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 48 | 44 | +4 | +0.8 |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 52 | 33 | +19 | +3.4 |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 30 | 30 | - | - |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 57 | 54 | +3 | +0.4 |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 58 | 50 | +8 | +1.0 |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 48 | 42 | +6 | +0.7 |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 60 | 58 | +2 | +0.2 |
| Total | 100% | 50F | 43F | +7 | +6.5 |
Evidence
Cited sources and documented absences, criterion by criterion.
An absence is a finding, not a blank: the reviewer looked for a named artefact and recorded that it is not located. Where a source sits is a fact about hosting only.
| Criterion | Weight | Handshake | Paylocity | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | Cited | Absences | Audit / hosting | ||
| Article 11 Technical Documentation | 20% | 4 | 1 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Bias Audit Transparency | 18% | 5 | 1 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 1 | 1 | — |
| FRIA Support | 15% | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 1 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Data Governance Disclosure | 15% | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 2 | 1 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domain |
| Human Oversight Design | 12% | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Post-Market Monitoring | 12% | 3 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 1 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| Customer Documentation | 8% | 4 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain | 2 | 1 | Sources on the vendor's own domain |
| All criteria | 100% | 27 | 7 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domainSources on a separate domain | 11 | 7 | Audit reportSources on the vendor's own domain |
Handshake has 34 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 27 with a source URL, 7 documented absences; Paylocity has 18 evidence rows across 7 of 7 criteria — 11 with a source URL, 7 documented absences; some documentation or audit rows for Handshake sit on a domain separate from the vendor's own site.
Provenance
The scores above are documented by 52 evidence rows on file for these two vendors: 34 for Handshake, across 2 distinct source domains, and 18 for Paylocity, across 2 distinct source domains.
- Rubric
- v1.0
- Handshake last reviewed
- September 25, 2026 · HireAIScore editorial team
- Paylocity last reviewed
- July 17, 2026 · HireAIScore editorial team
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