State of

Developer

Recruitment

2020

Methodology

'Things have changed', said every recruiter and hiring manager we spoke with during this year. Processes, policies, people - everything has undergone a complete overhaul. But by how much? How incisive were the upheavals brought about by COVID?

We asked over 2000 recruiters and hiring managers to help us distill this shift into hard facts.

The Developer Recruitment Survey 2020 is made up of responses from over 2500 recruiters and hiring managers in the tech world. Here’s an introduction to the kind folks who took our global survey:

About 30% of recruiters say their talent pool increased post-COVID.

While the majority (33.08%) say that they couldn't see a significant uptick in their candidate pool, we can see the effects of remote hiring come into play here. The second significant cohort - 30.7% - is of respondents who said that remote hiring had increased their sourcing funnel.

LinkedIn and internal referrals were the channels of choice when sourcing. Job portals and careers pages have also been significant contributors to job applications this year.

Hackathons are the preferred way to engage with developers.

Regardless of company size, most recruiters say that hackathons have proven to be an effective mode of engagement. Despite the pandemic, virtual hackathons have been effective in both hiring as well as internal engagement.

Coding contests and workshops were the other popular methods of engaging with the community this year.

Diversity hiring has been a priority for most.

It was impossible to stay blind to the topic of diversity and inclusion in 2020. Except for recruiters from early-stage startups, most respondents said that they had prioritized diversity in tech hiring despite COVID-related constraints.

Over 47% of millennials want to work at diverse companies but tech’s lack of diversity and unconscious bias have always been a problem. Hopefully, 2020 will help companies make strides in the right direction.

Time-to-Hire remains unchanged for most recruiters, post-COVID.

Across the board, most recruiters say that their Time-to-Hire (TTH) remained unaffected despite the pandemic. However, a significant number of recruiters in enterprises said that it took longer to hire the right talent, post-COVID.

As companies continue to identify unique priorities based on the new needs of employees and customers, they need skilled developers who can enable both change and transformation. With COVID and the need to augment traditional human interaction, finding the right talent will be even more important for recruiters.

Cost-per-Hire remains unchanged due to COVID.

Most recruiters working in enterprises said that they saw no change in their Cost-per-Hire (CPH), presumably because they have the right processes and tools in place; thus avoiding delays and extra costs.

A significant number of respondents across other company sizes said that their Cost-per-Hire had decreased this year. This could be attributed to the adoption of newer, non-traditional methods of tech recruitment. Adopting remote hiring techniques has definitely made processes more cost-effective.

Hiring Managers actively look for problem solving skills in junior developers and system design in seasoned candidates.

Different skill sets are prioritized for developers with different degrees of experience. For candidates with over 6 years' experience, System Architecture becomes a valuable skill. Problem solving, however, remains a desired skill across all experience levels.

Full Stack is the hardest role to assess.

Evaluating a candidate’s coding skills is hard, both with and without a tool. According to our analysis, Full Stack, Data Science, and Machine Learning roles topped the charts.

Reason: these roles are an amalgamation of multiple skills, and creating customized tests and accurate assessment parameters for each can be difficult.

Accuracy in evaluation is the most important capability of an assessment tool.

Accuracy in evaluation is an important criteria for hiring managers who use a virtual assessment platform for tech hiring.

They also swear by its power to save time in logistics and travel, eliminate unconscious bias, and improve overall candidate experience.

Accuracy in evaluation is the prime reason for non-users to make the switch.

As previously stated, non-users say that accuracy remains the top reason to switch over to an assessment tool, but they’d also consider using a tool to eliminate bias and standardize their hiring.

In India, 13% of the respondents chose bias-free hiring as their main reason to use an assessment tool.

In the absence of a coding assessment platform, recruiters look at skills and experience to screen developers.

We were, however, thrilled to see that for most recruiters a candidate’s pedigree ranked low on the radar, and skill-based hiring has been gaining popularity with 21.5% of recruiters choosing this over other options.

