5 Ways Recruiters For IT Know What They Are Doing

Recruiters for IT pride themselves on being experts in their field.

All businesses with more than two employees will have experienced some form of recruitment process. However, there is a big difference between a recruitment process completed by individuals in your company and one fulfilled by recruitment experts.

As an IT recruiter, I can assure you that the insights and knowledge a recruitment agency can offer as part of your IT hiring process are invaluable. Below I set out my top 5 ways recruiters for IT know what they are doing and why you should be using one!

Knowledge of the market

Working with businesses day in and day out gives recruiters for IT an almost bloodhound sense of where the market is heading. They know which way the wind is moving, sensing changes in the market that many companies wouldn’t be aware of without proactively seeking network and market insights.

The market can be volatile. Often IT recruiters will specialise in one area of IT in order to hone their expertise. For example, VIQU specialisms include but aren’t limited to business transformation, software development, cloud and infrastructure, and cyber security. Focusing IT recruiters on one area of tech allows them to understand the role and the market inside and out. This can include knowing whether a specific job role is currently in particular demand, or which technologies are preferred by each industry.

IT recruiters have unique knowledge over companies who aren’t active in the market. They are constantly speaking with your competitors and potential candidates, garnering key insights that would benefit you as well. This gives them an advantage in negotiating the best route to employment for all parties.

Understanding of what candidates are looking for

Recruiters for IT know what candidates want because they talk to them daily. They get to know their pain and push points. They understand what candidates are looking for in their next workplace and crucially what makes them want to leave their current company. This allows IT recruiters to advise you not only on how to attract candidates but also retain them.

To give you a general insight, according to a recent Total Jobs report, here are the most attractive benefits for IT professionals:

• Flexible working hours (39%)
• Financial bonuses (35%)
• Remote working (26%)
• Generous pension (25%)
• Additional holiday allowance (25%)

These kinds of statistics are certainly useful as a starting point, but the level of local and specific candidate insights you can gain from an expert IT recruiter just doesn’t compare.

Understanding what candidates with the skillset you’re looking to secure want and what competitors are offering, enables IT recruiters to save you time and money in the long run. After all, if you don’t know what drives your candidates, they’ll leave, and you’ll end up repeating your recruitment process just a few months later.

Expertise in creating effective EVPs

The knowledge that recruiters for IT have comes in handy when they are optimising your employee value proposition (EVP). This proposition is a combination of your employee experience from benefits, training, and company culture.

Imagine you want to join a company. Which would be more attractive to you? A company that only has a simple job description, or one that actively highlights its culture and benefits not only in the job description, but through their blogs, social media posts, and website? If it’s the second, you are in the majority. In fact, according to a HubSpot report, 75% of active job seekers are more likely to apply for a role if the employer promoted their EVP strategy.

Cultivating a distinct EVP is a crucial aspect of your recruitment and retention process. Being able to clearly identify and explain why someone would be interested in joining your company and what you can offer them will strengthen your overall strategy.

Every company has an EVP (even if you haven’t properly written it down and structured it yet) but very few know how to promote it effectively. This is where recruiters for IT can improve your talent acquisition processes. They can advise you on how to effectively showcase your EVP through your company website, socials, and job adverts, to attract top tech talent.

By developing a strong understanding of your EVP, the IT recruiters you choose to work with, will become an extension of your team, representing and actively promoting why potential candidates should join your business.

Extensive networks of IT specialists

Most professionals tend to utilise LinkedIn as an opportunity to connect and build relationships with industry peers. Whereas, an effective IT recruiter spends the majority of their day building and nurturing relationships with businesses and IT talent within their specialism.

They achieve this by joining IT-specific groups and connecting and interacting with specialists in their area of IT. As an IT recruiter’s web of connections increases their posts and job adverts then reach a much wider audience. This is a result of their followers liking or sharing the post which then reaches their industry peers as well. This domino effect means that your job advert will be far reaching and attract the attention of many top professionals.

Furthermore, IT professionals that regularly follow and interact with the recruiter’s online profile, are likely to trust them and go to them if the recruiter is advising a role that is relevant to their skillset. Building relationships with the top professionals in the industry through LinkedIn, gives IT recruiters an optimal advantage when it comes to promoting your role. All of this work is designed to give your company and job adverts the attention they deserve from an ever-growing network of IT specialists.

Awareness of the core elements of an excellent recruitment campaign

Recruiters for IT live and breathe recruitment campaigns.

(Truly it is our bread and butter!)

Running an effective recruitment campaign is not an easy task at all. Many businesses enter into the process with little planning, no focus, and don’t reflect on what to improve afterwards. That’s where IT recruiters can help!

An effective and successful recruitment campaign will include:

• Setting clear objective of what you want to achieve
• Defining an ideal candidate
• Building/ promoting your employer brand
• Developing an EVP
• Choosing the best channels to promote your company and/or role
• Engaging with candidates
• Organising interviews and assessments to suit your business
• Assessing the process
• … and most importantly, securing a great candidate!

IT recruiters like VIQU know how to run successful campaigns for businesses regardless of size and budget. We have the resources to make your company sparkle to potential candidates. Give us a call or send us a message and we will listen to your requirements before discussing how we can support your next IT hire.