Ep 196 – Global Tech Recruiting Trends

Sep 11, 2019 | By Jessica Miller-Merrell | Podcast

Globalization and outsourcing have led many U.S.-based organizations to expand their business operations internationally. This has created a need for smarter and faster ways to screen talent, especially in the technology sector. In a near zero unemployment economy, recruiters and HR leaders know they must be able to move quickly once a qualified candidate has been identified, and we’re looking for support services for screening technology candidates – especially when tech isn’t our recruiting specialty – or simply considering that most recruiters aren’t trained engineers or developers.

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Table of Contents

Episode 196: Global Tech Recruiting Trends with Henrik Enström

Today I’m joined by Henrik Enström, CEO of Future Skill, a global IT cloud-based recruitment testing company. Henrik, welcome to the Workology Podcast.

How Hiring Assessments Improve the Candidate Experience

The challenge of finding talent is universal shares Henrik. It doesn’t matter what country you are in. He says that the market for tech talent is competitive no matter where in the world you are hiring for, and the need to qualifying that talent is the same. Henrik created his code test assessment technology after becoming frustrated as a candidate himself. He says that often times the recruiter or hiring manager isn’t technical which lends to not only the company hiring the wrong candidates for the role, but also drawing out the hiring process for everyone including the candidates. Great candidates want to work for companies who are organized and have established processes that takes into account their own time as well. This is why technical hiring assessments are so important. You need to hire quickly and respect the time of your candidate pool.

Candidates Are Gaming the Hiring and Interview Process

Henrik has worked for a number of well-known companies including Ericsson and Boeing. These companies are large often making effective hiring especially when you are recruiting in global markets a challenge. It is often slow, drawn out, and time consuming. These things, unfortunately don’t make for an efficient and cost-effective recruiting and hiring process that captures the hearts and minds of the best in breed talent especially for technology.

And there are a number of ways that the hiring and vetting process can be gamed. Just before I began recording this podcast interview with Henrik, I ran across an AirBnB experience listing that offered training for interviewing at Amazon. For $4,500 a job candidate can pay to experience Amazon’s Interview Loop experience. The experience is typically held on a week in Seattle and is five hours long. While I am a fan of interview preparation, this might take things a little too far. The experience also offers other packages including a more in-depth interview evaluation and coaching for an additional fee. I have linked to the Amazon Experience on AirBnB in the resources section of this podcast transcript.

Conclusion

Our whole industry is evolving so quickly, but it’s amplified in the technology sector and in recruiting tech employees. We have to move so quickly to make an offer, or risk losing the candidate, but we also have to ensure that we’re making offers to the candidates with the best (and validated) skill sets. And as this is happening, we’re hiring more and more outside of our region or country, which presents another set of challenges. It’s fascinating to learn about technologies that can help us adapt to these changes and save our recruiting time and budget.

Connect with Henrik Enström.

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Jessica Miller-Merrell

Learn more about Jessica Miller-Merrell, SPHR, SHRM-SCP, the founder of Workology, a workplace HR resource, and the host of the Workology Podcast. More of her blogs can be found here.