Interactive session:How to hire software engineers?

iwan@gulenko.ch

@iwangulenko

whoami

• Software engineer by trade

• I run a tech recruiting agency in Zurich (https://medium.com/@iwaninzurich/eight-reasons-why-i-moved-to-switzerland-to-work-in-it-c7ac18af4f90)

• I am interested in making tech-recruiting suck less

email: iwan@gulenko.chtwitter: @iwangulenko

Overview: Tech-recruiting sphere

Hiring managers: How to hire engineers?

Job seeker: How to prepare and what to expect at interviews?

How to hire software engineers?

email: iwan@gulenko.chtwitter: @iwangulenko

Employer perspective

email: iwan@gulenko.chtwitter: @iwangulenko

email: iwan@gulenko.chtwitter: @iwangulenko

interviewing.ioworkshape.io

• Lack of standardization

• Hiring costs are second highest expenditures after salaries (300 billion $ market worldwide)

• Sourcing + quick assessment

email: iwan@gulenko.chtwitter: @iwangulenko

Problem

Show what you have

• Cool tech-stack

• Great opportunity to contribute and grow

• Reply fast to inquiries of engineers

Where to get engineers?

• Blog (https://medium.com/@iwaninzurich/eight-reasons-why-i-moved-to-switzerland-to-work-in-it-c7ac18af4f90)

• Meetups

• Employee referrals (underrated)

• Github

Candidate perspective

Coding interviews

• Phone interview (either depth or breath)

• Homework

• Look at existing code

• Code something small onsite (algorithms / data structure / practical)

As a candidate, what can you do?

Software engineering resume

• People read resumes on autopilot.

• Don’t list every project you’ve worked on (page length 1-2)

• Contribution >> technology/frameworks.

• Explain in simple but detailed language.

1. “Designed software application including: data modeling, software architecture design, software- hardware integration, user interface design, and database management“

2. “Created and launched a service that collects product opinions and recommendations from Twitter. The service finds related tweets, removes spam, analyzes sentiment and creates a structured database of everything that was said about particular products [link to demo]. The service is exposed as a consumer website and as widgets that can be embedded in online retail websites.“

3. “Developed [product name], using C# in .NET framework, for marketing and allowing end-users to experience [another product name]“

4. “Evaluated and identified [OS name] network stack performance bottleneck in latency, per-packet processing overhead, and scalability of different network IO models through various system measurement and profiling techniques“

Good or bad?

http://blog.alinelerner.com/lessons-from-a-years-worth-of-hiring-data/

Avoid typos

http://blog.alinelerner.com/lessons-from-a-years-worth-of-hiring-data/

http://blog.alinelerner.com/lessons-from-a-years-worth-of-hiring-data/

typos and grammatical errors

matter more than anything else

having worked at a top company

matters

having attended a top computer science university

doesn’t matter

Sample size: 300 candidatesResearch question: Who performs well

as a software engineer?

How to interview your interviewers: The Joel Test

1. Do you use source control? 2. Can you make a build in one step? 3. Do you make daily builds? 4. Do you have a bug database? 5. Do you fix bugs before writing new code? 6. Do you have an up-to-date schedule? 7. Do you have a spec? 8. Do programmers have quiet working conditions? 9. Do you use the best tools money can buy? 10. Do you have testers? 11. Do new candidates write code during their interview? 12. Do you do hallway usability testing?

How to interview your interviewers• If possible, ask for the opportunity to view the source code.

• If possible, ask for the opportunity to go with the guys for a beer.

Bonus (if you feel comfortable):

• "What is the most costly technical decision made early on that the company is living with now?"

• "Where do product / feature ideas generally come from?“

Generally:

• Don’t ask engineers about benefits/salary/vacations/process – you can get those answers later from HR or whoever.

Salary negotiation - how to make 5000 EUR in 2 minutes

• Don’t disclose your current salary. This can be used as a benchmark against you.

• Postpone discussion about money to the end.

• If HR insists that you name a number, tell them that you feel uncomfortable talking about this at that point because you want to find out how you can add value first before you know how much to ask for.

• If HR still insists, tell them that the number should not be a benchmark for later negotiation.

• If they suggest you a number …

• …let it sink.

• Always ask for more: “How I negotiated for an additional $15,000 at Yammer” (Link)

• It’s a business relationship. For them, you are a resource…

Interactive session:How to hire fronted engineers?

iwan@gulenko.ch

@iwangulenko