No matter how long and complex Boolean you write, it will miss a significant percentage of qualified Software Developer candidates. Search on – or X-Ray – LinkedIn, Github, Gitlab, dev.to, Stackoverflow, HackerRank, Reddit, Slack, Discord, or Twitter – and you will still miss them.
Consider this. You can search by (“preferred”) programming language and location on Github. But many Github members do not write code for a living – they are students, professors, retirees, managers who miss coding, and so on. Staying on Github, you won’t know that; user profiles do not even have a field for the job title. Meanwhile, you can search by the job title on LinkedIn, but a significant percentage of professionals with the requested programming language skills (who are popular on Github) have barely mentioned the language name on LinkedIn.
Combining knowledge and data from several sources uncovers “invisible” talent.
My followers know I have been obsessed with cross-referencing profiles, in particular, in technical recruiting, Github and LinkedIn (only because it works!). It finds prospects who did not fully reveal their professional background on any one platform. But that is not the only way to tap into that hidden talent pool.
Here is a complementary approach. Do your research and find which companies or teams use the required technology. There is a good chance all Developers on the team use it, whether they have been vocal about it or not.
As a simple example, running a recent sourcing project, I saw many North-American Developers at Shopify write in Ruby. It looked like it was the language of choice for the team. So, if I search on LinkedIn and find Developers at Shopify with no summaries and no recent job descriptions (a turn-off for Recruiters!) but Ruby in the skills or past job experience, I can safely assume that they currently use Ruby. I would also have a good guess at the years of experience with the language if they used it at past jobs. It is like reading between the lines. 😀
If you think you would benefit from sourcing ideas and practical advice on how to uncover untapped technical talent, join Master Sourcer David Galley for a unique free webinar
10 Essential Steps for Sourcing “Invisible” IT Talent
Wednesday, August 31st at 17:00 CEST / 8 a.m. PDT
Incidentally, the webinar’s sponsor is AmazingHiring, a tool that helps to uncover technical talent based on multiple sources. If you are hiring IT talent, give it a try.