What’s the key to attracting and recruiting the best developers on the planet? What’s the key to selecting the best from the rest? Joel Spolsky – CEO, Software Developer, creator of Stack Overflow, author of Joel on Software tech blog and Smart and Gets Things Done (one of the best books on tech recruiting out there!) – thinks deeply about hiring world class technology talent. He’ll share what he’s learned from building a tech company from scratch and researching what top tech talent expects when going through a recruiting process.

What do Snoop Dog, Stephen Hawking and the Dean of Harvard College have in common? They all believe in the importance of increasing the supply of computer programmers. In this session, we’ll hear from visionary companies (like Zappos.com) that have developed in-house coding academies, electing to create more software developers through intensive training programs. How long does it take to turn a customer service representative into a junior coder? Are programs like this a viable long-term strategy to address the tech talent shortage? Two forward-thinking companies will share the results of their recent efforts.

In this interactive, training-style session, Kevin Wheeler – frequent world traveler and expert in talent acquisition and cultural norms – will help recruiters understand how to keep your foot out of your mouth and adapt your communication to some VERY REAL differences between the US and places like India, China, and Eastern Europe – home of some fantastic tech talent. How should you adjust your initial outreach? Is the direct approach and flattery always best? How is screening and interviewing different? Does a candidate’s orientation around time, their respect for authority, and their indirect communication style impact how well they’ll come off to you and hiring managers? And what about offers? Does yes really mean yes? How are motivators and negotiation tactics different? Kevin will leverage a scenario-based approach to give us very tactical, how-to information we can take back and use to improve our ability to engage with non-US tech talent.

Are you recruiting without a clue? The difference between an average tech recruiter and a brilliant one may be a solid understanding of the underlying technology. What‘s the difference between compiled and scripting languages? What in the world does “Big Data” mean? Isn’t Java and JavaScript the same thing? And why can’t everyone work the effin’ Windows Server environment? In this session, we will demystify the world of software development, unscramble the keyword bingo and bring you up to date on the latest software development trends.

Great recruiters know that the secret to success includes fearless phone skills. In this animated session, Marc Hutto will demonstrate the lost art of ethical phone-based research. Marc will “reveal” the secrets of conducting company research via telephone (using real-life examples) and help you understand how to get the most out of research, talent mapping and name generation projects. He’ll even let us listen to a call that goes haywire; what’s the worse thing that can happen when a phone sourcer reaches a surly engineer? You won’t want to miss this!

Sit back and watch (or sit up and take notes) as Kate Matsudaira (Founder of PopForms, and former VP of Engineering at Decide.com) expertly interviews a software development engineer.  Kate, who has conducted more than 600 interviews and who is the creator of Recruiting Hacks , will walk us through how she structures the interview, what she asks (and why), and, most importantly, what she listens for in order to identify top talent and eliminate the duds. This session will walk the fine line between truly geeky (“compute all the permutations of a string”) and the culture-focused (“tell me what makes you weird”) to help you identify the right candidate for every role.

We’re working on a ‘knock your socks off keynote’ – stay tuned.

Learn from 3 case studies, highlighting how leaders of tech recruitment teams from Facebook, Box, and Groupon are raising the game around tech recruiting for their companies. What kind of tech recruiting strategies are working well? What’s harder than it looks? How are recruiting leaders overcoming internal challenges around resourcing and capacity when the business wants more, more, more! Attend this session to gain insights into the real world challenges recruiting leaders face, and how they’re overcoming challenges that probably look a lot like yours. Bring your questions!

Roll up your sleeves and bring your toughest reqs. We’ve secured some of the world’s best sourcers to help you solve your sourcing challenges in a small group setting. Spend some time improving and refining your sourcing skills – pick a topic, find your table and get expert coaching from one of our sourcing gurus (yes, we called them gurus). Some of the topics we’ll cover:
– Cool Boolean Hacks
– Creative Diversity Sourcing
– Custom Search Engines
– Cold Calling, Research and Talent Mapping
– Sourcing Social Media

We’re asking Glen Cathey “where tools are going, where tech is going, and what trends will be seen for next few years” and we expect an answer that will astound you!

Join us for a casual lunch where you and your peers can share ideas and discuss best practices for recruiting tech talent. No speakers, no Powerpoint. Instead, you’ll get the chance to sit down at tables organized by topic (i.e. sourcing, branding, interviewing, closing, tools) and share/learn from your fellow tech recruiters and engineering hiring managers.