Remote DevOps engineer positions - what should you expect in hiring and applying

Note: Currently FirstBlood Technologies has one open position for Angular frontend developer. If you are a frontend wizard, please apply.

Introduction

I finished a hiring round for a remote DevOps engineer position at FirstBlood Technologies, an Esports tournament platform. DevOps, or Development/Operations is the old sysadmin equivalent role in companies. But instead of focusing on maintaining physical servers, it focuses on process and quality automation.

The hiring was primarily conducted through StackOverflow Talent service. During the hiring process, I extensively collected statistics about the candidates and I share them here. If you are applying or hiring for DevOps positions, you should find this post helpful. 

Why remote software development is the future?

FirstBlood is a fully remote company and was already one before pandemics. Our remote positions are worldwide, though somewhat timezone constrained. Because we hire globally, we can hire from a much larger talent pool a company, yielding to a high volume of applications. 

A remote open position on StackOverflow Talent gets applications in hundreds, not in dozens that one would get locally. This allows us to have good data about software developer expectations globally. Based on good data, we can make fairer and more objective hiring decisions. I am breaking down this data for you in this post later.

Suggestion for candidates

So you want to become a rock star developer? Here are some tips to get started.

• Participate in local meetups to polish your communication skills and learn about the industry trends
• Have a blog or portfolio website to demonstrate one’s abilities and passion for the industry
• Regularly share technical posts or tweets where you help yourself and others who are developing skills in your favourite technologies
• Be active in open source projects, make issues, comments, pull requests
• Be active on StackOverflow and help others 

We are constantly hiring new people to join FirstBlood and encourage you to reapply in future. Please follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook and Twitter for new career opportunities Also sign up on our website and join the conversation in Discord as we are constantly sourcing talent from enthusiasts in our online community, especially is you are a gamer fanatic. 

What makes a good software developer candidate 

A good candidate is one that outcompetes his rivals with more realistic salary expectations, more experience in the industry and a better fit for skillset needed in the position. Especially for remote positions, talented people are willing to have a lower salary in the exchange of freedom and extra time working remotely gives for you. 

When hiring globally, it is ungentlemanly but prudent to ask the salary expectations upfront. We have had candidates. with the same skill level, applying with a salary expectation of $1,000 - $20,000. The upper range is way too expensive for the company, so unfortunately one cannot afford these candidates.  

DevOps position hiring funnel

A total of 5 candidates out of 203 progressed to interviews. As the interviewed candidates were very strong, the deciding factor was good communication skills, prior experience with our technology stack and motivation to work in FirstBlood. 

We received 203 applications. One candidate (0.5%) got hired. Candidates were sourced from StackOverflow Talent service.

For the comparison Harvard college acceptance rate is 4%, New York Times intern is on the same level of 0.5% and an astronaut is 0.04%

Country breakdown of candidates

As this is a remote position, we got candidates all over the world. 

Above is the breakdown of top countries. Because the application was English, you get fewer candidates from countries where English as a secondary language is not well-established. Indian has always dominated as the source of applications for all of our positions, as it hosts the majority of English speaking people on this planet. Note that because of the free text input on the application form, the USA is twice there.

Experience and salary expectations

As we were hiring to a remote position, we got candidates all over the world. The salary requirements varied greatly. Below you can see how salary and experience levels compare to between all the candidates and those who were selected to the interview.

Difference between interviewed candidates and all applicants

We asked some particular questions from the candidates we have found are good indicators if they have enthusiasm for their work in software development. Below is a comparison of how interviewed candidates demonstrated more aptitude towards the role, by having more experience and being more active in software developer communities.

Motivation

What ticks the people? Here is what the candidates told motivates them most.

Technology knowledge

Below is the breakdown of how candidates reported they are familiar with the technologies used in the position being hired in. Note that this does not represent the general DevOps technology popularity, but only the set we asked candidates to indicate if they have experience for. 

Kubernetes and Docker are air for DevOps. Ansible is the most popular deployment automation tool.

Video games

As the application was for a position in a video game industry, we also asked what kind of games candidates were playing. 100% of candidates told they were playing some game.