Technical Sourcing Guide for Beginners to Find the Best Tech Talent

Hiring tech talent can be a big challenge for recruiters and hiring companies. You might get multiple applications from various sources and still need help finding the right fit.

Why are you struggling to find the right fit? There are various reasons behind candidates not showing interest in a company. One of the primary reasons can also be a need for more knowledge on your end, which might impact the quality of your hiring initiative. After all, as a recruiter, you must possess in-depth knowledge of every aspect that affects technical sourcing.

So, let’s go through the key areas you should focus on while technical sourcing.

Understand what your ideal candidates want

Understanding what your ideal candidate expects from a company can help you to level up your technical sourcing initiative. To hire the best tech talent, you need to understand what they expect before and after they onboard with your team.

Some of the standard expectations of skilled and experienced developers are as follows:

1. A promising company goal: Before joining any company, every experienced developer would like to check if the company's objectives align with their career goals. So, ensure you have the right programs and strategies that offer career growth, attracting high-level candidates to open positions.

2. Offer high-quality equipment: Tech industry thrives only with the help of high-quality sourcing tools for technical recruiters. Therefore, professionals need such equipment to work faster and more efficiently in order to reduce manual and repetitive tasks. Good talent will only follow if you offer your workforce the best and the latest tech support of the highest quality. So, make sure you mention the tools and technologies you use at work during the hiring process.

3. Offer competitive pay: Compensation is a major driving factor behind job decisions. To source tech talent, you must offer a competitive salary. If you offer decent pay, good candidates will automatically be interested. To offer competitive pay, you need to set an average salary for the job and consider some important factors: You can do so by going through the industrial standards for salary, the seniority level, and the complexity of the job position. You also need to consider the last CTC (cost to the company) of the candidates before discussing their salary.

4. Offer work flexibility: Another important element that tech talent actively seeks in a new job is flexibility. Call it the Covid-19 aftereffect but about 72% of employees in tech companies now work remotely. This high percentage emphasizes the importance of work flexibility. So, if you are willing to offer remote work flexibility, state it in every job requirement.

5. A good company culture: As per research by Robert Walters, about 73% of executives leave a company due to poor company culture. Company culture is a major driving factor behind new tech talent joining or leaving a company. If a company has a good culture and a peaceful work environment, skilled and experienced tech professionals will undoubtedly be interested in joining your company.

Know the technicalities associated with the job role

As a technical hiring professional, you need to possess adequate technical knowledge for the job role you are hiring for. Even if you are not a developer, you need to understand the technical terms and processes associated with the job.

For efficient technical sourcing, you need to understand the technical concepts to determine the level of experience of each candidate.

Another way out is to choose Turing’s Talent Cloud, which self-vets employees before recommending them to companies. All you need to do is request developer talent through Turing’s hire page, and you can recruit skilled and experienced developers in 14 days.

Switch to the right technical sourcing channel

Once you take preparatory actions to hire tech talent, the next step is to choose the right technical sourcing channel to find suitable candidates. There are various channels to source tech talent, but only some are ideal for tech hiring. For example, a job opportunity posted on LinkedIn will be more authentic to job seekers than posted as a regular post on Facebook.

With that, here are the best technical sourcing channels to help you find the right tech talent for your company:

1. LinkedIn

As we all know, LinkedIn is a professional networking platform actively used for recruitment by companies. It is also an excellent platform for technical sourcing.

You can use LinkedIn to browse candidates’ profiles and check out their qualifications, experience, and other relevant information. You can also use the platform to build a network to find candidates for future technical sourcing.

2. Freelancing websites

Freelancing websites are also used for technical sourcing, where you can select suitable candidates by posting a job requirement. Once you post a job requirement, freelancers will start bidding on the project, and you can shortlist the candidates who seem to be a good fit.

You can communicate with your shortlisted candidates to evaluate their skills and assess their work reviews from previous projects to ensure their work quality before hiring.

3. Job posting platforms

There are plenty of platforms on the web which are specially dedicated to job postings. Job posting platforms allow targeted technical sourcing. You can create and post a job description stating your requirements and benefits.

Once you do that, interested candidates who match the skill and experience requirements will send in applications. You can simply go through those applications and find the right fit for the job.

4. Technical recruiting platforms

Technical recruiting platforms can also be used as ideal technical sourcing platforms. The main advantage of switching to these platforms is that they help you find suitable candidates willing to apply for new jobs.

You can choose qualified candidates from a pool of available and skilled talent. Some of these platforms are

• Turing’s Intelligent Talent Cloud
• HackerRank
• HackerNoon

5. Github and StackOverflow

GitHub and StackOverflow are developers’ communities. Technical professionals on these platforms share their work, knowledge, and experiences with various technologies and upgrades.

Many of these tech professionals actively look for new career opportunities as well. You can use these platforms for technical sourcing and get a list of suitable candidates for a job.

6. Staffing companies

Staffing companies maintain a pool of candidates for fast technical sourcing. All you have to do is pay a fee to access their talent pool and get a list of candidates who specialize in the job you are offering.

These companies also offer dedicated teams where each member is carefully selected to match the job profile. However, you will have to conduct technical vetting to evaluate the quality of work before hiring.

Understand the importance of warm talent outreach

The most crucial step in the technical sourcing process is reaching out to potential candidates. You should approach candidates with warm talent outreach to succeed in your technical recruiting sourcing strategies.

Warm talent outreach is about being genuine, direct, and warm with every communication you make with the candidates. It is an initiative to attract potential candidates who have already reached out to your company or have been in contact earlier.

Outreaching these candidates for technical sourcing can help you find qualified talent. Show your enthusiasm and craft an email encouraging them to apply for the job. Like marketing emails, technical sourcing emails should also attract your targeted readers. In this case, the readers are job candidates. For warm talent outreach, here are some essential elements that you need to consider:

1. Keep it crisp and concise: If you are targeting skilled and experienced candidates, there are chances that they already have access to various job opportunities. Many other technical sourcing recruiters could reach out to such experienced candidates through email. So, make sure to keep your email crisp and concise to grab the attention of your targeted candidates.

2. Keep it specific: Create a robust job picture for your targeted candidates. Communicate about the role, state why they should be interested, and mention the next steps they can take to make their way through the hiring process. You can also end your email by inviting them for a one-on-one conversation.

3. Give it a personal touch: Giving a personal touch to your technical sourcing emails is a great way to get traction from potential candidates. So, begin by writing an eye-catchy and interesting subject line. Check out their work profile and mention which of their past work drives your interest in hiring them. Doing so can trigger candidates’ interest and help you source suitable candidates.

Conclusion

Technical sourcing can be challenging if you do not perform it with a dedicated approach and the right set of sourcing tools for technical recruiters. That is why, as a technical sourcing recruiter, you must pay attention to all the factors that impact candidates’ interest in any job.

You should begin by understanding the technicalities associated with the job and then get to the right sourcing channels. These sourcing channels can be freelance websites, job posting platforms, staffing companies, etc.

In the end, make sure to know what your targeted candidates want and understand the importance of warm talent outreach to frame technical sourcing strategies accordingly.