The IT industry is the fastest growing industry worldwide. Hundreds of thousands of specialists are working every day to develop and advance new technologies. Even people who use them on a daily basis have difficulty keeping up with the pace of change. What about non-technical people? Should they have at least IT recruiter basic knowledge? It may look frightening. However, it’s not so scary at all.
In search of IT knowledge for recruiters
There are many places to find the technical knowledge for IT recruiter. Here are some recommendations:
- Talent Place: IT Recruiter’s Glossary
- No Fluff jobs: https://nofluffjobs.com/blog/slowniczek-pojec-it-dla-poczatkujacych-programistow-i-nie-tylko/
- CodersLab : https://coderslab.pl/pl/blog/podreczny-slowniczek-dla-rekrutera-it
It’s also worthwhile to take advantage of developer courses available on Skillveo and Udemy platforms. Such training for beginners won’t teach you programming, but it will certainly make the technology easier to understand.
Put your IT recruitment knowledge into practice!
As an example, let’s see how to analyze an example technology that a Front-end Developer uses, based on the knowledge only from the pages above.
Angular is an open framework and platform for SPA development, written in TypeScript. Angular was originally intended to be a version of the other popular framework, AngularJS, but design decisions made Google decide to release it as a separate entity. Why? There were many reasons. For example, due to the lack of backward compatibility and a simple upgrade path for applications written in AngularJS to Angular 2.
The simplest definition can already put a recruiter in considerable astonishment. What is a framework? What is the TypeScript language used for? According to online encyclopedias, TypeScript is a free and open-source programming language created by Microsoft. It was created as oversight of the JavaScript language. It allows optional static typing and object-oriented programming based on classes. For someone who has never had contact with the IT industry before, such a definition can only create more confusion. That’s why it’s worth following industry blogs. In such places, complex definitions are often explained in simple terms. And, in addition, supported by examples, which allows you to assimilate knowledge in a more pleasant and simple way. In addition, they are supported by examples, which makes it even better for non-technical people to familiarize themselves with the concept and understand it.
How to deal with complex technical issues
Unfortunately, the requirements for an IT recruitment project often include several to even a dozen technologies, depending on the role. Moreover, some roles can also cause confusion. Take DevOps, for example – it’s a colloquial name for a position that is actually a methodology. How to deal with it? The best way to do this is to lay everything out. Angular, which is a framework, written in TypeScript which is an overlay of JavaScript. Now checking JavaScript, we will find out that it is a front-end language. What does it mean? It is used to create the graphic part – The one that users are dealing with. Now, by deduction, we can determine that if someone knows Angular then they must also have experience with Typescript, which can be described as a front-end language. This made our search for a Front-end Developer with Angular make a lot more sense.
Principles of successful recruitment in the IT industry
- A recruiter must be inquisitive on a daily basis, not only asking small-minded candidates about their work experience, but also at the stage of preparing for an interview with a candidate.
- Instead, he does not need to be omniscient about technology. It is enough to know the basics, to understand how front-end and back-end languages differ, how to pronounce Java correctly, what a framework is or what databases are.
- A recruiter is not a programmer, not a technical person. Its function is to determine whether a candidate meets certain criteria for inclusion in the recruitment process.
- The more detailed the criteria, the easier the recruiter’s job.
- It is also worth using extensions such as GlossaryTech. Not only do they themselves scan a candidate’s Linkedin profile for keywords, but then they still define those words.
If you want to learn more about IT recruitment and you are interested in the candidate’s perspective read: “Recruitment through the eye of a programmer“. It is still worth learning about work-life fit, a model that can be very attractive to a candidate.
Dear colleagues and dear fellow recruiters, as you can see – there is nothing to be afraid of! The IT industry can be intimidating. The pace of change and the amount of technology may seem overwhelming to some, but you are able to cope. You have to put effort and time into learning technical knowledge. However, the satisfaction that will come when you talk to a candidate, the moment when you understand everything he talked about is worth it. This greatly facilitates sourcing and the pace of the recruitment process itself.
