Archives 2021

Social Media and Virtual Networking Best Practices

The global shift to online platforms for social interaction has had a huge impact on the professional world. These days, hiring managers don’t just check applicants’ social media as part of the hiring process—they also use it to recruit new talent.

Follow these guidelines to use your online presence to your advantage during the job search.

Clean Up Your Social Media

When you begin looking for a new job, giving your social media a tune-up should be a top priority.

Make sure your profile pictures, bios, public posts, and tagged photos present a professional image of you as a candidate. Delete any content that could be considered objectionable.

Highlight Past Projects

Use your social media to share professional achievements and projects.

Whether you recently completed an IT certification or finished building a server from scratch, consider spotlighting your achievement in a public post that will leave a good impression on recruiters who scout your social media.

 Leverage LinkedIn for Networking

Maintaining a profile on LinkedIn makes it easier for potential employers to discover you. It also gives you the chance to reach out directly to recruiters about jobs.

Once you’ve ensured your LinkedIn profile is up to date, you can start searching for recruiters in your industry. When you find a promising one, send a connection request with a short introduction in the attached message.

If the recruiter accepts your request, reach out with more information about the kind of position you’re seeking. Your communication should be courteous, professional, and personalized to the recruiter’s company.  

Attend Virtual Events & Follow Up

It’s easier than ever to attend online conferences, meetups, and job fairs for professionals in your field.

When you connect with other professionals at these events, make sure to trade contact information. Reach out in the following week with a brief email letting them know you enjoyed meeting them.

Find Your Next Job with ABBTECH

When you let ABBTECH handle your job search, you ensure that you will connect with clients you’ll want to work for.

ABBTECH is an IT staffing firm that helps tech professionals find jobs in startups, government agencies, and Fortune 500 corporations. Visit our Career Portal to begin your job search today.

How to Properly Delegate at Work

How to Properly Delegate at Work

Being a business leader relies as much on properly delegating responsibilities as assuming them. The ability to delegate tasks is critical for staying efficient and using employees’ strengths to their fullest. Follow these tips to delegate successfully at your workplace.

Give Specific Direction

Successful delegation relies on good communication. Since your employees all communicate differently, be intentional about how you communicate when delegating. Some employees learn best by listening, while others may want to see a demonstration.

Be as specific as possible about the outcome you are expecting. If the task is complicated, walk through it slowly. After you have given directions, ask if there are questions or if you need to go over any of the instructions again.

The more guidelines you establish in advance, the less confusion or chance of error there will be in the future.

Offer Training on Tasks you are Delegating

In order to properly delegate, you have to embrace the power of effective training.

Business leaders often avoid delegating to capable employees because completing the task at hand requires specialized knowledge of a process. Instead of taking the time to train a worker, they default to assigning the task to someone who knows the process.

Training employees to take on new responsibilities will benefit your company in the long run. It requires some extra time and effort upfront, but the reward will be more widespread institutional knowledge within the company.

Delegating Demonstrates Trust

Once you delegate, be mindful of how often you check in or ask for updates on the assignment. Provide the time and space for workers to complete tasks on their own.

Stepping back and letting them handle a task on their own signals that you are confident in their abilities, which makes them more confident in themselves.

Choose the Right People

When delegating, make sure to pick someone whose strengths match the requirements of the project you are passing along.

Each time you delegate, think about who among your staff has the right set of skills or the learning capacity to complete the task. Building a team of skilled workers who are ready to take on new challenges can help you make this decision quickly and easily.

With ABBTECH, you can staff your business with skilled IT contractors. Our IT staffing and recruitment firm provides tech professionals for your workforce. Contact ABBTECH today to start bringing new talent into your company.

IT Industry: Resume Best Practices

IT Industry: Resume Best Practices

In the IT industry, a professional resume that highlights technical achievements is necessary in order to be a competitive job candidate.

Not all resumes should look alike. While some industries value creative resumes, others call for professional resumes that adhere to certain criteria. Follow these best practices whether you are applying for a temporary IT job or a full-time position.

Stay Focused

Every item on your resume should be related to your technical knowledge, abilities, and experience. Avoid listing non-tech-related jobs or internships unless the alternative is a gap in your employment history.

Go Beyond Your Degree

Many IT positions require or strongly recommend a college degree, so it is important to list it on your resume.

However, you should also include technology-related certifications, recognitions, and awards besides your diploma. Adding these to your resume will demonstrate your abilities and help you stand out as an applicant.

Spotlight Achievements

Highlight accomplishments at your past jobs instead of simply listing your assigned duties and responsibilities.

Naming the assignments you received in your previous workplace does not speak to your individual strengths. Hiring managers will always be more interested in the projects you completed, the innovations you pushed, and the value you added to your company.

