Tag Archives: IT recruiting

How to Source for Recruitment with Talent Management Systems

Technical recruiters who have been involved in the information technology and staffing industry for a while will be able to attest to the transformations that have taken place in the technical job landscape, and the huge increases in employer demand for IT roles. IT recruiting companies that understand the evolution of best practices in the IT recruiting world, and employ best practice strategies, have emerged as cutting-edge forces in the current workforce environment. Technical hiring managers who recognize IT talent management as the core business function that it is in today’s high-activity technical job market will serve as a valuable resource to other IT staffers for that reason.

Technical recruiters who stay on the edge of recruitment technology trends are in the best position to take advantage of them before they become common knowledge, and perform on a more competitive level than other technical staffers. Ultimately, the technical recruiters who work for IT staffing agencies are one of the best tools employers have at their disposal when developing talent and a solid workforce. IT staffing firms who develop a global perspective on the IT staffing industry, and hiring managers in the information technology industry will stay current and relevant.

Review: “Recruiting and Retaining Employees for Dummies”

IT staffers starting out or looking to polish an already-established technical recruiting career will want to pick up a copy of Recruiting and Retaining Employees for Dummies. Even seasoned IT headhunters working at IT staffing firms with plentiful resources will love Manning’s book – not because it’s actually for dummies, as the playful title references – but because it’s written as the author intended, to be straightforward, free from unnecessary detail, and an easy read for professionals without a lot of free time. Part one of the book includes the term ‘recruiting wars’ in the title – referring to the high levels of competition that exist between IT staffing firms. Becoming competititive in the information technology industy involves mastering steps: first, a solid grasp on the basics, followed by strong lead-generation skills. Finally, the active IT staffer will want to develop his or her recruiting plan based on the goals of short placement periods and low cost.

The book opens with an in-depth look at benefits. Presenting company benefits verbally to technical candidates, negotiating with companies to get technical consultants the kinds of benefits they expect for every level of experience an IT staffer manages, and maximizing the benefits you are able to land for candidates are key skills that will advance a technical recruiter’s placement rates and career trajectory. As an IT staffing firm offering excellent benefits, AVID Technical Resources understands the importance of providing benefits packages that make for happy employees, as well as insuring that candidates our IT headhunters place offer good benefits through either the placement company, our firm as staffers, or a combination of both. Grab a copy of this book today to quickly increase your IT recruiting success quotient.

Review: “The Inside Scoop: Recruiters Share Their Tips on Job Search Success with College Students”

College students or recent grads considering a career in technical recruiting will want to pick up a copy of The Inside Scoop: Recruiters Share Their Tips on Job Search Success with College Students. A lucrative career in the IT staffing industry can be a great career option for motivated young professionals. As Cunningham points out, an internship at an IT recruiting firm can be a great way to learn more about the industry. Since a big part of IT recruiting is understanding the qualifications for the job, and giving IT contractors advice that may give them a better chance for an open IT job than other IT consultants competing for the job, this book can be very helpful for the novice IT recruiter looking to learn the basics of the job.

As any IT recruiter working in the information technology industry knows, a lot of the work IT staffing firms engage in happens behind the scenes. Chapters covering the best techniques for writing resumes and cover letters can serve IT hiring managers well, so that they are both familiar with these skills themselves but also able to coach IT contractors on those fronts. Interview questions common to various technical positions and dressing to make a good impression are key topics for any IT recruiter to make sure his or her candidate is well-versed in before an interview.  As any successful interviewer knows, the key to turning the interview opportunity into an offer is the ability to close well. A strong thank you note, negotiating skills, and conveying positive qualities through non-verbal cues all play  a key role in the successful interviewer’s arsenal. Technical consultants and IT recruiters will find this book to be a practical guide to success in the information technology industry.

Review: “Recruiters On Recruiting: Tell Me About Yourself: Conversations About Life, Love And Work”

Recruiters On Recruiting: Tell Me About Yourself: Conversations About Life, Love And Work gives IT staffers and those working outside of the technical recruiting industry a look at the work of IT staffing. Based on interviews with top-performing Silicon Valley technical recruiters, the book reveals tips for optimizing the income potential of the career, and quotes recommendations coming directly from IT headhunters. Technical candidates currently on a hunt for an IT job will also find valuable advice on conducting a successful search, crafting a solid technical resume, and interviewing skills that close the deal.

Technical candidates reading this book who may be familiar with the with IT staffing industry purely from working with technical recruiters in the past, and maybe getting placed into contract or contract-to-perm IT job positions may be surprised to learn about how wide the range is for the variety of job types a technical recruiter will handle. Not only do technical staffing firms place temporary contract positions, they offer direct hire opportunities, executive search options and vendor on premise arrangements.

Review: “Top Secret Executive Resumes: Create the Perfect Resume for the Best Top-Level Positions”

A technical candidate who turns to a technical staffing firm like AVID Technical Resources for executive search purposes will want to take a look at Top Secret Executive Resumes: Create the Perfect Resume for the Best Top-Level Positions. In this book, Provenzano culls from over 20 years of experience as a certified resume writer to delve into the elements that go into a high-level technical executive’s resume. Technical Recruiters are well-versed in the art of editing technical resumes in order to highlight past technical experience and skills in a way that markets and develops their skill-set for the highest visibility level for a technical employer’s critical eye.

Provenzano inserts over 150 pages of genuinue executive-level resumes in the book for prime examples of what technical candidates want to use as a model when crafting a technical resume. IT staffing firms looking to keep a competitive edge will find the insights useful for technical candidates, and IT staffers focused on providing solid resume-editing advice. The book also offers before and after examples to display the kind of transformation a technical resume can undergo to bring simply stating technical skill-sets to selling technical employers on their specific value to their company and open position.

