5 Tech Skills Every Recruiter is Looking For

The skill India report says that hiring in 2018 “looks positive” and is expected to grow by 10-15%.^[1]

As we have entered 2018, we see everything changing-how people perceive their careers, how they define jobs and now the advent of automation and artificial intelligence has transformed everything. What looks like a  growth now lies in the laps of technology and the newly designed IT jobs and skills.

With the rise of automation, digitalisation and machine learning, IT has a new found meaning, leaving behind some old IT legacies. Organizations in this era of dynamism, cannot neglect to adopt newer technologies,  because if they do, then they are nothing but redundant.

Companies are now in a state of war, where each one is seeking the same skill set that fellow competitors need. The competition for the talent has become fierce with a 2% unemployment rate, which given the industry standards is fairly low for tech workers (The Bureau of Labor Statistics). ^[3]

The market has a demand for both new and mature technologies. Technical recruiters whose jobs are becoming a growing challenge, need to identify the person with the respective in-demand technological skills and hire him/her. But then again, the huge demand-supply gap adds to the misery. A government report estimates 1 million jobs going unfilled every year. Hence if the employers don’t stack up these technological proficiencies in their organizations, then they have already lost the battle against this growing demand.

So, now that you are wanting a sure shot way to fight the war against technology, I say arm yourself with technology. In today’s competitive market, the recruiters who wish to hire the right technological fit or wish to upskill, ought to look for these skills and qualifications in their desired match.

I would like to have a diagram where we tell about the mature and new technologies and within it the skills mentioned.

1.Information security analyst

In layman term, they are the ones who protect the information system. With the increasing infiltration of networks, there has been a growing need for expertise in cybersecurity. Companies want to prevent their information systems against hackers and cyber-attacks, hence this profile is in huge demand. The Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the profession is expected to increase more than 28%, resulting in 28,400 new jobs.

Qualification & skills:

• A bachelor’s degree in Computer science, cyber security or related field
• C, C++, Java or PHP programming languages
• Security information and event management [SIEM]
• Cloud computing and SaaS models
• Windows, Linux and UNIX operating systems
• DLP, anti-virus and anti-malware

2. Block-chain engineer

They are the ones who figure out how to secure a changeless, distributed database. Its role has the aspects of a web developer, database developer as well as a distributed system developer. They design protocols, plan for unfriendly incentives and do a lot of testing of assumptions. Immutable ledger is useful for a lot of applications, but the fact that they are hard to design has led to a high demand for these engineers.

Qualification & skills:

• A degree in computer science or engineering
• Experience in Java, Golang, Rust, Scala, Python, C++, C#
• Experience of working on open source technologies and new language like Solidity
• An understanding of bitcoin or other currencies

3. Data scientist 

As Big Data and machine learning set their feet in the business world, data scientists are becoming increasingly important in industries from finance to health to drug discovery. A data scientist takes a huge amount of unorganised data and using her maths, statistics and programming skills organizes it. After structuring she analyses the data for insights and find solutions for company challenges.

Qualification & skills

• A degree in science, technology, engineering, math or an equivalent professional qualification
• R, Python
• Machine learning
• Hadoop platform, experience in hive or pig preferred
• SQL/Database coding

1. Software developer

He is the person concerned with all dimensions of software development program from research and design to programming and testing of computer software, he does it all. They are basically the innovative minds of a computer program. There is an expected growth of 30% from 2016 to 2026 for software developers, The Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Qualification & skills:

• A bachelor’s degree in computer science, software engineering or related field or a degree in mathematics
• C++, C#, Java, Python, Lisp
• PHP
• SQL/MySQL
• HTML/Css3

2. Web developer

They are the ones who create the website. When you have a good user experience thank them for the effort! In this age of digitalization, where everything from buying clothes to food to friends has come online, the position of web developers becomes even more desirable. E-commerce seems to be the main reason for the increasing number of web developers. As we see companies expanding their web presence to satisfy consumer needs and making the purchase easier, more web developers are required to build the websites. The Bureau of Labor Statistics shows that the demand for this profile is expected to increase by 13% till 2026.

Qualification & skills

• A bachelor’s degree in Computer science or Information technology
• SQL, JavaScript, Linux command line
• HTTP protocol
• AJAX
• Separation of concerns [MVC etc.]

Tech is a rapidly evolving field.  To be successful, companies need to keep acquiring new skill sets and keep learning about developing technologies. Hiring managers and candidates know about their needs for the future, more than half of the tech employers are now expanding at a high rate which seems to be a healthy sign for the tech market. The above-mentioned skills and profiles are in-demand and need special consideration. This growing need can be satisfied with the perfect hire who has these skills, hence evolve with technology.

