Tech companies are always looking to hire the best developers. It’s their unique skill set that enables these companies to bring their product visions to life. As you’d expect, developers with proven skills are in high demand. Studies have shown that great developers can be 400% more productive than the average team member.
The tech industry is very competitive as it is. This just makes exceptional talent even more elusive. The tech giants offer an incredible amount of incentives and perks to their employees. That’s a way for them to entice the developers they’re effectively courting to join the company.
This also means that these companies are always on the lookout for the best engineering talent. Most of them have large internal recruiting teams that are tasked with finding the right people to bring on board. Some even rely on external recruiting agencies to help them find the talent that they need for their teams.
Major tech companies have an advantage that others don’t
Just by the virtue of their existence, tech companies like Google, Facebook, Twitter, Microsoft, Amazon and others attract top talent. Most developers already want to work for one of these titans of the industry.
Whether that’s for the industry-leading pay and perks or the opportunity to develop products that will improve billions of lives, these companies face no shortage of interested candidates who would jump at the opportunity when it presents itself.
That’s an advantage that other companies, particularly startups, don’t have. They simply can’t provide the benefits and scale that big tech can.
The tech giants do need help sometimes too
The biggest tech companies receive millions of CVs every year. Only a fraction of all applications will pass the stringent hiring processes. That’s one of the main reasons why these companies actively search for new talent.
Companies like Google and Facebook have a significant network of internal recruiters. These are employees of the company that are tasked with finding suitable new talent. However, they also rely on external recruiting agencies as and when required.
Big tech companies including Microsoft, Amazon, Netflix and more often rely on external recruiters when they need to hire in specific cases. For example, they might be looking to fill a certain executive position or they might need developers with a unique skill set located in a foreign country.
Learn from the titans to hire the best software engineers for your company
There are a lot of lessons to be learned from the practices that the top tech companies utilize to hire the best developers. Being inspired by the way they go about the entire process can help you attract great talent for your company as well.
1. Be clear about your hiring criteria
Your hiring criteria needs to speak to the people that you want to bring on your team. You should provide absolute clarity about the criteria so that the potential candidates know exactly what the job entails and what will be required of them.
The more detail you can provide, the better it will be. The job description should clearly mention if a specific skill set is required, such as proficiency in a particular language or framework.
2. Strive for transparency in the hiring process
Candidates shouldn’t have any lingering questions or concerns in their minds. They shouldn’t have any doubts about the role or their place in the company when they come onboard. The cost of hiring the wrong person for a job is quite significant. It can be up to 30% of their entire first-year salary.
By being more transparent, candidates will get the entire picture of what the job requirements are and how the hiring process will proceed. This is also a good stage to talk to them about opportunities to grow within the company.
3. Present your vision in the best possible way
Many developers view their job as a way to change peoples’ lives for the better. The opportunity to do that is often a major consideration when deciding which employer to go with. You must present your vision to them in the best possible way.
It should make your company stand out from the crowd. The vision should state what the company strives for, what it wants to achieve and how developers are important to that goal.
4. Develop a referrals platform
A referrals program is one of the secrets that big tech companies rely upon to gain access to exceptional talent. It’s a way for them to incentive existing employees to refer other great tech professionals to join the company.
The benefit of referrals is that the time to hire tends to be shorter and those employees also have a higher retention rate.
External recruiting agencies help you find the needle in the haystack
One of the scenarios in which big tech companies use external recruiting agents is when they’re looking for special talent. It’s an effortless way for them to sort through the pack to find the true hidden gems that will bring their visions to reality.
CodersLink has a proven track record as a leading external recruiting agency. We strive to find the best talent for companies so that they’re effectively able to fill the skills gaps and respond to their scaling needs.
Leverage our recruiting ties in Latin America to hire developers for satellite offices or for your US office. We can help you extend your company’s hiring reach by using external talent pools to build, grow and manage remote tech teams.
Photo by ThisisEngineering RAEng on Unsplash