List Technical Skills

Besides listing formal education and credentials, IT resumes should include a summary of the candidate’s relevant technical skills. These include capabilities in programming languages, operating systems, databases, and platforms.

When compiling your list, indicate your level of proficiency for each technical skill. Avoid overstating your skill level.

Tailor Your Resume to the Job

Many hiring departments use software called Applicant Tracking Systems (ATS) to scan resumes for key terms and phrases before passing them to human readers. If your resume does not contain enough of these terms, it may be automatically rejected.

To improve your resume’s odds of making it through the ATS, ensure the descriptions of your skills and credentials match the terminology used in the job posting for the position you are interested in.

Include general, overarching descriptors and keywords in addition to more specific keywords. If you worked as a systems administrator, including both the operating systems you worked out of as well as the specific technologies you used will help match your resume to more jobs.

Send Your Resume to ABBTECH

Speed up your job search by sending your resume to ABBTECH. We are an IT staffing and recruitment firm that matches talented IT contractors with temporary jobs.

ABBTECH places tech professionals in small businesses, startups, major corporations, and government agencies. We save you the time and energy of hunting for jobs by finding opportunities that suit your qualifications and preferences.


How to Foster a Positive Workplace

How to Foster a Positive Workplace

Building a positive workplace is an active process that requires a group effort. And it is worth the investment, because it benefits everyone. Working in a positive environment improves the lives of managers, employees, and contractors in your business.

This advice will help you begin to be more intentional about fostering positivity within your organization.

Be Positive and Uplifting

You can make an immediate positive impact on your staff. Greet employees by name at the start of the day. Appropriately compliment them. And thank them anytime they do a favor for you. When they are struggling with an assignment or having a tough day, encourage them.

These demonstrations of support and encouragement may seem small in the moment, but establishing yourself as an uplifting presence can mean the world to the people around you at work.

Reframe Negative Talk

When negativity creeps into conversations in the workplace, it can infect your entire staff and bring everyone’s mood down.

Besides refraining from engaging in negative about your company, customers, or employees, try to turn others’ negative talk into opportunities for learning and growth. Instead of saying that numbers look bad and performance is low, try using more positive language by saying that numbers need improvement and performance could be higher.

Celebrate Accomplishments

One great way to keep your workplace positive is to plan events or company outings to celebrate important milestones and achievements.

Work teams that pause to celebrate accomplishments before moving on to the next project are able to maintain high energy and positive attitudes. Celebrating wins reminds workers that their hard work is seen—and provides an incentive to keep it up.

Encourage Peer-to-Peer Recognition

While recognition from a boss can motivate staff members, recognition from peers is equally important. Companies can benefit from implementing programs to encourage peers to celebrate each other’s achievements.

For example, at ABBTECH, we use the STAR Employee Program to encourage peer-to-peer recognition and build positivity among employees.

Our program allows employees to nominate each other for internal company recognition when they demonstrate skills within at least one of four categories: Solutions Oriented, Team Player, Action and Results, or Responsibility and Ownership.

Build an Inclusive Company Culture with ABBTECH

Creating a culture that empowers everyone to succeed and support each other is critical for fostering a positive work environment.

ABBTECH helps you recruit and hire IT personnel who fit your company’s goals and culture. Contact ABBTECH and find out how our strategic IT talent services can help your business succeed.


Why You Should Consider an IT Contract Position

Why You Should Consider an IT Contract Position

There are many advantages of choosing contract work over a full-time position with a company. In the IT industry, the benefits of contract roles are especially prominent. Read on to find out why you consider contract positions when looking for a new IT job.

Avoid Burnout with Short Contracts

As a group, tech workers tend to experience high rates of burnout. Factors that contribute are long working hours, a lack of work-life balance, and high-pressure job environments.

Seeking contract work can help lessen your chance of burnout. Temporary jobs allow you to gain experience in fast-paced environments without making a long-term commitment.

They also give you the chance to try out various roles, responsibilities, and work settings in order to figure out which is best for you.

Make Professional Connections

Serving as a contractor is a convenient way to expand your network of professional contacts within the IT industry.

By moving between businesses, you can quickly develop lifetime professional connections with other members of your field.

Learn New Technology

When taking on IT temp jobs, you will have the chance to build a repository of knowledge about different information systems, hardware, software, and telecommunication equipment.

Holding a full-time position with a company as an IT professional frequently entails using the same systems every day. While some workers enjoy this consistency, learning new technology can be rewarding for your career and personal interests.

Whether you want to add new technical proficiencies to improve your resume or because you enjoy learning new skills, taking on IT contract positions gives you the ideal opportunity to try out a diverse range of technology.

Flexible Schedule and Location

Temporary IT positions provide a degree of flexibility that is often inaccessible with a full-time job commitment. When working in contract positions, you can travel and make changes to your schedule without hindering your professional life.

While full-time employees may be bound to a certain city or region, contractors can relocate without sacrificing their opportunities for professional development.

