Open post Quardev - Recruiting event

Trends in IT and Recruiting Event

Quardev - Recruiting event

Our Quardev team had an opportunity to attend an engaging ‘Trends in IT recruiting event’ hosted by WorkSource. We heard from key recruiters from eight different employers about the current recruiting trends and the market. The panelists included, Luna Zuniga (Homestreet Bank), Shannon McCourt (King County Department of IT), Lewis McMurran (MAXset), Eric Read (NuWest), Kris Minkel (Quardev), Erik Lee (TokuSaku Consulting), Brian Byrne (Volt WorkForce Solutions) and Christine Dominguez (WA State Department of Labor & Industries).

We want to send a shout out of thanks to Denise for the opportunity to be a contributor on the panel.  It is always great to be in a position to be able to positively influence a group of people.  Having eight employers on the panel allowed for different perspectives and unique insights on the current employment market. The panel was very educated and the questions that were asked were relevant to current employer trends and the overall job market. 

The discussion kicked off with some great insights the companies are seeing regarding growth, staffing and new product lines for 2018. Strong data skills seemed to be in demand, along with soft skills, a good reputation, and solid references topped the list as important to have when looking for that dream job. While overall experience and prior industry specific background came out as giving candidates an upper hand when their resume is in review.

A key takeaway from the panel was their insight about the key ingredients for achieving success in the initial interview and screening stage of the hiring process. Recruiters on the panel advised candidates to take extra steps to show interest in the role, anything from maintaining consistent follow up with recruiters and hiring teams to adding the personal touch of a hand written Thank You note following each face-to-face interview. Even more important is to make a habit of asking for constructive feedback when the interview does not move to the next step. Which led some on the panel to recommend being realistic and upfront about skills and experience right from the start of the process to improve chances of being hired.

Rrecruiting event discussion

The discussion kicked off with some great insights the companies are seeing regarding growth, staffing and new product lines for 2018. Strong data skills seemed to be in demand, along with soft skills, a good reputation, and solid references topped the list as important to have when looking for that dream job. While overall experience and prior industry specific background came out as giving candidates an upper hand when their resume is in review.

A key takeaway from the panel was their insight about the key ingredients for achieving success in the initial interview and screening stage of the hiring process. Recruiters on the panel advised candidates to take extra steps to show interest in the role, anything from maintaining consistent follow up with recruiters and hiring teams to adding the personal touch of a hand written Thank You note following each face-to-face interview. Even more important is to make a habit of asking for constructive feedback when the interview does not move to the next step. Which led some on the panel to recommend being realistic and upfront about skills and experience right from the start of the process to improve chances of being hired.

The discussion concluded with some useful tips job seekers can use to succeed in the job market. Some of the top tips included:

  • Differentiate yourself from other applicants – add a personal touch and consistency when following up with hiring managers and recruiters
  • Use keywords in your resume that align with requirements that are described on the job posting
  • Stay engaged throughout the process – remember that hiring managers and teams are looking for enthusiasm for the role and energy as much as they are looking for experience
  • Keep your resume updated and tailored to the expectations for the role you are applying to
  • Pay attention to your social media profiles, especially on LinkedIn
  • Interview didn’t go as planned? – Be sure to follow up and ask for constructive feedback that you can use to improve interview outcomes moving forward

Unique to this event, post panel discussion, was the opportunity for candidates to meet with panelists and recruiters to share their experience and discuss any potential opportunities – we couldn’t think of a better way to wrap up the afternoon

Quardev team - Recruiting event

Overall the event was very informative, giving candidates new ideas on how to succeed in their job searching adventure. We all travel the same path in life but get there at different times.  When it comes to your career search we are all at different stages.  Some are looking for roles where they can influence others, some for a stable position, some for contract work, and others for fun.  Being an influencer and being able to provide and advice and assistance to others is second nature to any good recruiter.  Our work is to ensure we are helping people find the role that’s best for them and best for the hiring manager.  It was awesome to meet everyone who attended after and provide advice.  We might not have been able to link everyone to a specific position but we were able to point them in a positive direction.  We definitely look forward to contributing in the future and are thankful for the opportunity to participate.

If we didn’t have a chance to connect at the event, and you would like more information about how our Quardev Recruiting team can assist you in your career search, please don’t hesitate to reach out. Email works best. contact@quardev.com. For more information and new job opportunities, click here.

2018 Annual Career & Internship Fair

Next Thursday, January 25th, Quardev will be at the Worksource Career Fair at North Seattle Community College from 2-4 PM.  Come see us and learn more about what we do and our current openings!

North Seattle College, 9600 College Way N, Seattle, WA 98103

First Floor, Opportunity Center for Employment and Education (OCE&E)

Thursday, January 25, 2018, 2:00 PM to 4:00 PM

Wednesday, 11/15, November QASIG Meeting

View details and register at QASIG.org

For our last meeting of the year, we are excited to welcome Penny Allen, from Recreational Equipment, Inc. (REI), who is going to share her PNSQC Keynote presentation with us. If you weren’t able to attend PNSQC this year it’s a great opportunity to catch it. Let us know if you can join us!

Quality Engineering 2017: Trends, Tricks, and Traps

The motivation to develop digital experiences faster and better is the centerpiece of the Quality Engineering movement. Said more simply, we have to do even more with even less despite galactic level complexity and consumer expectations.

The question is: How?

