Changes in Candidate Screening

My colleague, Tien Anh Nguyen, recently sent me an article on Slate titled, “But He Looked Good on Paper”, about the changing ways in which candidates for positions at tech startups are screened and hired. As someone who offers recruiting support to expansion stage technology companies, I am always interested in learning about new ways that other companies are having success with candidate screening.

A major theme of the article was that Americans will increasingly find jobs not through external recruiters, job boards, and their resumes, but by showcasing themselves online and undergoing less subjected automated assessments. I have discussed boards which are meant to display software developers’ expertise in the past, such as StackOverflow.com, but discussion boards are now becoming popular in other areas of expertise.

Slate also predicts that video will become more highly utilized in future recruiting. According to the article, a handful of Bay Area startups have started using HireHive, a company that offers monthly plans to pre-screen applicants on video. Another startup, RoundPegg, assesses how a candidate will fit into the culture of a workplace. A series of short surveys and analysis by an organizational psychologist can tell the hiring manager whether an applicant will have a problem with the manager or team. For more information on other types of video and remote interview software that are becoming increasingly popular, check out this earlier post of mine on the subject.

Have a great Labor Day weekend, and Happy Hiring!