This week we wanted to shine some light on Technical Recruitment and its challenges so we reached out to Ana Borges, a Technical recruiter from Betsson Group to pick her brain on various challenges she faces on a daily basis. Below you can find her replies.
Before you started working in an in-house position at Betsson Group you have worked in an agency recruitment environment. What are the biggest differences between the 2 in your opinion?
Working in an agency environment gave me the skills and tools to sell people and companies to each other, “fighting” and advocating both ways. This valuable experience played a huge part in my personal growth and development in the field. The biggest advantage of working in-house in my opinion comes from being involved in the entire process. This gives me the ability to better understand what the teams are looking for, allowing me to make a better selection of the candidates I present. Being an inside person, solely committed to our objectives and fully immersed in the company’s culture, provides me with insights that allow me to better evaluate an individual’s potential, professional and cultural. Having been through a similar (relocation) situation not too long ago, I can better empathise with their fears towards this new career shift and do a better job of continuously supporting them, during the process and after they have joined our team.
Technical Recruitment can be a very difficult job at times, what keeps you going?
Knowing that I’m changing people’s lives everyday, proposing new adventures and new opportunities and then following they’re progress, seeing them evolve and succeed.
What made you decide to leave Portugal and relocate all the way up to Stockholm?
My partner received an offer to move to Stockholm and on my first visit during a holiday, I decided to stay. I fell in love with Stockholm, the colourful architecture, the constant contact with nature, well I could give you a long list of good things the city has to offer.
Have you seen new trends in the IT start-up scene in Stockholm recently?
There is a lot of events to bring more woman to the Tech sector. From meetup groups, to conferences, private and public groups. Also rise of Fintech companies.
Which are the ‘don’ts’ that Tech recruiters should keep in mind in your opinion?
Failing to do their homework! You have to understand the field you are recruiting for. More often than not, this means leaving your comfort zone and immersing yourself in that world. In tech for instance, it’s crucial to know about the technologies that make up the role you’re looking for. Sure, you’re never going to roll up those sleeves and start coding, but you need enough knowledge to lead a conversation and evaluate the quality of the response. You’re usually that first level of screening candidates go through and ensuring you pass along the profile that meets the requirements, is your ultimate goal. This will save time, not only your own, but of your colleagues who’ll follow up as well as the candidate you’ve just approached.
Not coming across as a human being! In our field we’re constantly overwhelmed by personal metrics and objectives. Focusing exclusively on these easily makes you forget about why you’re doing this in the first place. Giving candidates the opportunity of their lives, to prove they are worth it, to see them grow themselves and your company as they do it.
The way you initiate your conversation will speak much to how you’re perceived on the recipient side. Am I another number or do you truly believe in my talent? A candidate thinking about the first one is likely to leave it at that and not even bother responding. Tailor your message, look at his career progress and achievements and formulate it based on those. It’ll take you longer to compose, but in my experience, nothing has generated better response and feedback than this attention early on. It’s a big commitment to even start these conversations, so you need to build trust early on. After identifying interest from his/hers side, explain that you’re here to support. Their success will be your success! Explain what they’re about to go through, give them the chance to ask they’re own questions and tell them to do so at any stage of the process, they have your email. Follow up after every interview to get a sense of how it went. All these points will help you build a relationship and show a little more of who they are. There you go, half of your work is done and you can actually skip many of the cultural questions in your list, most of the times you’ve experienced enough to judge them in this category, in first hand!
Picture: Pixabay