We have to evolve our toolset, our techniques, and even our thought processes. In a very real sense, we have to redefine ourselves and our craft and we have to do it NOW before the choices are made for us.

In this talk, we’ll look at the different ways QA teams are adapting to their new reality: everything from service virtualization to contract testing to blue/green deploys. We’ll explore tools and techniques that worked and a few that failed. We’ll look at the trends driving mobile development, platform development, and cloud engineering with a very specific eye on keeping quality at the forefront of every effort.

My goal is to arm you with the knowledge necessary to start your own revolution and the will to challenge the norm in search of the next, great evolution.

About our speaker:  Penny Allen is the Director, Enterprise Quality Assurance at Recreational Equipment, Inc. (REI) and started her technology career as a mission systems engineer for NASA and then decided to try something really challenging: quality assurance! Her fortuitous decision to attempt something new became a hallmark of her career as she explored the expanse of software development with Engineering Leadership roles at companies like Nike and Fiserv.

That passion for continually trying new things brought her to the forefront of the Quality Engineering movement in the age of Continuous Deployment, DevOps, and SAFe. No longer content to watch the same good intentions produce the same mediocre results, Penny dove head first into rebuilding the concept of QA. Telemetry instead of test plans; meaningful data instead of monotonous metrics – the list of opportunities is endless.

In her current role at REI, Penny is building a quality program centered on solid engineering, great people, and the desire to always do a little better than the day before. There is always something novel to try in the quest to build better experiences.

PNSQC 2017 – Scaling Quality Software is in 2 weeks!

We are excited to again be participating in the PNSQC event two weeks from today!

The line-up includes great speakers covering topics like:

  • Who owns Quality?
  • How to build a workplace people love by adding Joy
  • Trends, Tricks, and Traps in Quality

And many others focusing on scrum, lean start-ups, AI, IoT, and more.

Stop by our booth and say hi to Krista, Jim, and Torrie and of course, we’ll have our famous jotters along with other treats.

If you haven’t registered yet there’s still time, check out the PNSQC Website: https://www.pnsqc.org/2017-conference/

Hope to see you there!

QASIG Meeting: September 13, 2017, 6PM

Join us at our headquarters for the next QASIG meeting on September 13th at 6 PM. As always, we’ll have pizza and beverages at 6 with the program starting at 6:30.

Register at the QASIG site: https://www.qasig.org/events/september-qasig-meeting/

Building a Collaborative and Social Application Security Program

Presented by: Joe Basirico, Security Innovation, VP of Professional Services

In today’s environment, there is no arguing that a comprehensive secure development process is necessary. Fitting tools, technology, and security reviews into our current development cycle has become table stakes for companies building the software of tomorrow.

Breaking the “find and fix” vulnerability based assessment cycle so that software is developed with security in mind from start to finish is critically important, but doing this without leveraging a collaborative and social security program that leverages bug bounty programs, security researchers, and every aspect of vulnerability disclosure misses a huge opportunity. In this talk, I will explore how your security program can reach beyond the Secure SDLC.

About our speaker:  As the VP of Services, Joe is responsible for leading the Professional Services business at Security Innovation. He leverages his unique experience as a development lead, trainer, researcher, and test engineer to direct the security consulting team in the delivery of high-quality, impactful risk and software assessment and remediation solutions to the company’s customers. His ability to blend deep technical skills with risk-based business and compliance analysis is a powerful combination.

Joe has spent his career analyzing application behavior with respect to security. He has researched how software development organizations mature over time from a security perspective. Through this research, he has developed an understanding of application threats, tools, and methodologies that assist in the discovery and removal of security problems both software and process related.

May QASIG – Featuring Khan Klatt, Director of Engineering at McGraw-Hill Engineering

Performance and Security Quality Practices in Continuous Delivery

presented by Khan Klatt, Director of Engineering at McGraw-Hill Engineering

Modern software engineering practices have challenged traditional thinking around the delivery of quality software. Waterfall practices have been eclipsed by agile practices, reducing cycle time to deliver software features from quarters or years to weeks or months. Agile practices are now being challenged by lean practices, which some organizations have exploited to reduce that cycle time from weeks/months to days/hours. In this talk, discover how decades-old quality practice and modern software engineering capabilities can be applied to deliver high-quality software on ultra-agile timeframes.

About our speaker: Khan Klatt is a Director of Engineering at McGraw-Hill Engineering, leading the company’s Continuous Integration/Continuous Delivery strategy. Khan joined McGraw-Hill Education in 2014, previously having worked in entertainment/gaming and social media startups local to Seattle. Khan built high-performance, highly-scalable APIs used by television game shows, web scraping/crawling, and content ranking algorithms, as well as a social media platform that scaled to 50M users in the early 2000’s. In the 1990s, Khan also helped co-found a Web consulting business and successfully built and sold a regional startup Internet Service Provider to a national ISP.

Khan attended Western Washington University in Bellingham, WA, where he served as the first Webmaster for that organization in 1993. His passion for progressive innovation was demonstrated in his work to integrate make the Campus-Wide Information System database available on the Web as early as 1994.

Khan came to the United States from Ankara, Turkey, where he attended grades K-12 in a Department of Defense Dependents School. Born in Turkey, Khan speaks Turkish and English as native tongues and learned elementary French in high school. In his free time, Khan enjoys hobbies like programming, photography, and travel.

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