Recruiting in any industry is no cakewalk. Each role and each candidate comes with a set of challenges you have to solve for, and finding the perfect match requires understanding those challenges. When it comes to technology recruiting, the big predicament is around the fact that technology advances incredibly quickly, which means the hiring manager’s needs do too. Whether you’re operating at the executive level of the individual contributor level, you need to understand the domain thoroughly in order to find the right people.
To keep up with the changing technology and needs, recruiters need to partner with hiring managers. It’s important that they take the time to garner at least a basic understanding of the technology. Recruiters need to understand why people want to work with the technologies, as well as how the technology will advance a candidate’s career. This requires getting involved with the process, rather than just playing “buzzword bingo.” As a former engineer, I knew when someone was playing buzzword bingo with me, and it wasn’t an experience I enjoyed as a candidate.
Here at Rivi, there are plenty of examples where we’ve rolled up our sleeves and tackled the technology challenge. Recently, I spent some time building out an innovation group in the Big Data space from Engineering Leadership down to the IC level. Before my team even started sourcing, I had multiple meetings with the hiring stakeholders to ensure I understood the technology, why the technology was important to the organization and how people’s careers could progress (at all hiring levels). Additionally, I took time to read white papers on the specific Big Data technologies they were using. Finally, the hiring manager and I partnered with ideas on where to source for these people.
As a result, there was a point in the search where there were more candidates interested in the role–and clients interested in those specific candidates–than could possibly fit into the interview schedule. When we take the time to really learn about the technology involved and partner with the people who have the inside knowledge, we can make the best possible matches for the companies we serve–and the candidates are more likely to be happy in the roles.
Thor Bucy is a Director at Riviera and oversees the non-executive recruiting practice.