IT Job Candidates Wary if Hiring Takes Too Long

Top 15 Companies Currently Hiring for IT Jobs

Tech professionals are more likely than the general public to perceive something wrong with a job that goes unfilled for too long, according to a survey in Britain by recruiting firm Randstad Technologies.

IT pros grew leery if a job went 67 working days without being filled (14 weeks), while the public in general did if a job sat vacant for 74 days, a week longer.

It’s common to hear companies say they have difficulty finding the tech talent they need — in a Dice.com survey of 800 human resource managers, recruiters, consulting and staffing companies released in June, 45 percent said hiring times had grown longer and 48 percent attributed that to being unable to find qualified candidates.

Recruiters told The Wall Street Journal back in March, though, that positions that took two months to fill before the recession can take up to four times longer now.

It quotes Tracie Grant, director of recruitment for Catholic Health Initiatives, which still had 18 of 50 positions open for project and program managers after eight months, as saying:

Hiring managers hear the news and see the high unemployment rate and tell us that they want to continue looking for better candidates. They want the perfect candidate, when the reality is, there is no perfect candidate.

Companies should be aware, though, that being unable to make a decision about a position reflects badly, and after a while, positions left unfilled just don’t pass the smell test.