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3 Keys for Technical Recruiting Success

Steve Lowisz
Recruiting technical candidates can be extremely difficult.

There’s simply not enough talent to go around, and companies are all fighting tooth and nail to hire the best people.

However, with a few tweaks to your approach, you can start more conversations and ultimately make better hires. 

Study Up

To successfully recruit in technical fields, you need a base understanding of your target industry. You don’t have to be an expert, but you do need to be familiar with different roles, skills, current trends, and so forth. 
The easiest way to do this is to join groups and forums online, read others’ discussions, and ask questions. If you’re polite, you’d be surprised how many people are willing to shed light on complex technical subjects.   

Learn Key Terms and Lingo

To truly influence tech candidates, you need to show you’re a credible source of career advice. Toward that end, it’s crucial to learn the terminology of your field.

This allows you to effectively communicate and shows you understand their line of work.

Google is your best friend here – check out glossarytech.com. If you don’t know what a word means, Google it, search YouTube videos, whatever you need to do to get the gist of it. 

Respect Every Candidate's Time 

Tech candidates are bombarded every day with messages from recruiters. One of the biggest hurdles for recruiters when approaching these candidates is standing out from the crowd.

To do that, you need to show that you are interested in them individually and that you have their best interests in mind.

Take some time to read their profile before sending a message. Then craft a message with some real personalization, noting their achievements, specific work experience, skills and so forth.

Focus on starting a conversation, not making a sales pitch! If you don’t respond to spammy messages, don’t expect busy candidates to respond to yours. 

Be Patient and Results Will Come

When you’re behind on a search, it’s easy to get impatient and take shortcuts like sending canned messages.

But the reality is slowing down and sending personalized messages is actually much more productive in the long run.
It takes time to really learn your target industry, read profiles, and personalize messages. But in a world of spammy recruiters, the effort really shows, and candidates are much more likely to listen.