Hiring Software Engineers

Building an engineering hiring process from role definition to debrief, and calibrating it.

Q: We’re a company growing rapidly. Our hiring process has been based on intuition so far. What do good hiring processes look like and how do we build them?

Hiring is the biggest pain point I hear most engineering managers, VP Engineerings and CTOs talk about. This is especially the case while we are still in one of the most heated tech hiring markets ever seen, and hiring managers expect this market to continue this year.

In this issue we cover:

1. The role definition. Why you should start with this, and why write it down.

2. The job description (JD). What goes into a good JD?

3. The interview process. Defining it, and why you should start with signals gathered.

4. Debriefs. How are hiring decisions made? What are common debrief approaches?

5. Calibration. How can you increase consistency and reduce bias in interviews?

6. Feedback loops. What to measure so you can improve the hiring process.

7. Resources to define a hiring process. An example interview process definition, scorecard template and a debrief summary. 

Related newsletter issues:

• Hiring and retaining a diverse engineering team

• Hiring junior software engineers

• Hiring an engineering manager

Note: This article mentions tools relevant for interview processes. I have not been paid to mention the companies behind these tools. My newsletter is fully independent, does not accept sponsorships and I have no commercial affiliation with the vendors mentioned.