How to Hire a DevOps Engineer: The Secrets of Successful Recruiting

Are you trying to recruit DevOps engineers? DevOps engineers reduce the complexity of maintaining your software throughout its entire life cycle, from coding to deployment. They close the gaps between the actions you need to quickly change an application and the tasks that maintain its reliability.

Your development team and IT operations teams may have different skills. Development teams want to introduce new features to an application. Operations teams want to preserve the stability of an application once it has been released.

DevOps is all about unifying and automating these processes, combining code, app maintenance, and app management. DevOps is essential, but it isn’t easy to learn. In this article, we’ll show you how to hire a DevOps engineer in a competitive landscape.

How to Recruit DevOps Engineers

Recruiting DevOps engineers can feel like a full-time job sometimes – and it is. However, if you want to become an IT powerhouse of note, you have to set up your talent teams for success. Simply posting a few ads on a job board isn’t going to help you find DevOps engineers any time soon. DevOps engineers are spoilt for choice and go virtually anywhere.

Some companies try to bridge the gap by hiring professionals to “perform DevOps” within their workflows. Still, because DevOps adoption depends on changes to culture and process, you could end up inadvertently creating an even more significant disconnect between your developers and your operational teams.

Here are a few techniques you can try to find a DevOps engineer for your business:

Go Where the DevOps Engineers Are

We’ve already said that job boards won’t cut it anymore. You may need to get really creative, really fast. GitHub is where you can find the best talent in the IT space. GitHub is an Internet hosting service for software development and version control using Git, including bug tracking and software feature requests.

Many developers use GitHub to share their code, ask questions and participate in the broader IT community. You can often find excellent tech profiles there. Approach the best candidates directly – it never hurts.

Offer Perks

Here’s the thing: if you want to hire a DevOps developer, you have to offer perks. Many companies offer equity stakes, but it doesn’t have to be that costly. Can they work from home? Are there meals/transport provided? Are their hours flexible? Will they be able to train in their field of interest? Do you cover educational costs? Childcare? Think about the perks you can offer, and make sure to put your best foot forward in the job ad.

Remember, many developers prefer a hybrid way of working, so consider a flexible workspace if you aren’t already working remotely.

Get Your Senior Engineers to Do the Talking

Culture and learning are significant to IT professionals. As competent as your talent team might be, HR professionals don’t speak the same language as technologists. Get your best people to sit in on interviews so they can tell your candidates about the job and what it would be like to be part of their team.

If the chemistry is right, that candidate might just be persuaded to take the job right then and there. You should also use those engineers to speak at industry events, hackathons, and online conferences so that candidates get even more excited to work with them.

Consider Hiring External Help

If you can’t find the right DevOps team, consider hiring freelancers or offshore workers to fill the skills gap. The world has shrunk, and with so many companies operating remotely, it’s a good idea to flesh out your teams with remote workers from all around the world.

It’s not only a great way of finding DevOps developers to do the work, but it’s a great way to save money. DevOps engineers in countries like Ukraine or China charge a fraction of the cost of US developers, for example.

Now you know how to recruit DevOps engineers for your business, all that’s left to do is the hiring work! Make sure that you try every tactic you can to beat out the competition, and good luck with your talent search.