The 5 Steps of an Effective Technical Recruitment Process

As they are in short supply, you must proactively chase them wherever they are. But you also still have to assess their technical skills and ensure they are the right fit for the job. 

Evaluating your tech candidates from all angles and avoiding recruitment mistakes is a rigorous process.

Here’s a proven 5 steps plan that will lead you to a confident and optimal hiring decision.  

1. Plan every detail of your tech recruitment process

You just received a call from your CTO seeking a new technical recruit. But before making known to everyone your hiring needs, you need first to figure out some basic elements : 

Agree on the job requirement 

What is the ideal profile of the developer or engineer that you’re looking for? You need to consult with managers and HR or do your research to ensure you have a clear picture of the best-fit candidate. 

You can ask questions such as : 

• Position: what is the exact title of the job that needs to be filled? DevOps, Full-stack developer, data scientist? 
• Skills and expertise: which preferred skills and knowledge should the candidate possess? Mobile development, machine learning, big data?
• Technology: which coding language and framework should the candidate be more proficient in? React, Java, SQL…?
• Experience: does your manager need a more senior or junior profile? 
• Responsibilities: will the hire need to supervise a team, communicate within a team, or manage their field of work? 

Plan the timeline and the budget 

You want to agree on the resources you will put into your recruiting process. A rigorous plan will ensure every stakeholder is involved throughout the project and that you achieve your recruiting project on time. 

What is the budget you want to use for advertising your job offer? Is this a high-priority or less urgent recruitment target? Which team members do you want to involve in the screening, interviewing, and decision-making process? What is the expected time for your new hire to start in this new position? 

Figuring out and planning these elements will give you a head start in your tech recruitment project.

Establish the job description and advertising 

Knowing the job requirement, you can now craft the job description. You might include all the elements necessary to qualify your candidates. You might also include your company’s main employee value proposition (EVP). Mention not only the employee perks and benefits brought by your company but also the values and social rituals integral to the day-to-day work. You want to present your organization in the best light possible.  

Having your job description, you can also prepare an advertising plan for your new job offer. You want to be sure to make your hiring needs to be known internally and externally. Getting closer to the marketing team and planning timely communications can help.

2. Source widely tech talents

Now is the time to collect a large list of potential candidates. Developers and engineers won’t necessarily apply massively to your job offer, so you might need to make yourself visible on numerous channels.  

Post on the right job boards

There are a lot of IT and tech job boards where you can find highly qualified candidates. You can post on websites like LinkedIn, Indeed, Dice, Angel List, or Tech Fetch.

They attract different audiences and have different prices, so you’ll have to base your decision on this. 

Reach out proactively on social media channels

Apart from maximizing your number of applications, you also want to reach out to promising passive candidates in various sourcing channels. Especially for specialized roles, this will ensure you add qualified and experienced software developers and engineers to your list. You can spark conversation on social channels such as : 

• LinkedIn Recruiter Platform
• GitHub
• Stack Overflow
• Reddit
• Twitter
• Freelancing websites

Tap into your existing pool of technical talents

Sometimes you have to leverage your existing database to find good-fit candidates. Dig into your past ATS data to review previously rejected candidates. You can also rely on employee referrals and networks to enlarge your search. Furthermore, you can look in your list of social followers, partners, and even customers to spread the word about your job offer. 

3. Screen all the candidates

You can’t interview all the candidates on your application list, even if they all have something valuable to offer. To save time and energy, you must shortlist your candidates to the top 5 to 10 candidates. To do so, you can get your candidate profiles through several assessment processes: 

Select by qualification and experience in the resumes

You can make a first selection depending on the most critical requirements. You can filter out candidates that don’t fit in terms of experience and qualification. Be aware, though, not to disregard candidates on biased or discriminatory factors like age or gender, and be open to candidates with different backgrounds (different industries, self-taught developers, and people with disabilities). 

Run technical assessment 

Technical assessments have become a sure and scalable screening method for technical recruiters. They usually consist in sharing online coding exercises or questions that candidates can solve remotely within a time limit. Incorporating these screening tests into your hiring process will save you tremendous time because you’ll only interview software developers with the necessary hard skills.  If you’re a non-techies, it will also help you create and share tests for various roles, qualifications, and seniority levels.

Shortlist via phone screening

You can run phone interviews if more than technical assessments are needed to narrow it down to a few candidates. Call every candidate and ask them about their background, motivation, and experience. You can get a first overview of their aspirations and see whether they’ll be a good fit with your company culture. 

4. Conduct Thorough Interviews

In this step, you want to identify critical elements that will help you choose among your last candidates. You can assess your candidate in real time through two types of interviews : 

Live Coding Interview

How can you know if your candidate is a good fit if you didn’t work with them beforehand? That’s what live coding interviews enable you to do. They are exercises where developers code, communicate, and problem-solve in collaboration with the interviewer. Engineering and hiring managers run the interview and can give them feedback and recommendations in real-time. 

Whiteboard coding interviews are a well-known method among technical recruiters, but now you can set up all this remotely. You can use an online technical interview platform to audio or video call with your candidate and work in a realistic development environment (IDE). This type of interview will help you accurately assess your candidates’ thought processes and communication skills. 

How do they communicate with their team and face unexpected problems? Do they ask for your help our figure it out by themselves? What do they pay more attention to? What is their methodology when tackling a problem?

Crucial elements you need to know before making your final hiring decision! 

Peer and On-site Interview

As a recruiter, you need to make sure your candidates will thrive in their future teams and in your organization. So it makes sense to include cultural fit interviews in your recruitment process. 

For developers and engineers, you might focus on peer interviews, where members of the teams are interviewing and working with the most promising hires. You can also invite your candidate to your company’s office to give them a feel of the day-to-day life and entice them with your in-person perks. 

You want to see if your company values and rituals connect with your candidates’ expectations and if they would see themselves enjoying working in your company. 

Related read: Candidate Experience Best Practices (+4 Examples of Excellent Candidate Experience)

5. Reach collective talent approval 

Now is the time to consider all information you gathered about your candidate and make a confident hiring decision. You might be facing a tough choice between two or three high-potential candidates. To reach a final decision, you can compare the objective performance of your candidates in the technical screening tests, coding interviews, and cultural-fit meetings. Don’t make it a solo decision, but involve all your team. 

You can rely on the following questions to make sure everyone is on the same page : 

• Does your candidate possess the necessary technical skills for the job? 
• Do you think they’re going to excel and achieve their goals? 
• Do they fit in the team and your company’s values? 
• Do you see yourself working with them?

The candidate with the largest collective agreement should win your approval and get the job!

Related read: How to Streamline Your Remote Software Engineer Onboarding

Speed up your screening, interviewing, and approval processes: CoderPad

CoderPad is a platform that will help you streamline your technical recruitment process. Moving candidates forward with confidence has never been easier. CoderPad Screen allows you to : 

• Narrow down your list of candidates with easy-to-set-up technical assessment tests.
• Code together before working together, thanks to a live coding interview platform.
• Be confident in your hiring decision with objective and fair scoring systems.

Do you want to set up a smooth technical recruitment process and avoid bad hiring decisions? Try CoderPad for free.