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Tag Archives: IT recruiting firms

Common IT Resume Mistakes

As you polish your resume for IT recruiters and IT staffing firms, you may want to stop and make sure you’re not making any mistakes that will make technical recruiters and IT recruiting agencies take your candidacy less seriously.  Here are some mistakes that are especially common in resumes from IT professionals:

1.    Your resume is full of clichés.  IT staffing companies and IT recruiting companies don’t want to see that you’re wasting precious space on your resume with phrases like “hard worker” or “fast learner”.  These phrases are too hard to quantify and don’t mean much anyways.  Focus on listing actual technical skills and accomplishments.

2.    You wrote your resume all in the third person.  IT recruiting firms see this far too often from both US and international resumes.  The problem with talking about yourself in the third person, especially on your resume, is that you’ll come across as egocentric and out of touch with professional norms. Don’t shoot yourself in the foot this way.

3.    Lastly, your resume shouldn’t be on a creative template or format.  Graphic designers are often guilty of this because they’re trying to show off their skills.  However, when you work with IT staffing agencies, they’ll want you to keep your resume in a simple, conventional format.  Your skills and experience should speak for themselves.  Don’t obfuscate them with a nonconventional format, border, etc.

IT Job Interviews for Introverts

Interviewing for IT jobs is pretty intimidating to most IT professionals.  Many will consult with their IT recruiters and IT staffing firms at length about what IT skills to highlight, what interpersonal skills to highlight, etc.  If you’re an introvert, interviewing for jobs can be even more nerve-wracking.  While you can prep with your technical recruiters and IT recruiting companies for any obvious questions your interviewer might ask, there is one aspect that you’ll have to prepare for on your own: small talk.

While this might literally seem like small thing, for some IT jobs it’s not.  IT staffing companies and IT recruiting agencies regularly are given jobs that require excellent customer service skills or the ability to work well with clients or a team.  If you can’t show some ability to do small talk, it could kill your candidacy.  Try to make sure you push yourself to do a bit of small talk (with energy and enthusiasm!) at the beginning and end of the interview.  These are the points you’ll make the biggest impression.  If you’re nervous, think about a few questions or topics that could be relevant: neighborhood restaurants near the office, seasonal activities, etc.  Keep it light and positive.  Your IT recruiting firms will be hearing great feedback in no time if you take these tips to your next interview!

 

An IT Job Interview Mistake You May Not Know You’re Making!

Great IT recruiters and IT staffing agencies help their candidates fully prepare for interviews.  And great IT professionals put a lot of work into prepping for interviews on their own.  But you can still miss landing the IT jobs, even if you prepare well.  One surprising reason that your IT staffing companies and technical recruiters might relay to you that you didn’t get the job: your answers sounded more like you were focused on saying what they wanted to hear than giving a truthful, genuine answer.

Why would this be a problem?  While taking your preparation and tips from IT recruiting firms seriously is important, interviewers really want to get a good sense of your technical proficiencies, experience, and personality.  If your answers sound like something your IT staffing firms and IT recruiting agencies helped you carefully construct to meet expectations, they will just frustrate the interviewer. You’ll be obstructing their hiring process, which will guarantee some bad feedback to your IT recruiting companies! To avoid this issue, focus on making sure your answers are honest and helpful, not just finessed and polished.

How to Impress Interviewers for IT Jobs

IT staffing companies and IT recruiters can usually help you prepare for your job interviews.  They can tell you what technologies to study up on, what experience the role requires, and probably what kind of personality would do well at the company.  But your technical recruiters and IT recruiting agencies can’t do one thing for you that is key in landing IT jobs: showing enthusiasm.

Why is showing enthusiasm so necessary in the interview process?  As most IT recruiting firms can attest, technical experience and skills are important, but so is interest in the position.  Motivated IT professionals achieve far more than unmotivated ones.  So even if your IT staffing firms don’t talk to you about it, make sure to show some obvious enthusiasm for the company and the role—it could be the difference between landing and losing the job.

Don’t Say This in IT Job Interviews!

Most IT recruiters and IT staffing firms would agree that it’s good to appear flexible in interviews for IT jobs.  If you’re too rigid on anything – timing, the kind of work culture you want, compensation, etc, it will pretty much guarantee that hiring managers will tell your technical recruiters and IT recruiting companies that you’re a bad fit.  You want to appear easy to work with and being too rigid definitely destroys that impression.  There is one thing you don’t want to be too flexible on either, though: the kind of work you’ll do.

It won’t reflect well on you (and thus frustrate your IT staffing agencies and IT recruiting firms) if you seem like you’re willing to do pretty much anything.  This makes you seem not only desperate, but probably not passionate or experienced enough as an IT professional.  The best IT professionals, the ones IT recruiting agencies have no problem placing, know what technologies they like to work with and don’t like to work with.  They have enough experience to know what they can do well—and what they can’t.  Good IT professionals also have a passion for the work they are really interested in.  They care about their work and the quality of it.  If you are too flexible, it will be hard for interviewers to assume any of this about you—never mind hire you!

