Navigating the intricacies of hiring the perfect candidate is a daunting task for the HR professional at the best of times – regardless of the role. However, when the objective is to secure top-tier technical talent to help your business thrive, the pressure and complexities multiply tenfold.

Unless you’re a hiring manager with specific technical skills that directly relate to the role you’re recruiting for, knowing what to ask your candidates can be a tough gig.

As well as the process being challenging to the HR themselves, without effective assessments, you can end up with mismatches between candidates and roles that can cost the rest of your team and your business dearly.

Unfortunately this isn’t as rare an occurrence as you may expect. A recent survey revealed that three-quarters of UK businesses are failing to conduct any form of digital competency tests, while one-third rely on non-technical specialists to recruit for their technical roles.

These significant flaws in the recruitment process have left the vast majority of businesses (93%) with new technical hires unable to deliver immediate value, and nearly half (45%) with newly hired employees lacking essential skills and needing further investment.

To avoid this scenario and strengthen your chance at both talent retention and competitiveness, read on for my step-by-step advice to aid you with the process:

1. Define the role accurately: Before you get to the interview stage, one of the most important aspects of recruitment is accurately defining the role you’re hiring for. If the job description clearly outlines the responsibilities, skills, and qualifications required for the role, you’ll attract suitable candidates who possess the necessary expertise and experience, reducing the risk of mismatches. It also helps HR managers to target the right talent pool and filter out irrelevant applicants more effectively, saving time and resources in the process.
2. Assess complex technical problem-solving skills: Next, it’s important that successful candidates aren’t just put through a standard interview process. Rather, they should be evaluated based on their ability to analyse problems, propose effective solutions, and communicate their thought processes clearly – only then can you gauge their proficiency in tackling complex technical challenges and select individuals who demonstrate the problem-solving capabilities necessary for success in the role. This can be achieved with technical interviews tailored to the role. However, in order to tailor the process and ask the right questions at the interview stage, you’ll need an acute understanding and experience of the role, or to find someone else that does.
3. Validate technical expertise: The following step is to thoroughly assess candidates’ technical abilities. Rather than bypassing any testing – which can lead to putting an excessive amount of candidates through to the next stage – skill sets should be validated by utilising technical specialists. This process not only helps mitigate the risk of hiring individuals who may lack the requisite expertise, but also ensures that the selected candidates can contribute meaningfully to the organisation from day one; something that’s particularly important in increasingly popular project-based work. So whether your candidate’s proficiency needs to be tested in coding languages, software development methodologies or system architectures, ensure that whoever is validating the skills needed, understands those skills inside and out.
4. Don’t underestimate the importance of collaboration and communication skills: Candidates who demonstrate effective communication, collaboration, and interpersonal skills such as empathy are much more likely to work well with colleagues and contribute positively to team dynamics. And, while technical expertise is imperative, complex technical problem-solving often requires collaboration and teamwork to get the job done, meaning a combination of these strong soft skills with technical expertise is the key to a truly well-rounded and competitive team. It’s a synergy that not only ensures team members possess the technical know-how, but also emphasises the importance of how tasks are carried out – including the ability to understand and appreciate the perspectives of others.
5. Identify gaps and opportunities for continuous learning: Once you’ve made your hire, to ensure the ongoing growth and development of your new – and existing – employees, it’s vital you keep an eye on any skills/knowledge gaps and new learning opportunities – a point even more pertinent in a rapidly-evolving technological environment. Failing to invest in the modernisation of your own technology team may mean you need to acquire more expensive, pre-trained professionals from the market, based on prevailing market conditions. This, in turn, can result in the team becoming “outdated” in their knowledge stack and eventually being replaced, or even leave them open to new cyber threats, which can potentially surpass the pace at which an in-house team can organically develop its expertise. As such, whether you opt for a “nurture and grow” approach that requires a one-time investment of time and money, or continually restructure the existing tech team with the associated ongoing costs of continuous transformation, a strategic decision is crucial.

While leveraging in-house expertise to address this advice can be a great option for some businesses, for others, third party experts should be considered. For example, in the situation where you’re hiring for a new domain knowledge/skill set or where you or your internal team lacks time, capacity or expertise for one or several parts of the recruitment process, external recruitment sources can bring fresh perspectives, specialised expertise and can:

• Validate hard skills and domain knowledge beyond the organisation’s expertise.
• Use industry-standard technical assessments to verify technical proficiency.
• Use technical interviews conducted by subject matter experts in collaboration with hiring managers.
• Be indispensable when it comes to gaining up-to-date insights and knowledge on cyber threats, and staying ahead of the industry’s rapid advancements in tech.

The bottom line here is that businesses failing to address the above advice increasingly find themselves recruiting the wrong people for the wrong roles; a situation costing businesses critical time and money in what are unpredictable economic times. If external support is what’s needed to change the processes for hiring technical talent, then it’s an investment that should not be overlooked.