Things you wish your CEO knew about recruiting tech talent

It’s not a secret that ways of attracting top talent have changed over the years. It’s now a hot market for engineers and developers. With many companies competing to have a slice of talented tech professionals, standing out from the rest can prove to be an impossible task. Between the realms of overall experience and education, exceptional talent is rare but it’s out there.

The dawn of the internet age changed all of that, however, and it's never been more evident that tech recruiting is a very different animal. In fact, here are some of the tried-and-true tips to assist HR leaders and CEOs when recruiting tech talent.

Post the job in the right places

There are over 3,000 platforms across 80 countries where HR managers and recruiters can post the open jobs. Technology has helped make the posting of jobs easier. Among all the sources, the most competitive companies post their open job positions at the local universities or college job boards. Most graduates including recent graduates and alumni tend to keep in touch and pay attention to their alumni network. This is because most graduates consider their former places of education as reliable and safe sources. For you to take full advantage, start by a simple conversation and connect with the school’s career center and alumni relations department.

Throw a party

You can host an event that is solely meant for tech professionals and entrepreneurs. Sharing expertise, experiences, innovations, and ideas with the community. This strategy will help you identify passionate tech professionals in the industry that may want to join your organization.

Ensure that corporate social responsibility and culture are included in the company website and job description

It is estimated that Millennials will make up over 75% of the entire workforce by the year 2025. Therefore, it will be very important for different brands to show their genuine (CSR) Corporate social responsibility and culture within the company website and job posting. The Millennial generation has been seen to care more about social justice and will want to work and dedicate their effort and time to companies that support values and personal preferences.

You Can Start with Only One

As a CEO or HR Partner, you most likely know that getting the first contact with tech talent is usually the hardest task. This means that you have to woo them to come and join your team with everything your business can offer. For example, you can woo them in by providing free breakfast, lunch, and dinner. You can also provide flexible days off among many other different benefits that employees enjoy when they join your company. Basically, you should create an ideal working atmosphere.

Paper Isn't Everything

In most cases, recruiting is about qualifications, references, and testimonials. In recruiting tech professionals, the best candidates might never have finished a college degree, might never have worked for an actual company, and might be significantly younger than you expect. In this field, degrees are a lot less important than they usually are.

The nation is your talent pool

The best tech talent might not be in your city. Or even your country. Major tech companies take their search for the best and brightest to the world, and often find their new stars in countries where English is not the first language.

Tech stars want different things

If you're used to recruiting for traditional fields, you may find it very hard to switch to a tech recruiting role, simply because the candidates are so different to everything you're used to. We all know what drives sales teams and business leaders, but the things that technology superstars want usually have nothing to do with power or status, or most of the other things you're used to using as an incentive to sign the ideal candidate.

You've got lots of competition

True stars in the tech industry are a lot like top athletes: they get plenty of offers, and have lots to choose from. Your offers, company culture and packages need to take that into account, and you need to create offers that they literally can't refuse. Because if you don't, someone else will.

They're here for a good time, not a long time

Tech positions are usually the realm of the younger recruit, but we already know that age has nothing to do with skill in this particular field. What you also need to realize is that tech superstars expect to jump ship every few years, and they, and their peers, see each job as a limited stepping stone to the next thing. You're not hiring someone that you will necessarily be training and grooming for bigger and better things. You want people who can hit the ground running immediately, and who will provide value for as long as they stay with your organization.

Money Talks

Very often, companies try to entice top talent with promises of growth opportunities, advancement, long term, down the road stock options and other benefits that offset the actual cash cost to company of a particular candidate.

Because tech recruits are so different, because they have so many options, and because they're probably not planning to stick around for twenty years to work their way up to a corner office, very often, money is the only edge you'll have against the competition. While culture matters, and there needs to be a good fit all round, if you're not willing to pay top dollar for top talent, someone else will. It is that simple.

In Conclusion

Technology is not going anywhere. If anything, it's going to permeate more areas of business, and become a more crucial part of our world over the coming years and decades.

If you want to stay ahead of the curve, you're going to need to recruit great people in this area, and that means changing the way you think about recruiting, if only for this particular group of people.

Because until coding becomes a standard business skill, and until we all know how to work digital miracles, these are still the people that hold our bits and bytes in the palms of their hands.

About nexus IT group

Those of us that call nexus IT group home know it is an influential and energetic center of motivated individuals with a passion to serve. The recent headlines touting our progressive culture have come as no surprise. We recognize the caliber of business partners, leadership, and industry knowledge that define nexus IT group. We work and live it every day.

However, a resounding, "I didn't realize that" echoes through our hallways as newcomers learn more and engage with our culture. And those still on the outside have yet to discover all that we have to offer. 

nexus IT group is a results-driven team at the intersection of technology + recruiting. We provide tech culture assessments, IT retained search, and tech staffing services in the enterprise, medium, and start-up space.

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