Standards are the building blocks of all business-client relationships. Your customers expect a certain level of professionalism and quality of service from you—as they should. And just as you hold your current employees to those standards, potential employees should be no different. An effective technical recruiter knows and understands this, and can thus create a streamlined recruitment strategy accordingly.
Unfortunately, quality technical recruiters are not a dime a dozen; in fact, they’re actually quite challenging to find in a market oversaturated with rookie recruiters. It takes patience, perseverance, and know-how to effectively scour the market for professionals you can trust with your staffing requirements and needs.
In this list, we discuss the traits that makeup an excellent technical recruiter and how to recruit developers of top caliber.
Technical Knowledge
Right off the bat, you need a recruiter who’s well-versed in industry-specific knowledge; someone who knows their jargon and job coverage like the back of their hand. With a smart recruiter on your side, you’ll know whether it’s a database engineer, software developer, or full stack manager you need and what job requirements will fit the bill.
Additionally, their technical knowledge will help you land a professional who’s brilliant and competent enough to be a real asset to your team. While academic track records build a good start, it takes both smarts and skills to become a sought-after tech expert. And on that note, an experienced and well-informed recruiter should be able to objectively sift through the prospects and find the one best suited for the position.
Market Insight
In most recruitment operations, especially for positions new to the organization, it’s common for organizations to just Google, copy-paste, and just slightly reword job descriptions—enough so that they don’t get pinged. And then they just pencil in the salary they’re willing to pay and put it up for anyone to—hopefully—stumble upon.
Unfortunately, this method is dated and frankly doesn’t give you the best results. You need someone with keen marketing insights who will help you know the most competitive salary rates there are to offer—because let’s face it; tech specialists won’t come cheap—while giving you the best possible bargain. They should also know where to find qualified candidates for the specific position you need to fill and should, with their knowledge, give you an approximation of how long it will take to fill said position.
Recruitment Experience
“Experience required,” doesn’t just mean someone who’s done similar work before; it denotes relevant work experience. The same rings true for your technical recruiter. You need to work with a company that’s had recruitment experience—preferably one that’s got results to back up their claims.
From the outside, recruitment looks like a pretty easy job. But the fact is that it takes skill to comb through applications and carefully consider their expertise, experience, attitude, intelligence, and professional requirements in regards to the position you’re looking to fill. Thankfully, weeding out the best and the brightest should ideally be a walk in the park for a seasoned expert recruiter.
Professionalism
The beauty of the concept of professionalism is that there is a general unspoken standard that society automatically holds people to. Despite the different dimensions of what can be considered “professional,” most of us can tell when someone’s being professional and when someone isn’t.
One such dimension of professionalism is the separation of business and pleasure. Ideally, the company you work with should be able to efficiently separate personal and business issues, effectively treating each client’s case as uniquely as possible.
You do not want to work with someone who brings with them the stress from their domestic troubles or their other clients to systematically dump on you. There’s workplace chatter, and then there’s unprofessional conversation. If all the whining he or she is doing is affecting your operations and productivity, then you obviously do not want to keep them around.
The technical recruiter should also respect your time and position by attending meetings on time and responding to your message punctually. You’ll understand a great portion of their work ethics with how they treat your schedule and how they respect you as a colleague.
And then there’s also the more technical side; the licensing and certifications. Unlike other factors, having a licensed recruiter is imperative. As professionals, they should be legally licensed in their respective field. The company they represent as a whole should also have the proper licenses to operate.
Communication Skills
In the field of human resource, effective communication is the Holy Grail. You need a technical recruiter that can operate both in mediated and face-to-face settings with ease and dexterity. They should also be able to strategically use their knowledge and jargon in such a way that they can filter through the applicants and find the ones who actually know what they’re talking about out of the ones who simply Googled buzzwords.
People come with barriers—some thicker than others—and a recruiter armed with excellent communication skills should be able to skillfully (and tactfully!) peel through those layers. Rapport is a recruiter’s way of getting through the tough, “strictly business” persona that every professional adopts when they come in for an interview.
The small talk that recruiters conduct is good for more than just filling up the silence. Firstly, it can act as a leeway into a topic that the applicant actually finds stimulating or interesting. Secondly, it humanizes the applicant as a person with hobbies, interests, emotions, etc.
In addition, you want someone who will represent your organization to outsiders—and your potential new staff member—in a positive light. Your technical recruiter will, for the time being, be an extension of your organization, and it’s crucial that they be able to convey decisions on your behalf in words that are in no way offensive or ambiguous.
Related Content: How Great Communication Can Lead to Great Software Development
Team Player
People skills don’t just come in handy when dealing with clients; it works for your company’s benefit as well—both internally and externally. Since they’re working on your behalf, your recruiter should communicate with you and involve you in the decision-making. Even though they’re essentially outsourced, it’s crucial that they integrate with your organization rather than operate all on their own.
There’s nothing wrong with a little initiative, and people who wait for you to tell them to move can also be quite disruptive to your business. However, that doesn’t mean that the recruiter should act without consulting or involving you in the planning and execution. Also, it’s going to be hard—if not downright impossible—to work with those who aren’t open to working with the team.
Read These 5 Technical Recruiter Tasks You Need to Outsource in 2018
Problem-Solving Skills
Even with the most extensive, exhaustive planning, problems can still arise. That’s why it’s important for a tech recruiter to have Grade-A problem-solving abilities.
In fact, instead of looking at the issue as a problem, seasoned recruiters treat it like a challenge that requires careful resolution. Normally, the hiring process comes with a number of common problems like insufficient applicants or a slew of them, scheduling conflicts, and last-minute emergencies. With an A1 recruiter, it’s safe to assume that they’ll come prepared.
Connections
Having a wide, extensive network pays off. This applies to any industry, but rings especially true for technical recruitment. A technical recruiter with lots of connections will most likely know who are the right people to reach and on what platforms. A veteran will also be able to tell who the best candidates are for the job just by looking at the job description or title.
Knowing a lot of people can make the hiring process easier, and not just in terms of bringing in a sufficient number of potential hires. The people they specifically reach out to will usually be of higher quality than the average candidates. They also have resource pools in professional communities—like LinkedIn, for instance—where other members can vouch for other people via recommendations and comments. They are therefore aware of the credentials, work ethics, and assets of each professional they choose to bring in.
Finding an exceptional technical recruiter is a must in order to find the best tech specialist for your organization. Remember; it takes one to know one. In a market that’s full of people who simply Google their buzzwords and rely mostly on their charm and wit, it pays to be keen. Sort out the good from the best by using these eight traits, and you’ll land yourself a real winner.