“Given the pace of digitalisation and its impact on business strategies, 2018 will be an important year for professionals to acquire skills in applications such as cybersecurity, big data, web development etc. The need to upskill has made business leaders move out from their comfort zone and invest in continuous learning and maintain their competitive edge” Krishna Kumar, CEO, Simplilearn

Now that we are well versed with the top tech talent in-demand, the required qualification and the growth prospects, what are we waiting for, let us grab them?

• Recruiting talent is one way to attain technological proficiency. It is tempting to reach out for the shiny ones, but such a quick decision may lead to a poorly integrated, underperforming system. Hence before hiring, assess the skills of the selected candidates via various assessments that test their knowledge in the required field. Once you have evaluated the candidates it becomes easier and less time consuming to make the best and right decision for your organization.
• But sometimes you may find your match within the company, when you look for the high potential employees and reskill them. They are a better bet since they are already aware of your company’s working, its environment and will perform with an intention to improve everything. Decide wisely and then follow a proper plan and recruit your top It talent.

For a long time, companies have been hiring candidates with mature skills in an unorganized way. To explain this better let me cite an example-

Suppose a company is looking to hire 10 people proficient in mature skills. The call to action would be-

• Collect– Getting the profiles through various avenues such as colleges, social platforms like LinkedIn, Internshala etc.
• Shortlist– Now once you have a pool of prospects to choose from, the shortlisting of resumes begins, and that is when you narrow down to 20 candidates.
• Interview-The work doesn’t end here, the tech manager now conducts personal interviews with each person and then after putting in so many hours you come up with your list of 10.

Quite similarly finding the candidate with the new skill set is even more difficult, not only because of the cumbersome hiring procedure but also because of a dearth of subject matter experts [SMEs]. When you don’t have people with the required expertise in the field you aim to target, then how do you hire at all?

In this era of growing demand, time is money, you cannot afford to waste it. Automating the hiring process with modern approach has complimented your time and money equally. Modern assessment tools make your investment worthwhile and your approach smarter. You may ask me- How?

• Sourcing- this is by far the most frequently cited challenge by hiring managers. Be stellar and optimised to source. Modern recruitment platforms such as Facebook, LinkedIn, community events and hackathons represent an outbound sourcing strategy, going offline and meeting people also a way to source candidates. These tools have increased the visibility and expanded the pool, hence attracting talent has become easier and less time-consuming.
• Selection assessments-is used to identify the skills that cannot be evaluated in the first step.
• The content of these tools follows a basic framework-Concept, Knowledge, Application, and Analysis.
• The online assessments could be MCQs or Hand-on Simulators.
• These tests measure the aptitude, personality, honesty and abilities. Where a higher score relates to higher job performance.
• Interviews– selection testing trims down the pool of prospects, now you can conduct the interviews, either telephonic or face to face and get your ideal match.

The modern approach has a 2-fold motive- filtration and selection. For instance, you have 25 people, now this automated platform by conducting assessments will not only filter the high and low performers but, also give you a comprehensive score as a submission of all values, hence aid selection.

Note that these modern tech assessment tools are not just about assessing better but also assists in automating the hiring procedure.

Let me explain this with the same example where a company had to hire 10 coders. So, now instead of following the lengthy traditional approach, the company follows a more organised system.

• It gives the pool of candidates a code challenge on an online platform.
• This platform subsequently evaluates the performance based on the various parameters and narrows down your list of options to the best available.

The integration of internet with different platforms- mobile, cloud, social or big data has made tech flourish in all shapes. Finding the right match is still a big hurdle in the way. With the integration of modern tech assessments tools from various online platforms such as Codility, HackerRank or Mettl, you can point at the professionals in-demand.

This way you have your list of the desired candidates in the most efficient way. 

External references

1. https://www.deccanchronicle.com/business/economy/110218/hiring-outlook-for-2018-positive-likely-to-grow-by-10-15-pc-india-sk.html
2. https://www.ndtv.com/business/cloud-mobile-or-big-data-in-demand-it-jobs-skills-for-2018-1795511
3. https://www.computerworld.com/article/3147427/it-skills-training/10-hottest-tech-skills-for-2017.html
4. https://medium.com/headlight/the-state-of-tech-hiring-in-2017-793afafd1181
5. https://blog.linkedin.com/2018/january/11/linkedin-data-reveals-the-most-promising-jobs-and-in-demand-skills-2018