Review: “Demystifying Technical Training: Partnership, Strategy, and Execution”

A valuable resource for technical recruiters, “Demystifying Technical Training: Partnership, Strategy, and Execution” has the stated purpose of demystifying technical training. Maximizing the potential of technical candidates involves playing up their strenths, and helping them to bolster their weaknesses, making them more marketable in the high-tech world. According to Combs, a key component of a solid technical training strategy involves an accurate assessment of a candidate’s technical strengths and weaknesses. It is only with this information that an IT staffer will be best equipped to tailor a technical training strategy to best capitalize on a technical candidate’s talents.

One formula Combs identifies that IT headhunters and other professionals working at technical staffing firms will find invaluable is her identification of predictable patterns in technical training availability within companies. For this reason, technical candidates in a position of employment seeking to make a move can take advantage of these training cycles in order to best position themselves to make an advantageous move into their next role. IT staffing firms who can encourage this type of strategy will be best placed to capitalize on it.

Review: “Talent Management Systems: Best Practices in Technology Solutions for Recruitment, Retention and Workforce Planning”

“Talent Management Systems: Best Practices in Technology Solutions for Recruitment, Retention and Workforce Planning” discusses how web-based applications have revolutionized the job search, talent acquisition process, and human capital management. Cutting-edge practices discussed in the book will assist IT recruiters and other proffessionals in the technical recruiting industry in using technogy to their advantage when pursuing potential candidates. IT staffers need to step up their web-based recruiting tactics in view of a continually advancing technological landscape.

Schweyer’s expertise in recruitment technology can benefit technical hiring managers working for an IT staffing firm in the technical recruiting industry. Best practices, according to him, include understanding that in a knowledge-based economy, what a technical employer values most in an IT candidate is the individual’s information reserves. A quality so qualitative cannot fully be captured on a resume, which is where an IT staffer’s specialized knowledge value comes into play: assessing those skills, and separating the technical candidate as a fully-rounded worker from his or her accomplishments. As professionals working in a fast-growing industry, IT headhunters can’t afford not to be up-to-date on the latest technological recruiting practices.

Review: “Ace the IT Interview”

Any technical recruiter who has guided a technical candidate through the interviewing process for an open IT job knows the importance of interviewing skills. This book serves as a practical guide to landing IT jobs, which is a skill an IT staffer wants to be well-versed in for the purposes of best advising technical candidates. The book provides a bird’s eye view of the IT interviewing process, and how technical employers view candidates and their answers to standard interview questions.

Accordingly, Moreira discusses the power of first impressions, and how technical candidates can make the best possible fist impression. The ability to anticipate re-occuring interview questions is a key skill for a good interviewing impression, so a portion of this book is devoted to key technical interview questions. Any technical employer will be interviewing multiple candidates for any open IT position, so the next step for a candidate who has mastered the skills of fitting in, and presenting according to expectations, is to go beyond that level of interview performance and stand out from the competition in a positive way — a way that will make him or her memorable in an interviewer’s mind. IT staffers will find this book invaluable for giving technical candidates the best possible interview prep for closing an IT job that will last till contract end, or be extended.

Review: “Invaluable Knowledge: Securing Your Company’s Technical Expertise”

“Invaluable Knowledge: Securing Your Company’s Technical Expertise” focuses on the retention side of technical talent management. Any technical recruiter who has had the experience of placing a highly qualified technical candidate in a high-paying IT job, only to have the candidate leave the position prior to the contract end for a higher salary, more attractive benefits, or any other incentive elsewhere, knows the importance of talent retention. The skill and financial loss creates a void, and an IT staffer who can develop skills to prevent this scenario will have higher success rates than his or her peers in the recruiting industry.

According to Rothwell, one of the secrets to getting top talent in the first place is to agressively recruit from competitors. Once that process is underway or complete, the next essential step to ensure a placement in an IT job is careful candidate grooming. The technical candidate must be technically proficient at a minimum — the rest: killer interviewing skills, attention to dress code, culture fit, language use, and more are the responsibility of the technical recruiter’s coaching right up until the point a candidate enters an interview. Without thorough prepping, an IT staffing expert is setting up his or her candidate to either fail, or miss his or her potential by a slim margin. No technical staffer can afford either scenario, so a careful read of this book will equip the competitive IT staffer for top sales performance.

Technical Recruiters, Are You Getting Enough Sleep?

Pritchard’s “101 Strategies for Recruiting Success: Where, When, and How to Find the Right People Every Time” discusses the technical hiring process, and how best to manage the process of finding and keeping great technical candidates. Any technical headhunter knows that the longer a top technical candidate stays in a contract, the better it is for the IT staffing firm that handled the placement, so the skills to keeping skilled people happy in their position is key. Pritchard identifies two facets to this skillset: a common sense approach and a corporate one. Recruiting assignments can present challenges, and as a former recruiting professionals with over 20 years of experience, this book offers solutions for broaching them.

Topics covered include: techniques for attracting top technical talent, how to engage in proactive IT staffing, how to recruit with diversity in mind, how to match client company needs with technical candidate qualifications, and retention techniques. As noted in the book, retention involves the art of maintaining a strong relationship with a technical candidate throughout the full period of the contract. Allowing the relationship to slip once the contracts are in and the candidate has put in a first day or a first week could be the difference between keeping the candidate for the length of the contract and having them seek employment elsewhere. Learn about contentment in a technical candidate, and how to be instrumental in maintaining it in this insightful read.