COVID has accelerated the shift towards remote hiring tools. Of the respondents who weren't using an assessment tool before COVID, 42% have now become adopters. In India, this figure increases to 47%.

Video conferencing platforms are the most popular method for conducting coding interviews remotely.

Video conferencing software like Zoom have been a favorite for conducting interviews, but they lack built-in code editing features. Meaning that most tech hiring managers had no way to assess a candidate’s coding capabilities in real time. An encouraging trend here is the uptick in managers who prefer coding interview tools over other methods. Hiring managers seem to love the flexibility that coding interview tools offer, both in terms of logistics as well as time saved.

It's no wonder, given that these tools, with their built-in features like pair-programming and real-time code editing, are tailor-made to enhance interview quality and candidate experience.

Collaborative code editing is the top reason to make the switch to coding interview tools.

Both recruiters and hiring managers attest that collaborative code editors are a huge benefit of coding interview tools, and see value in their developer-friendly user experience. Further, most managers look for good communication skills, a nice temperament, and culture fit. Yes, despite COVID, culture fit remains a priority while hiring tech talent.

Aligning on required skills is the biggest pain point for recruiters and hiring managers.

Finding common ground with the hiring manager has always been a sore issue for recruiters. They say that aligning necessary skill sets for a role, as well as defining a benchmark for candidate quality are the most difficult parts of the process. Communication, too, seems to be a problem for recruiters and hiring managers alike.

Across the board, sourcing remains the foremost challenge for all tech recruiters.

Building a robust talent pipeline remains the foremost priority for all recruiters. As the company size increases, we see that the focus on eliminating bias from the hiring process starts to take precedence.

More recruiters from larger companies say that this is an important challenge as compared to recruiters from smaller startups.

Hiring managers still believe in ‘knowing’ their candidates before an interview.

We asked hiring managers how comfortable they were with blind recruiting practices. Across the board, blind hiring seems not to have too many takers as most managers think personal information helps break the ice in tech interviews.

Our take: HackerEarth has always believed in skills being the most important currency in the tech world. We stand by skill-based, objective tech hiring which allows every developer a fair chance, and encourage bling recruiting practices as a step forward in the right direction.

Companies believe in actively training recruiters to recognize and remove unconscious biases.

In the hiring process, bias seeps in when we prefer one candidate over another based solely on first impressions. A hiring manager's preference for personal information captured on a candidate's resume can be a breeding ground for unconscious biases, but thankfully our recruiters say that they are aware of how real the threat is. When asked about how they challenge these biases, the overwhelming majority said that they train hiring managers to recognize their personal prejudices and hire objectively.

AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) would be the most in-demand skills.

This is in tune with the trends we have seen so far. With growing opportunities for AI and ML specialists in industries as diverse as banking, fintech, public safety, and healthcare, there will be a surge in these roles in the coming days. Our respondents think 2021 will be the year.

AI, Natural Language Programming, and automation will become a norm in tech hiring.

Our survey has reiterated the fact that manual practices in tech hiring only lead to more loopholes, inefficiency, and challenges for both recruiters and hiring managers. The shift to automation that began a few years ago will now include AI and NLP-based tools with the potential to remove subconscious biases from the hiring process, and save time while screening and assessing.

Health insurance and flexible work hours will be in-demand perks due to the pandemic.

COVID has changed the nature of perks and EVPs which companies can use to attract talent. While a work-from-home fund and wellness breaks are good to have, recruiters said that more developers were asking about upskilling opportunities than before - proving once more that skills are the only currency in the tech world.

Coding platforms and bootcamps will continue to be the preferred ways of upskilling.

This echoes what we found in our Developer Survey, earlier in 2020. As tech stacks grow and change frequently, it will become even more important for managers to keep a continuous check on their team’s skills before organizing customized bootcamps or coding challenges.

And if 2020 was but a dream...

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