Karat's Role Manager is your centralized workspace to manage how each role is defined, evaluated, and measured, helping you scale your hiring process with clarity and consistency.
In this guide, you’ll learn:
- What the Role Manager is and how it works
- How Archetypes structure and standardize roles
- The difference between Archetypes, Child Roles, and Custom Roles
- What's coming next in future enhancements
- How ATS integrations will streamline setup
- How to access the Role Manager and understand permissions
In the Karat platform, we use the term role to refer to an individual requisition—a specific position your team is hiring for. Roles and requisitions refer to the same concept.
What is Role Manager?
Role Manager is a new page in the Karat Central that replaces the previous Roles and Stages page with a more intuitive, comprehensive workspace. It consolidates all evaluation criteria and role configuration details in one place.
Note: The former Roles and Stages page will be deprecated in a future release.
With Role Manager, you can:
- View all Archetypes (standardized templates), Child Roles, and Custom Roles
- See interview formats, assessment areas, and hiring bars at a glance
- Access performance insights that show how candidates are performing relative to each Archetype’s or Custom Role’s bar—surfacing trends, calibration needs, and opportunities to refine the bar over time
- Identify outlier roles that may require updates or consolidation
This unified view keeps hiring teams, recruiters, and interview stakeholders aligned on what “good” looks like—driving consistency and helping organizations calibrate more effectively over time.
What are Archetypes?
Archetypes are standardized, reusable role templates pre-approved by your organization that define exactly how a particular type of engineering role should be evaluated. Each Archetype includes:
- Interview structure: Assessment areas, timings, question types, and weightings
- Hiring bars: The calibrated thresholds for each interview outcome
Archetypes ensure every candidate for a given role type is evaluated using the same criteria and expectations. They also streamline role creation—Child Roles built from an Archetype automatically inherit its structure and hiring bar, reducing setup time and eliminating the need to re-align criteria for similar roles.
How Archetypes are displayed in the Role Manager
Child Roles
Roles created under an Archetype are called Child Roles. They automatically inherit the Archetype’s configurations—ensuring all evaluation criteria are aligned to your organization’s standards. Child Roles can be viewed under their associated Archetypes.
How Child Roles are displayed within an Archetype in the Role Manager
Custom Roles
Custom Roles are roles not created from an Archetype. These typically represent unique or one-off requisitions that don’t fit a standard template. If needed, Custom Roles can later be aligned to an Archetype to improve consistency.
How Custom Roles are displayed in the Role Manager
ATS Integrations
Role creation and mapping is further streamlined through ATS integrations, allowing Archetypes and requisitions to sync directly between systems.
For more information about ATS Integrations, please visit the ATS Integrations Overview help page.
Future Enhancements
We are actively expanding Role Manager with additional capabilities designed to deepen visibility and streamline role management. Upcoming enhancements include:
- Archetype Descriptions - Clear, standardized descriptions for each Archetype, including example responsibilities and expected skill profiles, to help teams better understand the roles they support.
- Additional ATS Integrations - We will continue expanding Role Manager’s compatibility with leading ATS platforms. If you are interested in an integration for your ATS, please contact your Client Advisor.
Getting Started
How to Access Role Manager
- Log into Karat Central
- Navigate to Role Manager → Roles by Archetypes in the main navigation bar
Interactive Demo: Explore Role Manager
Want a quick, hands-on walkthrough of the new Role Manager? Check out our interactive demo to see how to navigate Archetypes view role details, and explore performance insights.
View the Role Manager Demo
No login required — click through at your own pace.
Role Manager Permissions
All users can view all Archetypes but only the Child Roles and Custom Roles they manage. Role management permissions vary by user type:
- Org Admins - Full access. Can create, edit, and manage both Archetypes and Roles.
- Group Admins - Can view and create Roles within their groups, but cannot create or edit Archetypes.
- Recruiters - Can create Child Roles through their ATS or API integration. (They cannot create or modify Archetypes.)
Note: Archetypes can currently only be created or edited in partnership with a Karat Deployment Engineer.
Frequently Asked Questions
Doesn’t a Role Manager already exist? What’s changing?
Yes — an earlier version of this page exists (“Roles & Stages”), but it had limited visibility and flexibility. The new Role Manager is a complete redesign that serves as the central workspace for how roles are defined and evaluated in Karat.
What’s new:
- A modern, intuitive interface organized around Archetypes (standardized role templates).
- Clear visibility into interview structure, assessment areas, and hiring bars for each role.
Overall, the new Role Manager eliminates confusion, improves consistency, and ensures every candidate is evaluated against the right standard.
Will the existing Roles & Stages page be deprecated?
Yes — but not immediately. Clients will have access to both versions for a period of time to allow for a smooth transition. Our goal is to ensure a seamless, disruption-free experience.
Do I need to use Archetypes? What happens if my organization has not set up Archetypes yet?
Archetypes are not required, but they are highly recommended. They create consistency across similar roles, reduce setup time, and ensure every candidate is evaluated against the same standards. If your organization hires for multiple variants of the same role, Archetypes make your process more scalable, accurate, and easier to manage.
If your organization has not yet set up Archetypes, your Role Manager view will simply show Custom Roles without grouping them under Archetypes. To set up Archetypes, please reach out to your Client Advisor or Karat Deployment Engineer—they can help identify role groupings and configure your initial set.
Do Role Manager and Archetypes change how interviews are conducted?
No changes to interview delivery. Role Manager simply provides clearer visibility into the structure behind the interviews your candidates already complete.
Need Help?
If you have questions or need assistance setting up Archetypes, mapping roles, or interpreting insights, please contact your Client Advisor or reach us at support@karat.com.