Having had over a few hundred conversations with programmers, I know what they pay attention to and how to establish good contact with a candidate.
Of course, there is no “universal” way to establish a positive interaction and make a candidate interested in your offer. After all, few things are as extensive and multi-level as human relations, but it is worth keeping in mind a few basic points which programmers will appreciate and thanks to which they will sooner choose an offer from your company than from a competitor’s.
Response time
We have mentioned this many times but it is so important that it is worth doing again – quick response. Whenever possible, we contact the candidate “on the fly”, so they are often positively surprised. The second thing is that if you have just received a CV from a candidate (whether through an advertising portal or, for example, on LinkedIn), it is very likely that he/she has a few free minutes at the moment and would be happy to talk to you by phone.
The specific offer and its details
It’s a good idea to be well informed about the offer. Often candidates will ask difficult questions, such as:
What does the team look like, and which developers is it made up of?
- What is the working day/month like?
- Is there any work tracker used in the company, and if so on what terms?
- Is it work on one project or several?
- What does the project for which you are recruiting look like?
- What are the plans for this project?
Unfortunately, these are not easy questions to answer. I have to admit that I often don’t know these details myself and say frankly “I admit that I didn’t ask for such details. Maybe I’ll just set up an interview with the team leader and you’ll get the information first hand”, but this is not an ideal solution – in the end it may turn out that the candidate’s expectations differ from the team and it will be a waste of time for both parties.
So it is better, in the future, to specify such things, and send a given list of questions to the client in the form of a form, even before the recruitment begins.
Another thing is that the client himself often does not know these answers because he has several projects at once and knows that he needs people, but does not yet know where to place them. It also often happens that our client has their own client at the stage of the so-called “lead” and simply does not have this information. This is also worth verifying and considering whether, as a recruiter, we want to take on this rather risky assignment.
Transparency and regular feedback
Feedback from the company has recently become a “buzzword”. – That is, every company talks about it, but still not every company actually gives it.
As I mentioned in another blog, you can have the best ATS and give one-click feedback, but without “moving”, it won’t help.
As far as we’re concerned, we usually just grab the phone and take a minute to explain what and how – candidates really appreciate it. If someone wants more detail, then we email or post on LinkedIn. It takes a few minutes per candidate and the topic is closed, and it’s worth it – because candidates come back, and many people and companies forget that today’s junior, in whom no one is interested, is the future senior for whom everyone fights.
Getting to know the company
I often talk to candidates about recruitment – what they liked and didn’t like, why they chose (or, why they didn’t) this company.
Sometimes I get “You know… actually I didn’t learn anything about this company at the interview”. An hour-long interview, a few hundred sentences, a few thousand words, and sometimes the company still can’t communicate what it should.
These are all details that can (and even should!) be worked on to maximize the success rate of recruitment and to employ more of the people we want.
It’s worth introducing the company, telling a bit about the cool stuff – team-building trips, awards, bragging about clients, ratings on Clutch – you can really do a lot here, and this immediately builds a nice relationship.
I don’t suggest, however, to spend the whole conversation on such “getting to know you” – after all, in a larger dose it will be boring and, what is important, most people are rejected from the recruitment process and only a few percent are accepted to the company. However, it is worth spending those first few minutes, before moving on to the technical aspects, getting to know and presenting both sides.
Additionally, this will lighten the atmosphere before the interview and may help the candidate perform better at it.
Summary
These four points are something you should definitely keep in mind when planning the recruitment process.
There are really many, (many more) factors involved in recruitment, but as we all know, it’s all about the details in the final round, so if you want to hire the best people, it’s worth refining the process down to every last detail.
This is also something we help companies with as RemoDevs – as always, feel free to get in touch and have a chat – lukasz@remodevs.com
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