If Larry Letow had his way he'd be busy hiring two to three well-experienced engineers with deep skill sets in either Microsoft or Citrix technologies. But he's having difficulty finding candidates these days for several reasons.
One is that the Washington, DC job market is highly competitive. The government pays top dollar for the same skills technology firms need, and there aren't many highly skilled engineers on the job prowl.
"In general we're having trouble hiring. While there are a lot of mid-level candidates out in the marketplace, there are few senior people with the expertise we need," says the COO for
Convergence Technology Consulting. And when Convergence does interview a qualified candidate it often finds itself competing against compensation levels that are 10 to 20 percent higher in the government sector. "It's very competitive salary wise," Letow notes.
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Convergence Technology Consulting, founded in 2002, is a network engineering and integration firm with core competencies in network infrastructure, server-based computing, remote access, storage virtualization, and server virtualization. The firm, which has about 25 fulltime technologists on staff, is a Microsoft "GOLD" Managed Partner, a Citrix "PLATINUM" Partner, VMware Authorized Consulting Partner, and EMC2 Velocity Partner. Its project engagements range from designing major initiatives, providing primary IT support, emergency technical assistance, and quality services.
While its engineers provide expertise in specific technologies, Letow focuses on hiring IT professionals who also boast good writing abilities and communications—and that brings up another hurdle. Oftentimes candidates with the right tech expertise are lacking such soft skills.
"We're a high level technology organization that provides deliverables, whether in reports or presentations, to clients and prospective new customers so our tech staff has to be able to communicate with anyone in an enterprise," Letow explains. Yet the key element to getting on board at Convergence is showing hiring leaders what you're capable of, says the COO.
Letow recalls interviewing a mid-level tech specialist who didn't have the deep knowledge the company was seeking at one point, but the candidate did get hired thanks to some other skills.
"We say to candidates 'tell us what you're going to do as part of your professional development to keep boosting your skills and your contribution if you're hired.' This one candidate promised he'd spend a few hours after each workday ended on getting his skills honed and he impressed us with his sincerity. We hired him and he did it," recalls Letow, adding that it's an example of how mid-level skill candidates need to "set themselves apart from the other six million job seekers vying for a job."
Another issue in hiring, says the COO, is that many tech professionals seem to possess an attitude of entitlement. Whether that's due to the rosy hiring outlook Letow isn't sure, but he says he's not interested in anyone who's not as focused as he is on contributing to the bottom line.
"All of us, whether we're in sales, or engineering or operations, are focused on either generating revenue or saving costs and that's critical to our business," he explains.
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