The netPolarity Blog

“I have a list of technical user groups and post my open positions, but I don’t get much of a reply.”

Hilarious, right? I take it back. If this is you, you probably don’t think it’s all that funny because you’re probably dealing with a very unhappy and unsympathetic hiring manager.

We’re here to help. Join us on Thursday, May 16, 2013 at 11am PST for an information-packed webinar on Sourcing Technical User Groups. (Click here to register.)

Everyone thinks Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn when we say “social media,” completely forgetting that user groups have not only been around a lot longer than these communities, but that they are more useful than ever to recruiters, especially when sourcing for very specialized skillsets.
While recruiters still use these online communities in their search efforts, many don’t go beyond hope and pray — post requirements and pray for replies — with disappointing results.

In this webinar, netPolarity Sourcing Manager and MARS Head Instructor Mark Tortorici will shed light on technical user groups, and forums and show attendees how to actively mine these online communities using advanced sourcing tricks to make the most out of them, exponentially expanding your talent pool for passive and hard-to-reach candidates. We will focus on technology-specific user groups, diversity-related groups, and other technical groups & forums like Github and Stackoverflow.

Of course, in true Mark Tortorici fashion, we will also go through search string examples that you can immediately put to use after the webinar.

On our previous post, we shared with you the things we look for when hiring raw recruiting talent.

On the other side of the netPolarity equation — our flagship — is sourcing.

“Sourcers are of a different breed and it’s not as easy to spot one just looking at a resume or even interviewing,” netPolarity founder and President David Chuang said. “We use a different set of criteria when we look for sourcers.”

What do we look for in a resume? People who come from some type of technical background – IT, software development, QA – are great candidates to become Sourcing Analysts at netPolarity. Programming as a hobby? That works, too.

“Our sourcers process huge amounts of information,” David said. “We can teach a person advanced search methodologies, but he or she needs to be the type of person that enjoys sorting through massive piles of data all day long,” David said. “Not everyone can do that.”

“Sourcers tend to be more left-brained,” netPolarity President David Chuang said. “We look for analytical people,” David said. “It’s a little harder to spot a good sourcer than it is to identify a recruiter because the trait we are looking for isn’t always evident in a resume.”

If we must put a name to that specific trait we look for: geekiness. Recruiters are naturally curious about people, sourcers tend to be extra curious about technology and information. They get excited about the latest gadgets, the most recent software updates and they can’t help but tweak things.

“We look for that troubleshooting mentality,” David said. “They tend to be the do-it-yourself type. They are the types that will jailbreak their iPhones or spend a sleepless night working on a personal project.”

Exhibit A: Sourcing Analyst Chris Schwacofer’s Macho Man Randy Savage costume, which he worked on for weeks leading up to Halloween. He sewed the entire costume himself.

“Not everyone gets their sense of humor,” David added. “Their unique personalities definitely make netPolarity a more interesting place.”

This is quite true about the sourcing analysts we currently have at netPolarity. Exhibit B.

“I guess you can say they are the opposite of a recruiter. Sourcers deal with information, recruiters deal with people.”

netPolarity’s service delivery infrastructure, however, is still team-based so we can’t quite do away with interpersonal skills. They still have to partner with recruiters and their account executives.

“Forming teams with the right mix of personalities isn’t easy, but when done right, you get incredible results,” David said. “We’ve been doing this for years; we have it down to a science.”

Did you read this post and think, “that’s me!”? Send us an email and attach your resume!

Writing a resume is a science. Every element from the chronology (to reverse or not to reverse?), to the layout (paragraphs or bullets?), to the objective (leave it off… well, just leave it off) must serve a specific purpose. A wrong move or poor decision regarding your resume’s content can instantly remove you from consideration. With so many variables to consider, there are two simple phrases everyone should remove from their resumes:

"Participated in" and "Involved with"

These two phrases are guaranteed to move your resume from the consideration pile to the trash heap. To begin with, they are weak descriptors. Worse, they make a candidate sound unqualified. Being “involved with” something or “participating in” some aspect of a job implies your role was peripheral and that you do not command the skills or expertise required of a position. From a recruiter, sourcer or hiring manager’s perspective, a candidate who was involved with quality assurance testing is not as strong as someone who unit tested a java-based application or black-box tested a piece of software, even if you happen to be the greatest tester on Earth.

When sifting through hundreds of resumes from qualified applicants, hiring managers and recruiters are in a position to be selective, and chances are they will go with the candidate who is clearly doing the job as opposed to the candidate who was “involved with” or “participated in” the role.

So take a look at your resume. If you see these either of these phrases remove them immediately. You don’t want to imply to a hiring manager or staffing professional that you are not the right candidate for their openings.

Matthew Ferree is the Lead Technical Sourcer  at netPolarity and is one of our talented instructors, training the next generation of super-sourcers and recruiters under our in-house MARS-Elite program. You can also read more from Matt on his personal blog, Reqt.

Happy new year and welcome to our first blog post of 2012!

Something about the changing of the calendar year makes it a magical time. It symbolizes a fresh start for many people, hence, the tradition of making resolutions.

