Today, we wanted to take a closer look at the art and science behind finding the best tech people for your organization. In the current marketplace, putting together the best team requires that you find the right talent to meet your IT needs, retain the best people, and continually develop your staff to stay competitive.
Here at Market Street Talent, we know that each organization has a unique set of criteria to fill when searching for the right person. Based on our years of experience in the industry, we’ve found that sometimes the right candidate is the person with both the tech and interpersonal skills – or the right fit for the culture of your organization – that you want to join your team.
It seems that industry experts have made some of the same observations. A recent article in CIO.com addresses the importance of factoring in workplace culture when you make hiring decisions to find the right tech people. The writer, Sharon Florentine, makes the case that hiring for the right cultural fit can be even more important than focusing on tech skills alone.
The idea is that if you hire the right person that will work well within your team, you can provide opportunities for growth that will allow that person to acquire new technical skills. We think this approach can be a winning strategy for some organizations.
Many coders and developers are already interested in staying sharp and learning new skills. When you offer new opportunities for professional growth at your organization, you become very attractive to the type of tech candidate that is self-motivated and wants to shine in our field.
If you have any doubts about hiring a person that you might have to train, consider this: Tech is a rapidly evolving environment anyway. The person you hire for specific skills this year will still find it necessary to learn new programming languages, systems and protocols to meet the needs of a growing organization. Any time you update your systems, you want to have the tech people that maintain your infrastructure stay updated as well.
In addition, when you hire for cultural fit you avoid the problem of accidentally getting a person who might have amazing coding skills, but doesn’t have the professional maturity or savvy to communicate well with other departments in your organization – or even clients. You absolutely want someone with the “soft skills” to work well with people. It will make each day easier as you to work together, and the person will do a better job of representing your organization in the marketplace.
Finally, hiring a candidate likely to fit well into your unique organization will allow you to retain the right person. When you spend the time to invest in someone, you don’t want to lose that person due to mismanagement or employee disengagement. By choosing a candidate that works well with your team, you increase the likelihood that this person will feel invested in the success of your organization and want to stay, contribute and do his or her best.
Need a little help? Here at Market Street Talent, we can help you learn more about a potential hire. Our talented recruiters also pride themselves on taking the time to learn more about the unique needs of your organization to find the right match. We look at corporate culture and team character to help us find the right candidates, and weigh the skill set, experience and individual personality of candidates before making a recommendation.
We invite you to learn more about who we are, and what we can do to help you find the right team member for your organization!