Tag Archives: IT recruiting

Review:”Technical Recruiting Success for IT Firms”

AVID Technical Resources reviews “Technical Recruiting Success for IT Firms” by Dawson.  In the book, Dawson speaks from his high level of success in technical recruiting, and his perspective as a technical staffing consultant. His recruiting techniques involve IT staffing secrets he has identified and developed over time. His check lists offer ways to run through a list of tips, and apply them to each IT candidate, leading to higher placement rates and higher chances of turning technical candidates into working technical contractors.

One challenge a technical hiring manager may face is difficulties maintaining exclusivity. In the competitive IT recruiting industry, other IT staffing agencies may seek to interfere with a headhunter’s exclusive job coverage. Dawson reveals techniques for protecting those exclusive relationships, and turning them into solid placements for good IT professionals. He also covers the art of negotiating rates, a key factor for a technical candidate’s contentment and likelihood of staying in a role on a long-term contract. He closes with tips on managing references, and interview strategies. Pick up this book for a thorough look at a technical recruiters’ task list!

Review: “Trend Watch List Extended – Your World In Their Hands – Converging Trends Driving Your Talent Strategy”

Talent professionals employed in the technical recruiting industry will find Vanderbilt’s book on important employment trends helpful for placing technical candidates in IT jobs that offer a great skill & culture match to the employer. “Trend Watch List Extended – Your World In Their Hands – Converging Trends Driving Your Talent Strategy” discusses how technical headhunters at AVID Technical Resources and other technical staffing firms can best capitalize on the IT recruities strategies that maximize the broader trends being reflected in the job market as a whole.

According to Vanderbilt, workforce strategies centered around changes in the job markets are some of the most key areas that technical staffers can focus in on to increase their performance levels. Vanderbilt terms the intense competition for job placement capital the “staffing war”. She reveals the tactics top IT staffing agencies will need to acquired to acquire and maintain a competitive edge. Recruiting companies that want to stay abreast of the latest technical recruiting trends will want to grab a copy of this book.

Review:”Technical Screening – SQL Server Developer”

Obi Ogbanufe’s Technical Screening – SQL Server Developer helps technical recruiters develop a more efficient technical screening process for vetting candidates. The book discusses how to compare a technical candidate’s skills and background to the technical role requirements, and use cues in a candidates’ technical resume to best determine a match. One challenge Ogbanufe identifies for the technical recruiter is the issue of appearing confrontational when asking screening questions that ultimately determine whether or not the recruiter will get an interview with the employer. The nature of these types of questions is that they weed out the weaker links from the stronger ones, so offending a candidate accidentally by touching on a candidate’s technical limitations during the screening process is an easy mistake to make. The trick to preventing stepped-on feelings in technical candidates during the screening process is a technical recruiters’ savvy and diplomacy when delivering the questions. This book enumerates strategies and tactics to make conversations with the best technical candidates, as well as the not-so-best go smoothly. Technical Staffing Agencies can take cues from these concepts to make interviewing technical candidates a breeze.

The book also tackles the issue of efficiency. The IT Staffing Firm that can land more technical candidates in less time without sacraficing quality in the skills of the candidates submitted will make better use of company time than less-efficient IT Staffing Agencies. Technical Staffing Firms know that time is money, so time well spent means happy technical recruiters and technical hiring managers. If technical headhunting is a game of minutes, Ogbanufe shows how to best track those minutes to add up to hours that count. Technical recruiting companies will find tips in this book on understanding the job description of the SQL Server Developer more fully in order to best understand the type of technical candidate best suited to filling the role, and a guide to the technical terms most common in job descriptions for these roles. Finally, the book delves into the art  and science of building relationships with these technical candidates, and keeping the communication lines open. That’s something that anyone in technical recruitment will find valuable!

Review: “The Google Resume: How to Prepare for a Career and Land a Job at Apple, Microsoft, Google, or any Top Tech Company”

Technical recruiters know that a technical candidates’ resume speaks volumes.  Thus the ability to separate power resumes from weaker ones is key. IT recruiters who are familiar with The Google Resume will be doing themselves  favor when is comes to identifying strong technical resumes (and the candidates behind the resume). Gayle McDowell instructs technical candidates on the type of job experience, educational background and extra-curriculars that makes a candidate top tech material. Recruiters at IT staffing agencies can use the same information to identify the type of winning technical resumes that grab the attention of the best technical corporate employers, like Apple or Google.

