Is recruiting really that hard …or are we just going about it the wrong way?

We have all heard there is a huge shortage of tech talent and there is little doubt that the numbers back that up. Just add up all the open positions with all the existing positions and compare that to the size of talent pool. Add to that the difficulty of importing talent and working across a dozen time zones. We have a problem!

It is also true though that there are many large tech shops out there that have butts in seats that spend more time in meetings than building tech that can change the world. They have excellent recruiting departments with full time staff whose only job is to put those butts in seats. They pay for sourcers, and recruiting firms. They wine and dine candidates and treat them special before they throw them in with 10,000 other employees and sign them up for 30 hours of meetings per week.

So what do we do in small startups to compete? Right now, we follow the same path with the same tired job descriptions, responsibilities, experience, job titles. We are for the most part just mini-me recruiting.

Small firms like ours are badgered by recruiters and outsource firms that promise “silicon valley talent at half the price”. I get emails and phone calls every single day. It seems recruiting firms have no trouble recruiting recruiters…There are firms that offer to interview for us, teach us how to say the right things, explain to us how dumb or incapable we are. They bring us folks to talk to and tell us just offer them 20% more, they will take the job. After all isn’t it just about butts in seats?

Enough!!!

Enough meaningless job descriptions that folks often do not even read, but just apply anyway even if their resume has no semblance of the right skills, experience or even interest in what we are doing.

Enough mercenaries who jump from job to job every few months looking for that next 5%.

Enough applicants who are more worried about the title than the job.

Enough self-described “Full Stack Engineers” who can be anything from web page implementers to highly skilled system engineers. The title is the same, the mileage may vary. Full stack engineers are “like a box of chocolates, you never know what you are going to get” !

If you are still with me, thank you! Rant complete.

There is indeed a shortage of tech folks out there, but the way we recruit is not helping matters.

We are small and growing. We are on a path to doing something important and needed. We care about privacy, security and identity.

We are looking for software engineers who care about what we are doing. We are looking for Software Engineers for whom tech is more than a job.

We are looking for engineers who understand the importance of collaboration and working it out on a whiteboard.

You can learn more about us at ?https://journeyid.com/

Here is a link to our Careers page https://journeyid.com/about/careers/

Ignore the titles and job descriptions. If you are a Software Engineer who cares about tech, stays up to date on tech tools, and wants to make a difference with what you do, apply.

If you are interested in the thrills and breadth of experience available at a startup, apply.

We are at an exciting place in our evolution as a company. We have products and more opportunities than we can count. What we are doing is important and we want the right people to take us to the next level. We are not looking for butts in seats, we are looking for engineers who want to be more than that.?