Many modern companies face challenges when there is an urgent need to recruit new employees. Even temporary hiring based on an outsourcing model is a comprehsive task. Moreover, if you are looking for developers for your team, they should clearly meet all the set requirements.
But how can you evaluate the technical skills of developers?
Well, there are different ways to do that. In this article, I am going to discuss different ways through which you can easily evaluate and understand the technical skills of developers.
Tips to Evaluate Technical Skills of Developers
Evaluating the technical skills of developers can be done in a number of different ways. I’ve discussed the best ones below:
1. Start The Evaluation With an Interview
Technical interviews are the primary method for assessing a developer’s skills. Here, evaluate the candidate’s experience with languages and frameworks, as well as their way of solving problems and how clearly they communicate.
There’s no definite interview structure that you should follow. Developers in different countries have their own structures for this. For example, Companies in Poland may use practical coding tasks and technical problem-solving exercises, interview strategies to evaluate Polish software developers. Similarly, Americans may use behavioral assessment and live coding tests to evaluate the skills of developers during interviews.
Pay attention to examples from real life rather than working out theoretical questions. Ask questions that prompt them to share their logic. For example, how would they create an API that can handle increasing traffic or respond to slow requests?
Interviewing isn’t just talking about goals, past work experience, and level of expertise. Even during the initial online meeting, you can ask the candidate a few questions that can indicate their professionalism. Make a list of coding questions for developers in advance. For example, ask about popular development approaches, the technology stack used, and more. Good developers should always be ready for questions and assessments of their knowledge.
2. Provide a Practical Programming Assignment
Observing developers complete a practical coding task is a good way to assess how well they use their knowledge. Require potential team members to complete a brief yet accurate reflection of the tasks they would be responsible for on the job. You might add a small feature, repair a bug in a codebase that does not work, or create some unit tests for an existing module. Additionally, using an AI code detector can help verify whether the submitted code is original or generated by artificial intelligence, ensuring authenticity in the evaluation process.
Assessing code for quality, ease of reading, and structuring is just as important as simply checking whether the solution works. Check how they deal with problems at the edges, organize their idea flow, and record their code for others to understand.
Give extra points if their efforts show creativity or a smart approach to UX or how a website works. Always clearly explain the time limits and whether they are allowed to use library resources. Looking at a task someone has completed provides facts to go with the opinions collected in interviews.
3. Ask to Write The Code In Real-Time
Undoubtedly, one of the best ways to ensure that a specialist is professional is to observe how they work. You can offer a potential candidate to perform a test task in real time. What do you need for this?
- Start an online meeting on any convenient platform (Google Meet, Zoom, and others).
- Offer to turn on the video to avoid situations of third-party assistance to the candidate.
- Ask the professional to include a screen demo.
- Watch the candidate write code in real time.
The only problem that you could potentially face is the big time difference. That is why we recommend looking for and hiring specialists who are located in your time zone. For example, developers based in Poland and other nearby countries are suitable for companies from Central and Eastern Europe.
There are many other reasons why time zone matters when hiring developers. Keep all these points in mind when you are selecting and evaluating the right team for your software development goals.
4. Assign a Unique Test
Just remember which examination methods are most often used in schools and universities. We are discussing tests because they do not require a significant amount of time and effort to pass.
Creating a custom technical test customized to your product area or team’s specific challenges can be an effective solution. It enables the identification of which core abilities are present in the candidate’s approach.
However, you will need to create a unique test from scratch. You cannot copy a similar existing test from the Internet. Why is this so? In such a case, it will be easy for candidates to find the right answers. You can also include questions in the paper that require an extended answer. A custom test tests both the knowledge and its application by a developer.
5. Research Previous Works in Detail
If you spend time properly studying past projects in the portfolio, you will find many valuable pieces of information. Request that candidates provide case studies from previous jobs. Analyze these examples closely to see the details, critical design features, and level of teamwork.
See if developers follow good coding standards, keep the design scalable, and provide well-written documentation. Examine any experiences the company has had with recognized agencies or big brands. For example, at the N-iX agency, developers tend to work with big business solutions and use agile methods. It reflects a good level of engineering skill and the ability to address what clients require.
Final Thoughts
Finding IT talent is always a challenging and responsible process. For entrepreneurs and startups, it is important to hire a team that fits the planned budget, technical skills, and other requirements.
If you have already identified several options, you should thoroughly evaluate their technical skills to select the best candidate. Create a test technical task of a medium difficulty level to ask candidates to complete. This way, you can see which specialists are best suited for the position in your company.
Which countries should companies in Europe consider hiring developers from? One of the best options is Polish software engineers, who are known for their high level of IT knowledge.
Surely, you can also consider other countries to find development teams. The most important thing is to spend more time choosing candidates and not forget to evaluate their technical skills!
