MOTIVATION
After 20 years in the technology field as a developer and team lead, I am now offering a new service: Technical Recruiting.
Throughout my career I’ve attended lots of interviews as a candidate but also as team lead looking to recruit, and have found common issues with the process. Normally, an HR professional kickstarts the recruitment process by selecting candidates and shortlisting some of them. Then, these candidates must complete a technical exercise that can be done either at home or on-site; this is where the process tends to break.
A candidate is handed-off to a busy in-house developer who, on top of his/her own project commitments, needs to put extra time and effort to perform a proper technical validation. This can lead the developer to rush the interview, by sticking to a robot-like behaviour where the only responses accepted are those pre-defined by the evaluator, to the letter. Black or white. Furthermore, not every developer is fit to convince a candidate to join the team because they might lack people skills or because they might be burnt out. Here is where I step in.
Why would you put the burden of a time consuming recruiting task in the hands of someone who isn’t equipped for it or just doesn’t have the time to do it? You might be losing good candidates, money and precious time that could be used to finish your projects!
HOW DOES IT WORK?
First: MEET
I get to know the company, meet the development team, and learn how they work. I might even spend a day just listening and watching, to absorb the company’s culture.
Second: AGREE
I team up with your HR department or outsourced HR agency to create the screening process workflow. They will perform the first level filter, and those candidates who make it to a second phase, will go through a technical validation process performed by me.
Third: VALIDATE
The technical validation process consists of a technical challenge, which can be decided by your developers or be totally handed-off to me (remember, I am also a developer!). But, the validation is not only the exercise; it will also include an interview to learn about the candidate’s previous experience and their motivations/expectations for their next role.
Fourth: REPORT
I will review the exercise and give it a score (1 to 10), along with a report to include my observations. An important point here is that I will charge the company whether or not the candidate is hired, because my job is to do the actual validation, regardless of the outcome. Why is this good? Because I am not force-selling you someone just to be paid. I am not even telling you who to hire, I am giving people a score. Think of me as an in-house developer who is doing the technical test and giving their managers feedback about the process. I will just do it properly, with no distractions, putting all my attention and care into the process, and also using my 20 years experience as a guide.
ADDED VALUE
Why trusting me to hire your candidates?
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- I have extensive experience working in the IT field, using very different programming languages (things have changed a lot in the last 2 decades!).
- I’ve worked in different cities and countries, and also remotely with distributed international teams. I know about cultural clashes, and how they affect how we work together.
- I don’t focus on what a candidate doesn’t know yet. I like to see the full package: I see their past experience, query them about their career path, what they’ve learned, how they have improved, and what do they want to next. In other words: I seek potential. Sure, a perfect fit can show up with the specific requirements ready to be used but this is not always the case. Skipping a quick learner that can add much more value than someone who only knows a bunch of tricks and refuses to learn something new when the time comes can hurt the dynamics of your team and, hence, your business.
- I won’t give you bullshit: my score is my opinion, you can still have a final discussion with the candidate before making a decision. However, if we work together, I want you to see me as a recruitment partner. My goal is that you come back to me with more candidates in the future. So my score will be honest, and my observations thorough.