IT recruiting companies looking to hone their technical staffing skills will find this book useful. McDowell’s advice is more than opinion.  As a former member of Google’s hiring committee, he’s not bluffing when he claims to know what top tech firms demand in a technical candidate.  The book’s behind-the-scenes look at tech companies gives technical recruiters a better idea of how to make a good fit between a technical candidate and employer based on knowledge of various tech firm’s corporate environment. Reading this book will make the technical recruiters at any IT staffing firm more competitive, and more successful at what they do: finding the right IT consultants.

Review, “IT Made E-Z”

Starting out, the technical recruiter needs to learn tools to to increase sales & placements. Patrick Bowman’s book, IT Made E-Z, guides the new technical recruiter through the process of maximizing technical recruiting techniques. Bowman reveals tips for technical interviewing efficiency, and making a partnership between clients and the technical recruiting team. He covers specific technologies in-depth, so that the young salesperson can become familiar with technical terms, technical job descriptions, and how to identify varying levels of competence in technical skills when interviewing IT Candidates.

According to Bowman, part of success in the IT Staffing industry depends on the technical recruiter’s ability to add personal knowledge to the information the client company provides. This comes down to understanding fully what the client company is looking for, beyond the standard HR description of a technical role. There’s an art to extracting the full description of what a client is seeking, since technical skills may cover 80% of the total picture the client seeks, but the remaining 20% may involve other factors. Getting inside the head of the vendor is what will make an IT staffing firm more successful than competitors at making placements that last the length of the contract and are a good fit.

Personality Testing for Technical Recruiters & Employers

Technical recruiters at AVID Technical Resources know that personality determines more than just what movies you like or what type of music you prefer. Personality tests, possibly the most famous of which is the MBTI test; the Myers Briggs Personality Test, allow employers to predict a candidate’s potential fit for a specific job using their psychological profile. It might seem counter-intuitive at first — how can something as subjective as a personality shed light on something as fairly objective, like how much a candidate’s level of experience qualifies him or her to perform specific duties? While a personality test won’t tell technical recruiters or employers how well a candidate with Java on his or her resume can actually perform when the timer or the pressure’s on, it can reveal the changes of a good candidate/employer fit.

Fit matters to employers because they’re invested in a specific company, with a unique culture and coworkers who belong to a team. A resume tells technical recruiters and technical employers part of the story, but careful employers want the other piece of the puzzle to be in place also – fit. Anything that’s important to an employer is also important to a staffing firm partnering with that employer. A technical candidate may see a technical job opportunity as a chance to reach career goals, or stay within an industry he or she likes. It may even be a chance to switch industries into an area that interests the candidate. In this way, the candidate may be the victim of a little tunnel vision, failing to take into consideration the big picture for the long term. The right job is more than an opportunity, or the label of the ‘right’ industry for the technical job-seeker. It’s the chance to take a first step up a long ladder of rewarding challenges, and if personality conflicts are going to do in the candidate from the start, no one wins. Employers need to reinstate their search for technical candidate with the right technical skills to fulfill the demands of the role their company needs, and and technical candidates are on the job search again. A better approach is to acknowledge that personality plays a big role in a company – how good of a team player a technical candidate has the potential to be depends to a large degree on the amount of common ground coworkers share.

Technical candidates may be asked to take a personality test for an interview, but they may find taking one on their own just as useful for their job search as it is to employers. A personality test can give a candidate data regarding his or her levels of extroversion versus introversion, and open up job possibilities not previously considered. It could give a candidate clues on which industries are likely to be the best match, or what personality types he or she should look for in potential coworkers when interviewing. You know what? Those Myers and Briggs…they may have been on to something.

Review: Technology Made Simple for the Technical Recruiter

Technical Recruiters will find “Technology Made Simple for the Technical Recruiter: A Technical Skills Primer” by Obi Ogbanufe helpful for developing recruiting strategies and tech skills. AVID Staffing Firm employs IT Recruiting techniques covered by Ogbanufe in her book. Details she delves into include basic programming terms, networking tips, & operating system/network vocab. She even instructs on the art of knowing when a prospective candidate seems to be claiming levels of experience above what’s  present in their work background.

