It's never been harder to cut through the noise and get candidates' attention. Read this article to learn how to become THE recruiter who IT candidates will respect.
Who Is A Technical Recruiter?
A technical recruiter is an HR expert specializing in sourcing and hiring for roles most commonly in the field of IT.
Some of these roles include software developers, DevOps, system administrators, data science specialists, project and product managers, and even roles within the field of digital marketing.
Why Are Technical Recruiters Important?
Hiring technical staff has become increasingly difficult. According to Stack Overflow, the employment rate with developers is 87%.
For some more concerning data, there are five open jobs for a single software developer. And the demand for developers will increase by 22% by 2022.
There will be a huge demand for developers and technical roles and not enough people to fill these positions.
This is where you, a technical recruiter, come in place! with knowledge and tactics specific to hiring professionals in IT.
But Why Do Developers Dislike Recruiters?!
Based on our countless discussions with developers over the years, there are these reasons why they look down at recruiters:
- Recruiters don’t have knowledge about the technology.
- Recruiters don’t disclose enough information about the position/company.
- Recruiters send out mass emails/InMails with little to no personalization.
- Recruiters don’t research the candidate (their skills or location).
Even though there's this clash between software developers and IT recruiters, I believe you can become THE recruiter who the IT candidates will respect.
First, let's look at...
What Are The Characteristics Of A Great Technical Recruiter?
With several junior recruiters who joined our recent seminar, we have identified the traits of a great technical recruiter.
While they have a few things in common with generalist recruiters, technical recruiters have a set of unique characteristics that separate them from the bulk of other HR staff.
1. They Have Great Communication Skills
According to research, only 25% of developers spend any time looking for new work – with the rest being uninterested or passive candidates. Communication is the key difference between being seen as a knowledgeable HR expert and someone who just learned the difference between frontend and backend.
2. They Know The IT Roles They Recruit For
One of the most annoying things for developers is when the recruiter does not know about the role he/she is hiring for.
3. They Know The Technologies Very Well
Understand the difference between different coding languages, list the right tools and frameworks for the job and ask for the right amount of experience (don’t demand eight years of experience in a framework that’s existed for only four).
Recruiters appear clueless in front of candidates, who quickly become uninterested in the role.
As a technical recruiter, you should always try to stay in the loop and be aware of the latest technologies.
4. They Are Confident When Engaging With IT Candidates
Confidence is the foundation of success. The more they know about technologies, the more confident they become.
5. They Can Personalize A Message To A Developer
This is super-important. Who wants to receive a generic message, “Dear Mr/Mrs,” right? Furthermore, a recruiter needs to personalize the message based on what can be found on the candidate’s GitHub profile, for example.
6. They Are Great Researchers
Candidates in technical roles get a lot of messages from recruiters who want to hire them. To stand out from the rest of the crowd, do some digging, and find out more about the potential candidate.
What do they excel at? What’s their most significant achievement? What kind of languages/tools/frameworks do they like? By doing research and sending out highly targeted messages, you’ll stand out from a sea of spam in their inboxes.
7. They Are Great At Sales
Here’s the deal – people in IT roles are willing to consider different positions if the recruiter gives them something to consider. In a lot of pitches by tech recruiters, they leave very little data about the position, the company, the hours, the location, the salary. Which is why it’s a massive loss of time for potential applicants.
While it’s impossible to disclose all relevant information, try to reveal enough to inform candidates and spark their interest to apply.
8. They Can Cold Call With Confidence
We see great recruiters picking up a phone frequently. 20-30 successful calls a day with ease.
This is only possible if the recruiter is confident, knows the technologies, and can cold call like a salesman.
9. They Follow Up. Always.
Persistence is one of the most essential characteristics of successful sales representatives. Following up with prospects will significantly increase the open rates and reply rates of cold email campaigns.
Nowadays, our inboxes are cluttered with unwanted emails. Think about the number of emails one gets daily and how difficult it is to maintain a clean inbox. To be successful in sales—and recruitment—you need to be persistent, personal, and original.
10. They Have A Strong Personal Brand
Hiring for technical roles can be difficult, but it also takes quite a long time. Great technical recruiters maintain long-term relationships which helps them build their own personal brand.
11. They Are Reliable
Being reliable is one of the most valued traits in a person. And this is especially important for recruiters. Simply put, being reliable means that if you say you will do something, you will do it.
12. They Are Tech-Savvy
Besides staying on top of the latest technologies, there’s another trait that technical recruiters must have – being tech savvy. This entails a range of skills, from scraping the web for candidates’ email addresses, scraping profile data, using APIs to get candidates’ information – the more you’re comfortable with tech, the easier will it be to find and hire new candidates for technical roles.
13. They Are Good At Digital Marketing
People in technical roles work, rest, and live online. Therefore, it’s necessary to have a decent knowledge of digital marketing – copywriting, SEO, social media management, PPC campaigns, etc.
14. They Are Respected By The Tech Community
As a technical recruiter, you should strive to know the ins and outs of a technical community to stay on the lookout for new talent.
If a company just closed its branch and several employees just lost their jobs – you should be the first to know it.
Now, Evaluate Your Skills
On a scale from 0 to 10, how do you score? What can you do today, tomorrow to get better?
Next, Level Up!
If you'd like to speak with IT candidates and screen them quickly, join the Tech Recruitment Academy where we'll teach you everything you need to thrive in international tech recruitment. You'll also get access to our job board so you can start recruiting on the side.
Plus, join the next group of 20 recruiters and HR specialists who I train once a month Live in IT & IT Recruitment. Get your VIP ticket for the Program before they are all sold out again!