How To Talk About Mistakes in IT Job Interviews

Most IT staffing companies and IT recruiters will suggest you prepare to tell interviewers about a mistake you’ve made in past IT jobs.  You don’t need your technical recruiters and IT staffing firms to tell you that you need to be strategic about answering this kind of question.  What may surprise you, however, is that you also need to be honest and take responsibility for the mistake when you describe it.

How can you do this gracefully and impress your interviewers and IT staffing agencies and IT recruiting companies?   Firstly, pick a mistake you truly learned from.  If you just made of mess of things, but don’t know how you can avoid it in the future, it’s not a good mistake to talk about.  Next, take full responsibility for the mistake.  It looks worse to suggest it was anybody’s fault but your own.  You’ll seem like less of a team player, which no hiring manager wants to deal with.  Lastly, be prepared to answer some follow-up questions about this mistake.  You can continue to emphasize what you’ve learned from the mistake and how you’ve grown, but don’t skirt any questions.  Honesty is key here! Use these tips and you’ll do well and impress your IT recruiting firms—maybe even land the job!

 

IT Job Interviews: They’re All About Timing!

When you’re prepping for interviews with your IT recruiters and IT staffing firms, you probably focus on what you’ll want to highlight for your interviewer.  Maybe your technical recruiters and IT recruiting agencies have told you to emphasize your experience with certain technologies or experience serving particular kinds of clients.  However, the successful candidates don’t just get IT jobs based on what they say. It’s also how long they take to say it.

Most IT staffing companies and IT recruiting firms that help their candidates prepare for interviews might not think to mention that keeping your answers succinct is important.  However, if you don’t budget your time well, or your take far too long to answer questions, you’ll definitely make a poor impression on your interviewer (and IT recruiting companies by extension).  Check with your IT staffing agencies about how long the interview is likely to be before you go.  If you know the hiring manager budgeted about an hour to meet with you, pace yourself accordingly.  Taking their time into consideration will make a very good impression!

 

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Ask Your IT Recruiters This Question, Not Your Interviewers

When you’re interviewing for IT jobs, there are questions you should be asking your IT recruiters and IT staffing firms and questions you can ask your interviewers.  Most of the time this difference is pretty obvious—or technical recruiters and IT staffing companies are quick to explain it to IT candidates.  However, there’s one question most IT professionals unfortunately ask their interviewers instead of their IT recruiting agencies: What are typical hours for this role?

This question seems harmless enough to ask interviewers.  It’s certainly something most candidates want to know.  However, IT recruiting firms and IT staffing agencies would much rather you ask them this question.  When you ask an interviewer what the hours are for a role, you may make them wonder if you’re not interested in working hard to succeed.  If you come across as too focused on hours, you could seem as though you’re interested in doing the bare minimum.  It could well make you lose out on the job— and frustrate your IT staffing companies!

 

Focus On The IT Job You’re Interviewing For

Sometimes your IT staffing firms and IT recruiting agencies might submit you for IT jobs that are a stepping stone towards what you actually want to do.  Maybe you need more experience with a certain kind of technology, or perhaps you need to get your foot in the door to great company.  Whatever the reason, there are times it certainly makes sense  to let your IT recruiting companies and IT staffing agencies set you up to interview for jobs a step below what you’d like.  It’s important to remember that while your IT recruiting firms might know that this job is a stepping stone for you, you don’t want to underscore this to your interviewer.

Sometimes interviewers are aware a job will be a stepping stone, and sometimes they’re not.  Even if you’re in the former situation, your IT recruiters and IT staffing companies will still want you to focus on the job you’re actually interviewing for.  A job may be a stepping stone for you, but you’re still being hired for a position the company needs you to excel in.  If you spend the interview focusing on the next role you’d rather occupy, you’ll definitely ruin your chances of getting hired.  Make sure your interviewer knows you are interested in this job and would want to succeed in it.  This will win you the job– whether you’re overqualified for it or not!

 

 

Don’t Ask This Question in IT Job Interviews

Most IT recruiters and IT staffing firms remind their candidates to ask questions in interviews for IT jobs.  As technical recruiters and IT staffing agencies will explain, you’ll quickly lose out on a job if you have no questions to ask.  There are quite a few questions that will leave a great impression on your interviewer and IT recruiting companies.  There are also plenty of questions that will be almost as damaging as not asking any questions at all.  One question your IT staffing companies and IT recruiting firms would never want you to ask in an interview is “What’s your turnover rate?”

Why is this question so problematic? While it’s perfectly legitimate to want to know if a company has a high turnover rate, it’s the kind of question you should be asking your IT recruiting agencies.  They will be able to get this answer for you without putting your potential new employer on the defensive.  Questions like this can come off as hostile and accusatory when you ask your interviewer directly.  Come up with a different question to ask your interviewer, one that won’t make them feel uncomfortable!