jsync | Java Staffing Specialist

JSync Client Survey Results

02/06/2008

compiled by Dave Fecak

Over the course of my career I’ve represented thousands of candidates, and all of them have posed questions regarding interview techniques, resume building, hot technologies, etc. I have always tried to provide the best possible answers, which are usually condensed from my experiences with our clients. For this month’s column, I thought it would be valuable to our readers to cut out the middleman (“me”) and give you a peek inside the heads of some local hiring managers.

I contacted five hiring managers from five distinct jsync clients to ask a series of questions about what they look for and what scares them in the course of hiring talent for their teams. I recognize that different companies look for different candidates and characteristics, so I posed these questions to managers from diverse backgrounds and hiring situations. The companies they represent range from under 40 to several thousand employees. There are newly formed software shops and decades-old publicly held companies, and the software experience of the managers themselves is also quite disparate. Although this is a diverse group, I hope you can recognize some ‘universal truths’ in their answers.

NOTE – jsync thanks the managers that made this possible!

Q: What is the most common mistake candidates make during an interview?

MGR A: “Not admitting they do not know something. It is far better to admit that you don’t understand something than to try and bluff your way through it.”

MGR B: “Not reviewing their resume and not being prepared to discuss in detail the projects and technologies listed on the resume is too common, and inexcusable. If you don’t know a technology well enough to talk about it for a few minutes and to field a few detailed questions, don’t include it on your resume. The same goes for project involvement. I can discuss projects I did from 15 years ago, so I expect that candidates will be able to do the same.”

MGR C: “The most common, and frustrating, mistake is the inability to completely and fully explain previous experience and responsibilities. We rejected many candidates because we just couldn’t tell the depth and understanding of their experience. Sometimes it’s because the candidate really doesn’t have a perspective on the overall picture and how they fit into it, but more often candidates just don’t give forethought to explaining their experience, projects, roles, and responsibilities. Tech candidates focus too much on being able to answer the technical questions well and not at all on being able to explain their place in the project ecosystem. They often seem to think that it’s not their place to understand/validate project decisions (tech and non-tech) and just to write code. In any world, but especially in the Agile world, you need employees who can be empowered and take ownership, and having insight is a key attribute to making that work.”

MGR D: “Candidates seem to be focused on giving the right answer and they don’t ask enough smart questions, which often leads to slight misunderstandings and slightly-off-the-mark answers. I’m often more impressed by candidates asking the right insightful questions than I am by candidates who jump to a conclusion and rattle off an answer.”

MGR E: “Candidates talk over a poor phone connection during an initial interview. We understand it’s often hard for candidates to get away and we try to work with them in that regard. However, all too often candidates will call from a busy room with lots of background noise or call from an area with poor cell reception. If we can’t hear candidates, then we can’t learn what they have to offer.”

Q: What do you see as the most desirable skill(s) most candidates seem to lack in today’s marketplace?

MGR A: “I don’t know of any skills that most seem to lack. Everyone is so different.”

MGR B: “Good written communication skills are hard to come by in this market. I routinely receive resumes with typos, grammatical errors, and misspellings, which at one time would have resulted in the resume getting tossed in the trash can, no questions asked. In today’s market, I can’t be so stringent. However, I will not hire someone who can’t write, so in the end, written communication is a key factor. So much of what we do as developers depends on being able to clearly and concisely communicate through writing. Verbal communication skills are important as well, but they seem easier to come by than the written communication skills.”

MGR C: “Software development has gotten much more difficult over the past 20 years and, as a result, software developers need to have a wide range of skills in addition to their technical skills. They need to be effective team members, effective leaders, effective communicators, and they need to understand business decisions as well as technical decisions. All too often, we find candidates with solid technical skills and no or few soft skills or awareness that soft skills are a critical component to being an effective employee. In some cases, this can be extreme and candidates pride themselves on behavior that is counter to working well with others.”

MGR D: “I’m not sure if it is a skill or a trait, but many candidates we see have a hard time stepping outside the box. We see a lot of developers (especially high level architects) that can regurgitate book solutions, but when confronted with a slightly different problem statement they can’t adapt. As a corollary, candidates seem to hold tight to complicated solutions (WS-*, J2EE EJB’s, etc.) even when simpler solutions may be more appropriate.”

MGR E: “The ability to teach/mentor others. Many candidates demonstrate mastery of Java syntax and theory. However, candidates often cannot clearly and accurately describe the systems on which they have worked in terms that people not acquainted with the systems can understand. They cannot describe the specific roles they played on their projects. Also, their past careers may have demonstrated that they are ‘loners’”.

Q: How much weight do you give to certification (i.e. Sun Certified Java Developer)? Advanced Degrees?

MGR A: “I don’t think the SCJP or SCJD tell me anything about a candidate. The exams are easy to pass and many unskilled programmers have these certificates. For advanced degrees, it matters from what school and in what discipline. I am interested in what someone did for a thesis, but if it is an advanced degree that was just classwork I find it less impressive.”

MGR B: “They are nice to have, not need to have. Being certified doesn’t make a person a good developer, but the test is difficult enough (at least when I took it back in ’99) that you are forced to learn a bunch of good Java facts in order to pass it. Advanced degrees are not proof of good development skills either. My three best developers do not have advanced degrees or the Java certification, and in fact, one of them doesn’t even have a technical degree.”