If you like to retain control over how and where you spend your time outside of work, temporary contract employment may be a good fit.

Expedited Hiring Process

When you interview for IT contract positions, there is generally a quicker turnaround than when you pursue a full-time career with a company. 

Working with an IT staffing service makes the interviewing and onboarding process even more streamlined. Your recruiter will act as liaison with employers, providing assistance and guidance as you move into a new position.

ABBTECH is an IT staffing agency that helps IT contractors find placements in businesses of all sizes, from startups to Fortune 500 companies. Visit our Career Portal to start finding contract positions today.

How to Identify Your Employees’ Strengths and Place Them Accordingly

Capitalizing on employees’ strengths can help make them a better employee. Bringing skilled employees into your business is a critical step in putting together a successful work team. However, it’s certainly not the last step.

At the end of the day, your employees will only excel to the extent that their roles allow them. After hiring new workers, you’ll have to figure out where they belong in your company’s culture. Matching people with duties and responsibilities that suit their skillsets is one of the key ways you can improve general productivity.

Use these ideas to evaluate the strengths of individual team members and delegate tasks appropriately.

Observe Daily Workflows: watch for employees’ strengths

Beyond taking note of the end results for assignments, pay attention to how each employee goes about completing their work. Because employees work differently, you should be able to identify who has better skills in different areas.

Time management, organization, and workflow patterns should all be part of your decisions regarding placement within your company.

Consider Communication Skills: where are the employees’ strengths

There’s a reason that in surveys, corporate recruiters routinely name communication as the top skill that companies seek when hiring new talent. Communication can make or break a project.

Identifying good communicators within your team is a great starting point for doling out new responsibilities.

Give Self-Evaluations

No one knows your employees better than themselves. Because you’re determining how to place staff in roles that match their strengths, asking for their opinions makes them part of the process. This will give you more tools and insight to their strengths.

Self-evaluations provide a convenient way to measure how comfortable and confident your employees will be with different responsibilities.

Provide Leadership Opportunities

Giving workers the chance to take the lead on a project allows you to understand their skills on a whole other level. By seeing how they cooperate with others to accomplish goals, you can understand more about their teamwork skills. You will also be able to view how they handle responsibility.

You may be surprised by what comes out when you trust employees with a leadership role. Often, they’ll rise to the challenge outperform what you—or they—thought possible.

Use a Strategic Staffing Agency

Figuring out the right role for a new hire is a long, drawn-out process. It may take months or even over a year to determine how an employee best fits into your company. But, using your employees’ strengths is a great way to ensure they feel noticed and appreciated.

Many companies benefit from using a staffing agency that recruits qualified candidates for placement on your team. If you’re in need of skilled tech contractors to fill specific roles, ABBTECH can help you out.

ABBTECH’s strategic IT talent acquisition system matches quality tech professionals to roles within your company. Contact us today to start building your dream work team.

Workplace Burnout: How Young Professionals Avoid it

Workplace burnout is a common problem today.

Fast-paced work environments, nonstop online communication, and the drive to impress company leadership are some of the many contributors to burnout. Rising rates of remote work that blur the line between work and home life add to this problem.

Burnout is especially prevalent among young professionals. In one survey, 84 percent of millennials reported experiencing burnout at their job—a rate 8 percent higher than the general population.

Fortunately, there are some key steps you can take to reduce burnout at your job.

Set Workplace Boundaries (Then Keep Them)

One of the best ways to prevent burnout is to not let your professional life bleed into your private life.

When you clock out of work, make a point to log out of your email and other communication channels. Resist the urge to check whether anyone liked your GIF in the company Slack.

Instead, use your off hours solely for non-work-related pastimes. Get rest, work on hobbies, and spend time with family and friends. You’ll come back to work recharged and ready to take on new tasks.

Invest in Your Health to keep burnout at bay

Taking care of yourself physically can relieve stress. It can also stave off crashes or mental blocks.

Make a point to stay hydrated throughout your workday. Keep healthy snacks on hand for days when you may be too busy to sit down for a proper meal. If you are sedentary at your job, take a walk or get some exercise during your breaks—outside in fresh air, if possible.

Breathing exercises, meditation, and yoga are other ways to deal with work-related anxiety and burnout.

Build a Support System

Forming bonds with your coworkers does more than boost your productivity. It also gives you people from whom to seek support when you’re at risk of burnout.

Work friends (and even friendly acquaintances) can help keep your spirits up during the days when it seems like everything is falling to pieces.

Be Open and Honest

If you’re struggling to stay afloat during your daily work, don’t try to hide it from your boss. Be upfront and honest about how you’re feeling.

If you know you’re prone to workplace burnout, bring it up ahead of time during the hiring and onboarding process. Staffing recruiters can provide guidance as you enter employment with a company.

