Rejecting candidates is the chore everyone postpones, which is exactly why people end up ghosted. This recipe makes the close-out fast enough that you actually do it — a templated note from your real inbox, a status move, and a logged record — so candidates hear back and your pipeline reflects reality.

It's a high-frequency job. Done in two minutes, it gets done. Done as forty individual emails, it doesn't.

What you'll need

Gmail connected — the rejection sends from your own address, and without it the bulk action has no inbox to send from.
The candidates who aren't moving forward, somewhere you can select them — a job's table or a filtered view.
A Rejected status in your pipeline. The default set has one.

The chain

Filter or multi-select the candidates. In the candidates table, narrow to the people you're closing out — a status, a job, a stage — then select them with the checkboxes, shift-clicking to grab a range.
Send a templated rejection. With the candidates selected, use reject with template — it sends a templated rejection email to everyone selected at once. It goes from your own connected Gmail inbox, not a generic noreply@, so candidates hear from a person and any reply comes back to you.
Move them to a Rejected status. Move the same selection to your Rejected status — by drag, or as a bulk action on the selection. Now your pipeline numbers reflect who's actually still in play.
The timeline logs who and when. Every status change is recorded on each candidate's timeline — who moved them, when, and from what stage. "When did we close this candidate out, and who did it?" always has an answer, and it isn't a guess.

Where it can break

No Gmail connected. Reject-with-template needs an inbox to send from. Without Gmail connected, the bulk action can't send. Connecting takes about ten seconds.
The template is too generic to be kind. A rejection that could go to anyone reads as exactly that. Keep the wording warm and human — the template sends from your name, so it should sound like you wrote it.
You moved the status but skipped the email. Then the candidate is closed out in your system and never heard a word. The email is the kind part; don't drop it. Send first, then move.
You meant to reject a smaller set. A bulk status move is not individually undoable, and a sent email cannot be unsent. Check the selection before you send — the filter bar is how you get it exact.

Variations

Reject as part of a triage pass. When you rank a pile of applicants, the bottom band can be rejected in the same session — same selection tools, same chore handled while you're already there.
One thoughtful rejection, not a batch. For a candidate who got far — a final-round no — skip the bulk template and email them individually from their record. Some rejections deserve a personal note; reserve the batch tool for the early-stage stack.
Let HQ handle the moves. Ask HQ to move a set of candidates to Rejected — it writes a plan you approve. HQ moves stages and data; the decision to reject is still yours.
Removing a whole status. If you're retiring a stage entirely, removing a status asks where its candidates should go and merges them there — a different operation from rejecting people one selection at a time.