In the workplace, this presents a great opportunity to introduce, reinforce or promote initiatives. I can’t think of any other time when people are generally receptive and open to new ideas.

Find a way to tie it in with your employees’ new year’s resolutions and you’ve got yourself an easy win. Supporting employees’ new year’s resolutions can be beneficial to your organization in more ways than one. It can help improve your employer brand, boost morale and increase participation for key initiatives. This can translate to increased revenues resulting from an energized employee base and lower costs.

Getting fit, eating healthy and losing weight are not only among the most common new year’s resolutions in America, achieving these things can directly impact an organization.  Studies show that energetic employees are more productive. Improving general health can also lower healthcare costs and reduce absenteeism due to illness.

You don’t necessarily have to spend a lot of money on health and wellness programs to support these resolutions. Here are some suggestions you can implement for your own organization, some taken directly from the netPolarity playbook. Enjoy!

Encourage employees to form exercise groups.
Here at netPolarity, our employees take advantage of nearby trails and parks to keep fit. We have several groups that run at lunch, and a group that plays basketball after work. This not only helps keep energy levels up, it builds camaraderie and reinforces the team mentality which is critical to our business.

Encourage employees to form weight-loss support groups.
Goals are always easier to achieve when you have  support from your peers. Same is true for weight-loss, which is why groups like Weight Watchers and apps like myfitnesspal.com are so effective. These groups are easy to form in the workplace if you have enough people with the same goals (and chances are, you do). Just by virtue of being around each other, dieting employees can encourage each other, trade recipes, share lunches. Most importantly, having a weight-loss group at work provides crisis support. A dieting employee with an unsatisfied hankering for a chocolate bar at 2pm can be a cranky and unpleasant person to be around and can negatively impact everyone else. Having a support group to talk that person out of that craving can help save that employee’s waist line and everyone else’s day.

Weight-loss contests.
Make weight-loss fun by doing a contest, a la Biggest Loser. Participants put x-dollars into a pot, person who loses the most percentage body fat wins the whole thing. Ten people paying $50 each makes for a $500 prize — a nice sum to win — on top of achieving goals. Weight-loss contests not only provide a fun way to support employees in their weight-loss goals, it can also help spark that competitive spirit in them.

Reinforce the message through internal communications.
If you have an employee newsletter or an intranet for internal communications, wellness topics can be an infinite source of content. From low-calorie/cholesterol/fat recipes, to exercise tips, the possibilities are limited only by your creativity.

Here at netPolarity, we publish a “Do List” on Fridays, which features ideas for weekend activities, encouraging our employees to “go outside and play.” The idea is that fun, active weekends make for a happy back-to-work Monday. (Need any ideas for your own Do List? You can sign up to receive ours! I promise not to send you anything else and my  feelings won’t get hurt if you unsubscribe.)

Got any employee health and wellness ideas to share? Please feel free to leave a comment below or email me: lisaa at netpolarity dot com.

Happy 2012!

Lisa Amorao is netPolarity’s marketing manager, blog admin, lead Twitter skipper and a self-proclaimed weekend adventurist. Lisa’s staffing industry experience spans more than 12 years, with roles in recruiting and account management leading up to her marketing career.

You can connect with Lisa on LinkedIn or follow her on Twitter: @netPolarity.

This cartoon is funny but it’s also true. The problem with many sourcers and recruiters in the business these days is a lack of understanding with the jobs they are working on.

As staffing professionals, we are required to source and recruit on technical reqs all day long. If you only have a surface-level understanding of the technology (“Do you have C++ programming experience? Great!”), then you will only land surface-level candidates (ones who will say yes to ANY job).

Understanding the technology in the jobs you work on is vital. Not only does it give a better idea of what the job is about, but it will give you much more credibility with your candidates (hiring managers too!). So how do you get a better understanding? Well, you can start with the tools that are available to everyone:

Answers.com is a good place to start for most technology terms and concepts. It is not just Wikipedia. It is an aggregator of encyclopedias & dictionaries that includes Computer Encyclopedia, Wikipedia, Acronym Finder, Encyclopedia Britannica, and Merriam Webster to name a few. But don’t stop there. There will be times when you have to search Google for lists of technology or product information that is not available on Answers.com.

For example, if you need a c++ software engineer who works at the file-system level for network storage devices, then you can’t use a simple string. Most engineers put c++ on their resumes even though they really don’t have the experience. And if you just put in “storage” then you might get higher level SW developers or even systems-level engineers.
First, do a string to capture developers:

(“software engineer” OR programmer OR developer OR “c++ engineer”) AND c++

Next, research and add the different file systems that are used for network storage devices (there are many more besides these):

(“software engineer” OR programmer OR developer OR “c++ engineer”) AND c++ AND (nfs OR vfs OR cifs OR samba OR xfs OR “file system”)

Then, add in the companies/storage technologies. You can research these on Answers.com as well:

(“software engineer” OR programmer OR developer OR “c++ engineer”) AND c++ AND (nfs OR vfs OR cifs OR samba OR xfs OR “storage file system”) AND (netapp OR emc OR hds OR nas OR “hitachi data” OR “network storage”)

Finally, if this is a string for Google, then add in some operators to get resumes:

(inurl:resume OR intitle:resume OR inurl:cv OR intitle:cv OR inurl:vitae OR intitle:vitae) (“software engineer” OR programmer OR developer OR “c++ engineer”) AND c++ AND (nfs OR vfs OR cifs OR samba OR xfs OR “storage file system”) AND (netapp OR emc OR hds OR nas OR “hitachi data” OR “network storage”)

That is a very quick and easy way to break down the specifics of one technical requirement from a hiring manager. Obviously there are other specifics like location and job function/level that play into this, but at least by getting the basics down, you will be able to build from them.

