Less than 1% of software developers in Europe tend to have robust experience with cloud services development, and the pool becomes even narrower when you add microservices to your stack. Today, when finding an ordinary senior developer for your team can already be extremely challenging, getting a cloud-and-microservices expert on board may feel like climbing the Everest of hiring.
In this post, I will show how using the power of data you can optimise your job specification to get the results you need.
1. The Standard Spec
Almost every single working day of 2017, I would source for candidates for a job spec like this:
'Join an exciting new team to develop a fantastic new product! We are hiring a Senior Software Engineer with 7+ years of experience developing microservices and distributed systems.
- Salary: �75,000
- Location: Dublin, Ireland
- Contract: Full-Time Permanent
- Irish Stamp 4 or an EU passport essential
Please contact [email protected] with your CV to have a confidential chat.'
And the typical sourcing result would be:
| Spec Type | Reach-Out | Response | Qualified & Interested |
| Standard | 4,000 | 300 | 30 |
As you can see, many candidates do respond to our messages, but the rate is not high, and the number of qualified and interested candidates is simply dismal.
How can we improve this?
2. The �10,000 Salary Raise Spec
Most senior-level candidates in this market will command a salary far higher than �75,000 (adjusting, of course, for the cost of living). I went back and asked the candidates: what if you could get a �10,000 raise on whatever you are getting now?
The result was as follows:
| Spec Type | Reach-Out | Response | Qualified & Interested |
| Standard | 4,000 | 300 | 30 |
| �10,000 Salary Raise Spec | 4,000 | 400 | 50 |
3. The Visa Sponsorship Spec
Not surprisingly, many talented software engineers do not hold an EU passport. They might have moved from Russia, China, India, Japan, Brazil, Argentina and other emerging tech countries.
I followed up with the non-EU nationals by asking them another question: what if your new employer fully sponsored your visa?
The result:
| Spec Type | Reach-Out | Response | Qualified & Interested |
| Standard | 4,000 | 300 | 30 |
| �10,000 Salary Raise Spec | 4,000 | 400 | 50 |
| Visa Sponsorship | 1,000 | 500 | 110 |
Frankly, I was surprised by how many qualified candidates - living in Ireland, the UK and other EU countries - are on sponsored visas. With this restriction gone, candidate engagement shoots up to a 50% response rate and we have over 110 strong CVs to choose from for an interview.
Based on the other responses I was getting I wanted to try out one last thing.
4. The Remote Work Spec
A surprising number of candidates responded to the Standard Spec by saying that 'I would love to work for this company if the company allowed remote work.' Each candidate had quite a personal reason for why remote work would change the game completely - from taking care of their families at home to having the freedom to organise their own workday.
I asked the candidates the question: what if you could work remotely in this position? It yielded the following results:
| Spec Type | Reach-Out | Response | Qualified & Interested |
| Standard | 4,000 | 300 | 30 |
| �10,000 Salary Raise Spec | 4,000 | 400 | 50 |
| Visa Sponsorship | 1,000 | 500 | 110 |
| Remote | 3,000 | 700 | 170 |
Both the number of responses and the number of qualified and interested candidates were the highest of all.
Conclusion
If you are struggling with attracting quality cloud developers, try tweaking your job spec using one of the above options. If you can afford visa sponsorship or allow remote work, your choice of qualified and interested candidates will improve greatly. However, if neither of these three options is realistic for you, get in touch with our consultants. We can source from a large pool of candidates and come back to you with clear insights.