MGR C: “Quite honestly, I shy away from candidates that are too focused on certification. Certifications are generally a waste of time because they really don’t enhance the skills of the employee. Until someone puts in a certification process where real world criteria are a part of the process, and passing the certification is a non-trivial task, then they will continue to be of little value. Ironically, I did support employees getting certified because it was important to them, especially those with a tendency to value those things. I value advanced degrees when those degrees are from good schools and offer some specialization (e.g., advanced degree in AI). Generalized advanced degrees from the corporate night schools are of little value.”

MGR D: “I give no weight to certifications and only partial weight to advanced degrees. Many of the best hires we’ve had are not certified, nor do they have advanced degrees. Often ‘street cred’, like participation in open source projects or battle scars from working with high volume production systems will score a candidate more points.”

MGR E: “We give certifications little weight – we can usually tell a strong developer from their interviews. Advanced degrees get significant weight – especially those with advanced technical (CIS/MIS) degrees.”

Q: What is the most common ‘red flag issue’ you observe on resumes?

MGR A: “Misspellings. It amazes me how few people have spell check. Generally bad formatting is a real turn off. Always submit a resume in PDF, it really lets you control the look and feel of it. The second big red flag is the seven page resume. Get it down to two pages, three max. I don’t need to know that you worked at the supermarket when you were 18.”

MGR B: “Date gaps between jobs cause concern. Badly written resumes are too common and a cause for concern. Also, candidates tend to put every technology that they have ever heard of on the resume. This gets exposed easily in an interview if they don’t know what they are talking about.”

MGR C: “Claims of grand achievements when the timeline/role obviously don’t support such a claim. I was looking at a resume recently where a candidate claimed to have architected/designed/built a very complex piece of software for a large company but only spent 6 months there. Another red flag is the ‘too many buzzwords’ problem. It’s amazing how many candidates have been rejected because they put a technology/tool/etc. on their resume and can’t answer the first thing about it.”

MGR D: “Diploma mills. DON’T DO IT. A PhD from a diploma mill is worse than no PhD at all.”

MGR E: “Very long descriptions of jobs (especially short term engagements). Usually if a resume is over 3 or 4 pages, it’s a sign that the candidate is overcompensating or overstating their experience.”

Q: What one or two characteristics or attributes do most of your hires share?

MGR A: “Intelligence and curiosity.”

MGR B: “Good communication skills and a willingness to master the business domain that our systems support. I like to have developers that are business savvy, and recognize that we are here to solve a business problem. If we can justify the use of the newest, coolest technology to solve that problem, then we will do so. If the newest, coolest technology is not appropriate, then we have to recognize that and accept it.”

MGR C: “Smart and likes to get things done. I can tolerate all sorts of other issues but if they are not clever or just like to spend their time mulling over issues, I have no patience.”

MGR D: “A passion for tough problems and elegant solutions.”

MGR E: “To quote Joel On Software: ‘Smart’ and ‘Get Things Done’. A smart developer can learn our environment; and one who gets things done learns quickly and can become a key contributor.”

About the managers

Q: What is your best estimate as to the percentage of candidates that you/your team interviews that are extended an offer?

MGR A: “About 10-20% of people who had face-to-face interviews were offered a position.”

MGR B: “Less than 10%. For each open position, I phone screen candidates before they come in for face-to-face interviews. Because I am using companies like jsync, my hit rate is higher. If I did everything through my own recruiters, I would be well below 10%.”

MGR C: “Around 10%.”

MGR D: “I’d guess 20% make it through phone screens and 20% of face-to-face interviews are extended offers. So, roughly 4%.”

MGR E: “20-30% make it past our phone screen, 60-80% get job offers after on-site interviews.”

Q: How many developers or architects report to you (directly or indirectly)?

MGR A: “20”

MGR B: “26”

MGR C: “210 (local), 300+ (abroad)”

MGR D: “About 15”

MGR E: “10”

Q: What specific technologies will you be looking to hire for in 2008?

MGR A: “I’m seeing a LOT of RubyOnRails, especially in start-ups.”

MGR B: “OO design and development, Web Services related technologies, Java.”

MGR C: “The Java/J2EE stack, Agile experience.”

MGR D: “Like it or not, Web Services and SOA are hot. So we are looking for people with WS-*, WSDL, and SOAP experience, with special emphasis on security – especially single sign-on and federated identity management (e.g. SAML and OpenID). Candidates should understand some of the evolving RIA technologies such as Flex and JavaScript, and how they interact with back-end systems.”

MGR E: “Spring, ESB”

Q: Why are you looking to hire in this specific area (as opposed to hiring remotely or offshore)?

MGR A: “I am looking for developers who don’t just write code, but who can understand a business problem and derive a technical solution. In a start-up environment, you do not always have all the answers. I need people who can listen on sales calls, read our product development plan, and make it happen. This is hard to do unless you are sitting next to the other members of your team.”

MGR B: “If it looks like a long term need, I would rather invest in a full-time local resource, since there is a considerable learning curve for this business domain.”

MGR C: “We’re 110% committed to Agile and it requires co-located teams. Also, only certain types of projects/work can be offshored effectively. Projects requiring deep domain expertise, deep experience building enterprise class software, and close proximity to customers can’t be offshored.”

MGR E: “The best and most rewarding action is done in-person, on-site.”

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