I will be hosting a post-Sourcecon wrap-up event in November at the main offices of netPolarity. There will be some good presentations, tweetups, networking, food & drinks. Make sure you sign up if you would like to go, as space is limited. There will be many past graduates of my training programs and sourcing experts from the industry. You can contact Lisa Amorao for more info about the event: lisaa (at) netpolarity (dot) com and please contact me about training for sourcers & recruiters: markt (at) netpolarity (dot) com

- Mark

#sourcing #training #sourcecon #netpolarity

I was recently chatting with the teller at my local credit union and she noticed that I am now depositing a paycheck instead of the checks made out to me as a consultant. I mentioned that I had  decided to go back into full-time employment after a 7-month sabbatical.

“That’s great you were able to get back to work when you decided to,” she said. “not everyone is as lucky. It looks pretty depressing out there, I keep hearing about layoffs everywhere,” she said.

Always trying to spread a little ray of sunshine wherever and whenever I can, I told my teller that we are actually experiencing the contrary. I explained that I work for a staffing firm and that we are hiring left and right for our Fortune 1000 clients.

She seemed confused. But I get it. With the news media trumpeting news of a volatile stock market, an ailing economy and high unemployment rates, industry outsiders find it difficult to believe that contingent staffing companies are actually thriving at this time.

The reason is fairly simple. Contingent staffing makes sense, and more so during uncertain times. And no, the reason isn’t so companies can lay off people in a few months or that companies are reluctant to “commit” to “permanent” workers.

Contingent staffing saves money. What some don’t seem to understand is that the cost of a hire is way more than a worker’s salary. There are mandatory employment-related costs — FICA, SUI, workmans compensation insurance, benefits, recruiting costs — all of which are taken on by the staffing firm for their contingent workers.

Contingent staffing allows companies to staff-up quickly while minimizing risks. Sourcing and recruiting for each position is a costly and time-consuming task that companies simply can’t cut corners on. A bad hire is no joke and can — on top of the cost of finding a replacement — cost a company thousands of dollars in lost productivity, disruption, not to mention risk of litigation when things go horribly wrong. Contingent staffing companies specialize in recruiting and screening people, so recruiting costs are minimized when a company engages a contingent staffing firm. Staffing firms also absorb most attrition costs and risks for our clients, and this allows them to focus on keeping things going.

Contingent staffing gives companies access to specialized skills that may be outside their core competencies for short-term initiatives. Our clients have the luxury of talent on demand. This enables them to get projects off the ground faster while keeping their costs down.

Contingent staffing gives companies workforce flexibility which is crucial in uncertain times such as the one we’re in now. Is the economy really in a recovery or is this just a short-term spike? By engaging contingent workers rather than hiring “permanent” ones, companies can bring people in now and get ahead of the game, rather than later when things are already in full-swing. Having to play catch-up can be costly, too, and a risk that companies simply don’t have to take when a cost-effective solution is available.

So go ahead, you can wallow in the latest depressing economic news about employment, or change your outlook and look at it from the contingent staffing perspective. Things do look better from here.

Joining the team in June 2011, Lisa Amorao is netPolarity’s new marketing manager, blog admin and lead Twitter skipper. Lisa’s staffing industry experience spans more than 12 years, with roles in recruiting and account management leading up to her marketing career.

You can connect with Lisa on LinkedIn or follow her on Twitter: @netPolarity.

It’s an awesome time at netPolarity.

As netPolarity’s new and first ever marketing manager, I’m not only delighted to be part of such a dynamic and hard-working team, but most of all, excited to bring that energy and share that good staffing and recruiting juju around the web.

A company that operated with very minimal marketing efforts for 11 years, netPolarity grew exponentially but it did so quietly and largely unnoticed.  While netPolarity’s success story might send a marketing gal running straight for her therapist, there are so many projects and initiatives to get underway, it’s a marketer’s dream playground. Bringing the team’s awesomeness into the social media space is one of them. And it all starts with this blog.

It’s GO time.  Stay tuned here for more staffing and recruiting goodness from netPolarity around the web.

Thanks for being an early reader and I hope you stay for the ride.

Namaste.

Joining the team in June 2011, Lisa Amorao is netPolarity’s new marketing manager, blog admin and lead Twitter skipper. Lisa’s staffing industry experience spans 12 years, with roles in recruiting and account management leading up to her marketing career. You can connect with Lisa onLinkedIn or follow her on Twitter: @netPolarity.