Tag Archives: IT professionals

Salaries Won’t Remain Secret for Long in IT

IT recruiters, IT consultants, and IT managers may soon know all about each other’s salaries. Information technology is particularly full of millennial IT professionals who have few qualms about sharing personal information, including how much they get paid for their IT jobs.  In a culture built around sharing everything online, from resumes to vacation photos, IT staffing firms are noticing that IT contractors are becoming more and more likely to share their salaries with co-workers.  While there are plenty of pros and cons to this trend, it’s not really one that IT headhunters or anybody else should waste time debating.  Soon enough, particularly in IT, IT recruiters Boston to IT recruiters CA are likely to see that salaries are no longer secret.  What is actually far more important than debating the merits of the trend is for IT recruiting agencies and the clients they staff for to prepare for salary openness as a new reality.

 

Waking Up Early: The Key to Success in IT

What’s one easy change that IT recruiters, IT managers, and IT consultants can make to boost their success in their IT jobs?  IT professionals can simply wake up earlier in the morning to achieve more.  Amongst high earning people in the information technology field, including IT headhunters and IT contractors, waking up early in the morning is a common success factor.  Why would IT recruiters Boston to IT recruiters CA see this factor so often among successful people?  It’s because the practice goes beyond the skills simply listed on resumes.  IT staffing agencies notice that those who wake up early are getting to work earlier and getting a head start on the competition.  Being a go-getter is the best way to ingratiate oneself with a boss and IT recruiting companies, no matter what your area of IT or your skill-set.

 

IT Professionals Should Be Sending This Email

IT recruiters, IT managers, and IT contractors are all inundated with email on a daily basis.  IT recruiting firms and IT professionals all tend to use email incredibly frequently in their IT jobs, as is natural in the information technology field.  There is one email that everyone doesn’t send, though, that would make a huge difference for IT headhunters and IT consultants alike: a progress email to their boss at the end of every week.  IT recruiters Boston to IT recruiters CA can all benefit from sending a very brief email listing their accomplishments to their boss every Friday.  This email lets managers know that technical recruiters and IT contractors are practicing not only the skills on their resumes, but actually managing themselves and making sure they stay on task.

Leadership in IT– In Every Tier

Information technology is often a team-oriented field, requiring strong leadership skills.  Technical recruiters are particularly attracted to IT contractors with not only stellar resumes, but the ability to emulate leadership qualities, even if they are not being submitted as IT managers.  IT professionals in all ranks of a team can contribute much if they can emulate the qualities that make a great leader.  This is because IT recruiting companies find that the most successful teams are comprised of IT consultants that not only perform their IT jobs, but also possess the key qualities that make a great leader: warmth of personality and confidence.  IT staffing agencies obviously prefer candidates who possess some combination of these two qualities, but leadership studies show that having even just one of these qualities is particularly helpful.  IT recruiters Boston to IT recruiters CA can testify to the fact that a confident or a personable employee can bring a great deal to their company and team.

 

Productivity in IT

IT recruiters Boston to IT recruiters CA are all aware of the evergreen issue of keeping IT consultants as productive as possible.  There are two general reasons why IT staffing agencies might find that their IT contractors are not as productive as they could be.

The first reason IT staffing firms might hear that IT professionals are not meeting the expectations of their IT jobs is actually related to IT managers and other co-workers.  Constant interruptions—including personal, email, phone calls, text messages, etc all take time away from productivity.  IT recruiting companies have noticed that these interruptions take time away from productivity in two ways: in the moment of the interruption and response, time is lost.  However, IT staffing companies also point to the adjustment time in getting back into work after the interruption.

The second major reason IT recruiting firms hear that IT contractors might not be living up to the potential of their resumes is their own ability to focus in work.  Information technology positions, like most others tend to be affected by the availability of the internet, smartphones, or other office distractions.  Thankfully, some of the same technology that distracts us can also provide solutions for maintaining focus.  IT recruiting firms can point to plenty of apps that help workers stay focused, rather than checking irrelevant websites or various phone messages.

Performance Reviews in IT: Harmful or Helpful

Information technology is a field that revolves around quantifying things precisely.  Yet, IT professionals might benefit from not quantifying one particular thing:  performance.  Performance reviews in particular, especially standardized ones are not the best way for IT managers to gauge how well IT consultants are doing in their IT jobs.  IT staffing firms can testify to the damage that performance reviews can sometimes do to IT contractors’ productivity.

