Tech hiring is still broken, but it doesn’t have to be. Image by moritz320 from Pixabay
Last year, I set out with a head full of disconnected thoughts about hiring and a vision to share those thoughts with a wider audience. The response has been positive and overwhelming, with the Hiring For Tech newsletter at over 50,000 subscribers as of today!
I’m only one person, so I haven’t yet changed the world of tech hiring yet. Plus, with hiring slowed down last year due to COVID, companies haven’t always invested in improving their process. We still have the same problems we always did:
-
Companies are looking for weaknesses, instead of strengths. Weaknesses tend to be coachable, but strengths represent potential. Until we, as an industry, shift our focus, our hiring processes will always exclude good people.
-
Companies treat interviews as a competition, instead of a collaborative exercise. This puts candidates in a defensive position, instead of allowing them to show how they would work with their future colleagues.
-
Interviewers don’t invest in interviews, putting minimal effort into evaluating candidates. That includes not preparing ahead of the interviews, and not being involved after the interview.
-
Companies evaluate candidates based on criteria that don’t match day-to-day work. Algorithm interviews are a great example, when interviews could utilize real-world projects instead.
-
Companies don’t focus on hiring underrepresented groups, leading to perpetuating existing biases in their processes. The cycle has to be broken with targeted intervention.
If this feels like I’m repeating myself, it’s because I am. Over the last year, I’ve covered exactly how we need to improve hiring in tech, but we’re not making nearly enough progress. Now, there are two things that need to happen:
-
People need to speak up. This means not making excuses for the terrible practices companies use, instead holding these employers and interviewers accountable. Talk about what companies are doing wrong, and what they should be doing instead.
-
Having written down many of my thoughts, I’m going to focus on compiling this information in an actionable form and push for change. This means less writing on this newsletter. Expect to see new articles less frequently.
This is not the end of the journey for Hiring For Tech. The last year has only been the first step. Let’s making tech hiring better together!