How to become a tech recruiter: simple steps

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You probably heard stories about incompetent recruiters conducting the recruitment process more than once. A recruiter's mistake on behalf of the recruiter, no knowledge of the position, no feedback, bad recruitment management, inability to sourcing.

What are the most desirable qualities of a recruiter?

As in any professional group, some people should never recruit. One of the reasons for this may be the low entry threshold into the industry - the requirements for younger recruiters are usually not too high. Additionally, many people who do not know what they want to do in life look for their happiness as a recruiter.

Meanwhile, the truth is different - recruiting the right person is a long and complicated process. For several years, we can observe the recruiter's profession's specialization, e.g., Sourcer, and the growing multitasking, e.g., performing tasks in marketing, analytics, PR. Also, digitization, automation, and employers' competitiveness are just some of the HR industry's challenges, affecting the scope of competencies used. Therefore, good HR recruiters today are a very diverse group. What are the most desirable qualities of a recruiter? You will find the answer below.

How to become an IT recruiter?

Internships are not an easy piece of bread. They are actually an investment in which we pay with our own time. From a financial point of view, we would get more money by taking on less developmental but different work. So let us imagine that we do not have an easily accessible internship or even a job at the profession's lowest level. What can we do ourselves to become an attractive candidate or candidate for a future IT recruiter? I have prepared the list below, which is a good starting point for further education. Interestingly, this list could also serve as a mini-guide for onboarding an IT recruiter with no experience!

HR

First of all, you need to know exactly what the recruiter is actually doing. Try to assimilate:

- What is the typical course of the recruitment process, and what are the roles in it (e.g., the role of the hiring manager vs. the recruiter),

- What are the most important methods of finding candidates (job advertisements, direct search, headhunting, networking),

- The most common methods of candidate selection (screening call, behavioral interviews, technical competence interviews, psychological tests, assessment center)

- How is a candidate profile (or the so-called "candidate persona") defined

Sourcing

If you want to work as an IT recruiter, sourcing will be your daily routine. Direct search is the most common and effective method of filling the candidate funnel, so take a closer look at this topic!

Search for relevant Facebook pages, events, or industry groups. You will read a lot about the experience of recruiters there. But the internet is not everything - show your face sometimes! Direct contacts will be useful at every step of this career.

IT

Be under no illusions - having at least the basics of IT knowledge is essential in an IT recruiter's work. You need to know more about what the candidates really do. From experience, I believe that the best source of knowledge here is simply the Internet. If you really want to understand IT, you need to make it your hobby and spend some time learning. I also recommend starting with:

- The book "Technology Made Simple For Technical Recruiter."

- How to "speak the IT language."

- Workshops, including training for IT recruiters

Social Media

Your success in finding candidates largely depends on whether you are an efficient and active social media user. Not only Facebook! Knowing how these networks work and how their users like to communicate will be of great help in your work:

LinkedIn - it is simply indispensable for a recruiter's work. Start by building a reliable network and follow the best recruiters for knowledge and inspiration.

Twitter, Quora, AngelList - choose at least one of these media and start using it daily.

Become a partner for your client

If you want to work as a full-stack recruiter, you will often face a wide variety of challenges. Clients or Hiring Managers are not a group that is easy to get to know "second-hand" and learn good communication habits with them. Fortunately, you can work out the basics yourself - especially those regarding building relationships.

Networking

We mentioned this above, but it is worth elaborating on this a little further. The more you know the right people - the easier it is to get on your dream deck. Search for meet-ups, conferences, workshops regularly and start visiting them. Regularly check industry events on Facebook and ask groups about the opportunity to study or participate in closed events. In my experience, recruiters are a really open group that eagerly lends a helping hand to everyone. Well, ask questions, ask for advice and criticism, ask for recommendations.

The above list is by no means exhaustive, rather a broad guide. Each of the above paragraphs could probably be expanded to the size of a book. But enough talk, young recruiter, young recruiter - to learn!

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