The Next Enterprise Web

On average we are a very highly skilled group of people. Even though we have more than a hundred people working for us, we have happy, hardworking employees and most of them are quick learners.

In the Netherlands we can quite easily establish a name as company you want to work for. In other countries (like India, Ukraine etc) it is much more difficult. Let alone in the many other countries we are not yet established. So how do we get those good people and how do we work together with them?

There are many steps and a lot of time involved in getting these people, but it has nothing to do with putting ads on sites or in papers, as 99,99% of all companies do. As we need programmers and tech personnel, we spend more time in forums, chatboxes (IRC) and so on.

Then nowadays programmers have websites and profiles online which often contain code snippets and  even complete open source projects for you to check the quality of the developer.

Depending on the profile, chatting with the person will quickly give you an idea of his or her profile; via the phone or in direct interviews people (especially techies) will close up or have problems being as open as they should be. This goes not only for techies though; everyone is more open on chat, a bit later in the day or even at night.

Talking open, for a few chat sessions will benefit the upcoming interview a lot, for both sides. When hiring a manager abroad, even a few weeks of online communication is beneficial for the relationship in the short and the long term. Although people (apparently) still need face time, the extra information you  collect when meeting them online is extremely helpful.

Other things to check are profiles and information in social networks about the person. Most people, and especially job seeking people, have enormous amounts of personal information online in a number of networks. Hooking up via the networks and then meeting them online a few times helps break the ice.

Not many companies are seeing it, but their most gifted people have more efficient ways of arranging their lives and eventual they will take a good hard look at the company they currently work at and will demand the same efficiency from them.