
Two in five tech job applicants don't have the right tech chops, survey finds - sbuttgereit
https://www.zdnet.com/article/two-in-five-technology-job-applicants-dont-have-the-right-technical-chops-survey-finds/
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dclusin
The article says that salary isn't the most important factor for enticing
potential employees but I feel like that's a meme would be employers like to
buy into. Maybe you could convince a junior engineer to work for less with the
potential of rockstar teams or mission driven culture. But there's always
immediate need for senior engineers in highly functioning teams with plenty of
upward mobility. I've had several job offers and compensation has been the
show stopper. There isn't really a shortage of great teams. There's a shortage
of great teams that pay really well.

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LorenPechtel
Well, duh!

You only consider skills that people have actually used in a job as skills
they possess. Thus the only way people can acquire new skills that will be
recognized on a resume is if they end up using them in their current job. It
should be obvious that pretty soon the experienced people will fail to be able
to include some important skill on their resume.

Presto, a "shortage" of qualified people. Employers are so obsessed with
hiring the best person that they overlook plenty of people who could do the
job.

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CM30
So, is this really unique to tech?

Serious question there. How many people applying for jobs in other fields also
completely lack the skills they need for said job?

Obviously, it'll be a lesser count in some fields. On paper, everyone applying
for a job in medicine or law will have the appropriate qualifications and
(presumably) skills.

But what about others? I suspect a lot of people going for marketing and
design roles don't have the skills needed for the jobs they're applying for
too. It's probably a common issue in sales too, though that field at least
lets you find out pretty quickly whether someone's bluffing.

What's the percentage of unqualified applicants by role and industry?

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jandrese
Some jobs may be easier to buff until you make it. Someone going into
marketing can probably get along for awhile on BS, while a welder is going to
be put on the spot and actually tested on their skills.

Depends how much domain knowledge the recruiter has as well.

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towaway1138
Interesting. By coincidence, that's about the proportion of hiring companies
that don't have a basic professional environment, a reasonable program of work
to be done, and a basic clue of what they need in a tech employee.

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DeonPenny
Meh it's usually not as simple as thing especially as in tech. Because we do
problems a developer in one interview can do wildly better than the next
simply because he is more familiar with a type of problem.

