How we find and retain tech talent

An interview with Insider Inc.’s tech recruiter, Anum Khan

Finding and retaining talent is difficult. Finding and retaining technical talent at a media publisher headquartered in NYC (not Silicon Valley) is arguably even more difficult. But Insider Inc. has grown its tech and product team to nearly 70 employees worldwide — with 25 new hires in 2019 alone. And we’re on track to grow the team even more substantially in 2020.

We recently sat down with Insider Inc.’s Talent Manager, Anum Khan, to learn wmore about her approach when recruiting technical talent, the biggest challenges in finding qualified candidates, and what makes a great Insider Inc. employee. Here’s our conversation.

Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

TAKE US THROUGH YOUR BACKGROUND AND HOW YOU GOT STARTED AT INSIDER INC. AS A RECRUITER.

I moved to New York City from northern Virginia in 2012. I was working for a staffing agency in sales as an account executive. Very quickly, I learned that in order to be successful in sales, I needed to learn and understand the full recruitment life cycle. Soon after, I accepted a technical recruiter position with another agency, where I learned the ins and outs of recruiting talent with a technical skill set.

I spent five years on the agency side, doing both account management and recruiting, when I came across Insider Inc. in 2018. I found out there was a contract recruiter position available on the Insider Inc. talent team while I was working for an agency that provided tech talent to the company. I applied through a referral and was hired to help support the tech and product team’s hiring needs. I spent the first two months of my contract recruiting and creating a more streamlined process around recruitment.

In November 2018, I was hired full time as a talent acquisition manager and have been here ever since.

WHAT DOES A TYPICAL DAY AT THE OFFICE LOOK LIKE FOR YOU?

It’s very important for me to plan each day by prioritizing open positions based on level of urgency. The first thing I do every day is look at my list of open positions and prioritize based on pipeline. What that means is I review our total number of candidates and what stages they are currently in for each job.

For example, I look at how many candidates have applied over night, how many candidates are in the queue for a phone screening, and how many candidates are scheduled for interviews. Once I’ve collected that information, I know which roles I need to prioritize while making sure we are actively planning to create a pipeline based on level of priority.

HOW DOES OUR TECH RECRUITING PROCESS TYPICALLY WORK FOR A CANDIDATE? WHAT ARE THE STEPS THAT THEY GO THROUGH AFTER APPLYING OR BEING REFERRED FOR A JOB AT INSIDER INC.?

Our process is something I take pride in — I’m always working to make it better every day. Here’s an overview of how it looks for the tech and product teams:

1. A candidate applies or is sourced (via referral, etc.)
2. The talent team reviews the candidate’s application and resume
3. The talent team conducts an initial phone screening. During the call, we typically ask about the basics like their availability, background, and what they’re looking for in a new job.
4. If the candidate passes the talent phone screening, a tech lead then conducts a 30-minute technical phone screen.
5. If the candidate passes the technical phone screen, the talent team invites the candidate onsite for an interview loop with several employees for approximately 2–3 hours total.
6. The talent team gathers feedback. This normally happens during a debrief with everyone who was involved in the interview process to that point.
7. The hiring team makes a decision.

HOW HAS OUR RECRUITING PROCESS EVOLVED OVER TIME?

When I started, we really didn’t have a standard process in place for technical recruitment. We needed a more efficient procedure, so one of the first things I did was create screening templates and simple ways to track each part of the recruiting process. These processes have allowed us to be as transparent and consistent as possible during the hiring cycle.

HOW DO WE FIND QUALIFIED CANDIDATES? WHAT DO WE LOOK FOR IN APPLICANTS?

There are multiple ways we find qualified candidates. One of the most successful ways we land great talent across departments is through referrals. We also get a lot of candidates who apply directly on our Careers page, which is a great benefit to have. In addition, we use job boards such as Indeed, Glassdoor, Monster, ZipRecruiter, and eQuest, which allows us to reach a more diverse group of candidates.

I’m also a big believer in using LinkedIn to promote jobs. I work with our tech and product team to promote open jobs on their personal accounts, and we use LinkedIn Recruiter to help source and find candidates who are passively looking or currently employed.

WHAT ARE THE BIGGEST CHALLENGES IN TECHNICAL RECRUITING?

The biggest challenge is successfully finding the “good eggs” and attracting them to the positions and to Insider Inc. as a company. Many candidates are already employed, so you either have to catch them at the right time (when their existing work contract ends or when they are contemplating switching jobs) or you have to actively recruit them out of their current role by selling them on the opportunity.

WHAT ARE SOME OF THE ACHIEVEMENTS THAT YOU’RE MOST PROUD OF SINCE JOINING INSIDER INC.?

1. Diversity and inclusion (D&I) efforts while recruiting: We’ve made significant progress with tech and product team hiring from a D&I perspective in the last year. When I was creating and revamping our recruitment process, it gave me the opportunity to evaluate how we should be thinking about D&I when speaking with candidates and hiring managers. We hired seven women engineers on our tech team in the past year, and have prioritized attending more diversity-oriented hiring events, such as WomenHack. We’ll continue to work to remove bias in each step of the hiring process, knowing that we still have a lot of work to do. D&I efforts will continue to be a main priority for me and the Insider Inc. hiring team as a whole in 2020.
2. Tech internships: Insider Inc. had never offered technical internships until last year, when we hosted our first internship interview day. I was responsible for finding the interns as well as coordinating an on-site interview day with a group of candidates and our hiring team. I pitched the idea of partnering with a bootcamp, Flatiron School, because I had already been working with them to source resumes. We had a very successful interview day and hired three interns, who all ended up converting to full-time employees. We’ve since hosted a second interview day and plan to continue the program into 2020.
3. Hire by Google implementation: When I started at Insider Inc., one of my goals was to streamline the recruitment process and make it as transparent as possible. As a team, we decided that one way to help accomplish that goal would be by implementing a new, more robust applicant tracking system. I’d never managed an implementation project before, and we successfully completed implementing the program.

WHAT’S NEXT FOR THE RECRUITING TEAM HERE AT INSIDER INC.? ANY NEW PROJECTS ON THE HORIZON OR NEW SYSTEMS THAT WE’RE IMPLEMENTING?

Unfortunately, the same day we launched our new applicant tracking system, Hire by Google, we found out the application was going to be sunset by late 2020. We’re working on finding and implementing a new applicant tracking system this year as a replacement.

Editor’s note: This interview was originally published on the Insider Inc. corporate blog.