I wrote about how people and companies should help people learn to develop software who didn’t take the traditional university route (Developing Developer’s) and the Wall Street Journal today posted success stories of some who have taken non-traditional paths successfully in Blue-collar Workers Make the Leap to Tech Jobs. No college Degree Necessary.

This will, I hope, entice the recruiters who are seeking people expand their nets for entry level people. Job postings that demand degrees and many years of experience in a laundry list of tools will easily reject the people who have done what the journal article reports. I wrote about this last year in The Staffing Crisis. The same problem remains among the less skilled recruiters.

“Entry level shouldn’t have such requirements,” some say. I agree, but they routinely do. Look at what the job postings and recruiters are seeking.

Why? Because the computerized matching systems are being asked for what those resumes won’t have! A so-called recruiter who does nothing more than filter resumes like a computer does isn’t a recruiter, they are a human Mechanical Turk blindly following directions. If this is who you have recruiting for you, get better recruiters!

When you need talent please don’t let your machines and recruiters discard the people who might become exactly what you want. Otherwise, your competitors who look beyond blind machine matching and who are willing to train will get them, help them become great, and reap the rewards of having helped them. You — won’t.

Keep the Light!
Brian Jones