While IT recruiting agencies are aware of particular spikes in lowered productivity before and after performance reviews, mostly due to lowered morale and stress, technical recruiters can point to an effect throughout the work year.  IT recruiting firms could easily recount stories of communication breaking down between team members and managers and subordinates due the constraints of impending performance reviews.   In addition to the effects these reviews have on workplace culture, IT staffing companies can also easily argue that ‘standardized reviews’ are simply flawed tools anyways.  Like in the job search, IT recruiting companies would never simply judge candidates by their resumes.  The same is true of performance: it’s not quantifiable by a few numbers.

 

Communication Techniques Are Becoming Imperative in IT

IT professionals, despite their reputation for being kept behind closed doors in the information technology department, are becoming integrated into the office more and more. This change means that communication skills are becoming far more imperative for IT contractors and IT managers.  IT recruiters are finding that they aren’t just looking for perfect resumes any more, but IT consultants who work well within larger team and company environments.

In particular, IT contractors can make themselves more attractive to IT staffing agencies trying to fill IT jobs by working on both their verbal and nonverbal communication skills.  Verbal skills that technical recruiters look for would include things like knowing how to actively listen, encouraging the speaker to elaborate and suppressing the urge to contribute to a conversation.  IT staffing companies notice when somebody is good at making a speaker feel like the only person in the room and that everything they have to say is valid.  IT staffing companies like nonverbal skills like mirroring body language or giving ample personal space.  If IT job candidates can sharpen both nonverbal and verbal communication skills, they will make themselves irresistible to IT headhunters.

How IT Professionals Can Deal With Difficult People

Technical recruiters, IT contractors, and IT managers alike all encounter difficult people at their IT jobs.  Information technology, like most professional fields, is not exempt from unfortunate work relationships or clients.  In particular, IT professionals are likely to handle difficult clients who are upset that their technology isn’t working.  The good news is that there are plenty of tactics IT recruiters and IT contractors can employ in dealing with difficult clients, co-workers, or managers.

The most comprehensive approach to dealing with difficult people is to remember that co-workers, managers, etc are more than their resumes.  They have their own personal concerns, values, and communication styles.  If IT staffing agencies try to mirror the communication styles of difficult clients, they will suddenly get much further with them.  IT recruiting companies will also find far more success with difficult clients if they try to understand their priorities.  IT headhunters can easily overcome a difference in priorities once it’s identified.  Lastly, IT consultants and IT staffing companies will find a great deal of success keeping interactions with difficult people as short as possible without being rude or incomplete in their work.  Letting any kind of abuse or anger build is not necessary and won’t make the interaction any better or more productive.  This also means the less response IT recruiting firms give to difficult people’s tantrums, the sooner they are over.

Weakness and Mistakes are No Longer Taboo in IT

IT professionals are experiencing a new trend: information technology companies are reporting their mistakes and weaknesses in real time (or something very close).  This means as a startup’s founder admits to his massive error in front of a large collective audience including IT recruiting companies, IT headhunters, and IT consultants, the damage from that mistake has just barely been fixed.  IT recruiters Boston to IT recruiters CA are finding a new kind of candid attitude that might be a direct product of the etiquette and speed of social media.

IT contractors and IT managers are participating in social media that demands blatant honesty and moves at the speed of real time.  Technical recruiters could be tweeting what they’re eating for breakfast as they eat it.  This tweet, of course, will be followed by a slew of more throughout the day.  This kind of pace and honesty is possibly making startups and other companies far more willing to share their weaknesses with IT staffing firms.  If IT recruiting companies become aware of a company’s weakness or mistake, this will not seem so odd in a culture influenced heavily by a digital culture of honesty.  And furthermore, this information will probably be replaced by new information so quickly that IT staffing companies will forget it quickly.

 

IT Sees An Infusion of New Jobs

As big data pervades more and more of everyday life, new IT jobs crop up at a faster pace for IT contractors.  IT recruiters Boston to IT recruiters CA are seeing a new infusion of very different kinds of jobs into the IT market.  IT staffing agencies are noticing new job openings at companies that previously had no or very little need for IT headhunters.  Industries like fitness and weight loss are suddenly seeking IT recruiting companies and IT professionals at a far more frequent pace.  IT consultants are not only finding economic value in this expansion, but chances to take forays into new industries.  IT recruiting firms can bring IT professionals’ resumes into intriguing new fields where information technology is suddenly more useful as big data becomes sought after.  Of course, the best part about big data is that it’s here to stay and IT staffing companies will only see more business from this growth in the market.