Practical Guide to Hire and Retain Tech Talent

In this world where most companies rely on technology regardless of their niche, it’s indispensable to hire top-notch tech professionals. Therefore, there’s high competition among most companies when it comes to tech talent recruiting. It is no surprise for anyone to see the difficulties of hiring tech talent. The tech shortage is real, and it’s affecting most companies.

In this guide, you’ll find some handy tips to help you hire and retain tech employees. Besides, we’ll also show you how to maintain your current staff up-to-date with the current trends.

Reconsider Your Requirements

When you’re hiring a tech professional, you may think the most important factor is education. People usually put education as their main priority. However, in today’s world, there’s no need to have a bachelor’s degree in computer science to be a killer developer, for example. Many high-level software developers were self-taught, and others didn’t even go to college.

Coding bootcamps are very popular these days, and they’re usually focused on employment, so don’t be surprised to see how prepared bootcamps graduates are. When creating a list of requirements, try to be more flexible. Instead of asking for a bachelor’s degree, opt for experience. Usually, their experience will tell more than their education.

Don’t Limit Yourself by Hiring Only From Certain Areas

Remember that the tech world is usually a remote working environment. Depending on the type of professional you’d like to hire, you can consider recruiting a remote worker if you have a strong candidate. You shouldn’t limit yourself to hiring tech workers from a specific location since you have a vast pool of talent on the Internet.

Career Development

Even though it sounds like something irrelevant for most companies, the lack of career development is one of tech workers’ major reasons for leaving a job, according to a recent LinkedIn report. In this survey, we can see that more than a third of Millenials expect their employers to provide career development.

Therefore, it would be a good idea to offer career development to tech workers. You don’t necessarily need to pay for a college education. Even a coding bootcamp would count as they’re leveling up their skills.

Good Compensation

It’s no secret that tech workers have a good salary. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the average tech worker makes up to $88,240 annually. This wage is high compared to other sectors in the job market. Therefore, most of them expect to have good compensation at work, so if you’re trying to recruit tech talent, keep this in mind.

However, it’s also important to consider that benefits are usually more relevant for them than compensation. So if you offer them work-life balance and career development, they might think about it when deciding where to work.

Provide Them With Decent Tools

Tech tools and hardware do matter. Think about this when you’re trying to attract tech talent. They’d be more productive when working with the right tools. Otherwise, they won’t feel valued. Companies that continue to have outdated equipment aren’t as appealing as those that have up-to-date tools.

This is particularly important when it comes to tech workers because technology is constantly evolving. If you want your company to succeed, you’ll have to invest in the latest tech trends.

Reskill Your Workers

Another thing you can consider is reskilling your workers. Many of your employees are probably willing to reskill themselves so they can continue to be valuable to your company. This is also beneficial for you because they already know the dynamic of your company. Here are some of the best online bootcamps you can use to reskill your employees:

Thinkful: Thinkful has a variety of bootcamps that can be beneficial for all companies regardless of their niche. Its courses cover product management, data science, software engineering, UX/UI design, and more. This school has a good reputation and flexible payment methods.
Flatiron School: This school offers different courses that are helpful in any business. Flatiron School’s bootcamps range from cybersecurity and software engineering to data science.
General Assembly: General Assembly is another great school that teaches relevant tech fundamentals like digital marketing, visual design, and front end and back end development.

Work-Life Balance

Work-life balance is another relevant aspect that most tech workers consider when choosing a company. As we mentioned before, benefits are usually more important than compensation for tech workers since they typically have a high salary. Work-life balance means they can work productively while still having time to live their lives and enjoy their spare time.

One of the best ways to offer work-life balance is to allow them to work remotely at least once a week. They’ll continue to work, but they’ll do it from the comfort of their home. Besides, most tech workers only need a laptop and software to perform their tasks.

Take Care of Your Reputation as an Employer

It’s also essential for you to start building your brand as an employer. This way, tech workers will easily find information about your company so they can decide if you’re a good match. To do this, you should create a profile on review sites like Indeed and Glassdoor.

You can add some information about your company and the perks of working for you. Besides, your employees can also leave their opinion about you as an employer. This will give tech candidates information about your company’s background and other things like workplace culture.

Conclusion

Hiring tech talent is essential these days if you want to succeed in your industry. It’s a very competitive task, but if you do the right things, you’ll be able to attract the best candidates and retain them in your company. Remember to provide them with the right tools and offer them career development to make them feel they can grow in your company. And don’t forget to build your brand as an employer!

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This has been a guest post (my first one!) from:

Artur Meyster
Founder of Career Karma