IT Staffing Agencies like AVID Technical Resources will do well to take note of Ogbanufe’s insight and advice. Her experience and familiarity with the topic can be of value to any technical recruiter looking to brush up on a rookie skillset, or polish a seasoned technical career. In an industry that changes at lightning speed, keeping on top of acronyms is key for technical recruiters, and they’ll find the latest and most thorough information in this book. Pick up a copy of ” Technology Made Simple for the Technical Recruiter: A Technical Skills Primer” today, and get smarter!

Skilled Tech Positions In Demand

Company demand for highly skilled tech workers has been increasing since the start of 2012. IT job candidates seeking higher salaries than they were able to land during the worst of the recession are likely to have more options now. Although the recession may not officially be over, demand for high-tech skills have significantly increased. Tech-savvy candidates considering a IT job change should take note of the professional climate, and feel confident about testing the technical job-search waters.

Technical professionals already on a job search should expect shorter search periods, faster placement, and potentially, multiple offers. AVID’s technical recruiters have connections to Boston’s top tech firms, the IT recruiters are plugged in to the most current tech opportunities available. Any skilled tech professional can connect with an AVID IT recruiter by picking up the phone to start a relationship with a recruiter that could be the entry into a new job, or tech career path.  Contact one of the fastest growing IT recruiting companies today!

Skill Testing Online

Any job-seeker who has interviewed with a staffing firm before has probably taken online skill-testing. Staffing firms can purchase online skill tests from test providers like Proveit, Eskill, or Brainbench, which offers testing for candidates in a range of skill sets. Technical test topics include Java, Dreamweaver, and ColdFusion MX. These resources can be useful for technical recruiters seeking to place candidates in roles that require proficiency in these areas. Offered in multiple languages, and in options including in-office testing or remote, skill assessments can be useful purchases for staffing firms.

For candidates, online skill testing can be just as helpful. Rather than purchasing access to skill assessments as a company would, job-seekers can log into free assessment providers like Smarterer to test their abilities in skills commonly sought by employers, such as Excel aptitude, Powerpoint skills, and more.  Candidates who have invested time building relevant industry skills have an opportunity to showcase their skills through an assigned score, comparing them to other test-takers. High-scoring testers may want to display their scores on their Linkedin profiles, or send them to recruiters as a resume supplement. Got Skills? Show them off!

Women in Tech

The tech industry tends to be one that is fairly male-dominated. Ask a technical recruiter how many men versus women he or she speaks to in a day when seeking to fill a Java or QA role, and you will tend not to hear the odds stacked in favor of the ladies. While this issue would have been a pet project for Third-Wave Feminists in the 1990’s[1], in the 21st century, enough equal opportunity exists in the work force these days that job types or industries dominated by one gender tends to be by employee choice (arguably). Employers with an eye for diversity may be either actively looking for employees that break with the status quo, or have an ongoing wish list to diversify if the right candidate appears.

An AOL jobs article, for example, cites the IT  job title ‘IT Network Engineer’ as one in which women consistently make 5% more than men when filling the role[2]. Their statistics, below, show that this technical position is on average a male-dominated role by 95%, with only 5% of women choosing to pursue the title, despite the fact that employers offer a compensation incentive for females.

According to Neelie Kroes, VP for the digital agenda at the European Commission, that should change. “It’s a digital world now and the digital world is for everyone. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise,” she advised[3]. Certainly, in the present professional environment, it would be hard to make the case that there is a strong contingent of women trying to break into technical roles and balance out the gender inequality. It’s more socially acceptable at the moment for women to express interest in industries where they tend to hired either more or less equally, or more than men.

If real change is going to take place in the percentage of females willing to enter the tech field, it needs to start at the interest level. Girls in high school are generally not being groomed to be tech-proficient, or encouraged to familiarize themselves with the opportunities and salary levels they could enjoy if they pursued a course of education that would qualify them for roles like the IT Network Engineer. Education initiatives like this could either increase the pool of female talent entering the tech workforce and energize the economy, or it could just prove that the effort to equalize everything may be a little unrealist. It’s possible that in general, women may tend to find more career satisfaction in non-tech roles, and maybe that’s just one of the many differences that will always exist between genders.

Sources:

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feminist_movement

[2] http://jobs.aol.com/articles/2012/03/01/jobs-where-women-earn-more-than-men

[3] http://www.womenintechnology.co.uk/news/make-technology-more-inclusive-for-women-mep-says-news-801313746