When you work with an IT staffing agency like ABBTECH, you’ll receive the one-on-one coaching you need to be successful in your position. Our IT recruiters and placement services help skilled professionals transition into new career opportunities.

Visit ABBTECH’s job portal to match with openings in tech startups and businesses of all sizes. We’ll be available for support every step of the way.

8 Must-Ask Questions for Your Next Tech Candidate

The below 8 must-ask questions highlight candidate skills that help identify the correct candidate. Technical skills evaluation is the primary focus of recruiting and hiring for IT jobs. Interviews provide a valuable opportunity to contextualize those skills with more personal knowledge about your candidates—if you ask the right questions.

Here are some of the most useful questions you can ask when interviewing tech candidates.

Why are you interested in technology?

This simple-sounding question is a good icebreaker.

Right away, you’ll get information about your candidate’s history in tech. This helps define why they’re driven to pursue employment in this area.

Can you tell me about a tech innovator you admire?

Candidates are essentially telling you about their own goals and values when they talk about who they look up to within their field.

Their answer will demonstrate how they measure success in the tech industry.

How do you use your tech skills outside of work?

When candidates give you a rundown of their tech skills, they’ll usually focus on their professional experience.

The ways they use their skills outside of a work environment can tell you a lot about their strengths and problem-solving abilities.

Sometimes a candidate is a ham radio enthusiast, an amateur web designer, or the unofficial tech support for their family. It will be enlightening to find out how they use technology in their personal life.

What is your approach to security?

It’s critical for any IT professional to understand and use best cybersecurity practices.

Pay attention to how your candidate talks about security, and you’ll gain insight into whether you can rely on them to work with your company’s technology.

What is your role on a team?

Because people in the IT field typically support others, tech positions usually require some level of teamwork.

Even if you’re hiring for a largely independent role, it’s important to know how your candidate sees themselves fitting into your team.

How do you stay up-to-date with tech as it evolves?

IT professionals need to stay plugged into developments within their industry to work at the highest level possible.  By identifying how the candidate stays up-to-date, you can ensure they will bring new information to your company.

During the interview, make sure to inquire what steps your candidate takes to stay current on the daily changes to the technology they use.

Can you describe your favorite piece of technology in simple, non-technical terms?

IT support jobs involve much more than grappling with technology. These positions call for a high amount of quick, clear communication about technical topics. By asking this question, you will get an example of how they will explain things on-the-job.

Staffing IT positions with the right people requires you to understand how candidates communicate about technology with people who lack their level of technical knowledge.   

What certifications and experience do you have in tech?

It’s important to establish that candidates meet the criteria you’ve set for the position.

However, you may be able to skip this question if you use IT recruiting services. They can screen candidates’ qualifications and interests ahead of time.

Tech placement services from ABBTECH can ensure that the candidates you interview meet your basic requirements and fit your company’s needs. These 8 must-ask questions will be asked and answered by our candidates, by us.

Contact us today and learn more about our nationwide IT placement services.

IT Certifications to Boost Your Resume

Looking for a way to broaden your job opportunities in the tech industry? IT Certifications may be the way to go.

Studies show that earning a professional certificate or certifications boosts your chances of being employed.

Because acquiring an IT certification will enhance your resume, it can help you stand out to hiring managers. You can do this in your spare time.

You don’t even have to leave your couch to earn any of these popular IT certifications. Just log on to a learning platform like Coursera or Udemy and start building your credentials online.

Information Technology Infrastructure Library Certifications

Managing IT services requires a complex combination of business knowledge and technical abilities. As such, you can equip yourself for jobs in this arena by becoming certified in Information Technology Infrastructure Library (ITIL).

This certificate gives you options for positions that require knowledge of IT management framework, from directing a help desk to risk management.

Certified Information Systems Auditor Certifications

Within the IT field, demand for skilled cybersecurity experts is consistent and pressing.

By earning certification as a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA), you show that you are prepared for professional work in auditing, control, or security for information systems.

CISA certification is a must-have for most IT auditor positions. This can also help you find work as a security consultant, penetration tester, or any career within IT security and compliance.

AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner

If you’re a newcomer to the IT industry and have an interest in cloud technology, becoming an AWS Certified Cloud Practitioner is a promising first step to a future career.

This certification demonstrates knowledge of the architecture, security, account management, and services bundled into the Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud platform. As reliance on cloud platforms rises, the proven ability to use and navigate AWS is an in-demand skill.

CompTIA A+

Another ideal certification for those looking for entry-level work in IT is CompTIA A+. It verifies that you have a well-rounded set of fundamental IT skills. These skills include operating system configuration, tech support, IT networking, and basic cybersecurity.

Because hiring managers often look for this certification when recruiting for tech positions, so do we. At ABBTECH, we actively seek out CompTIA A+ certifications in the vast majority of our placements.

As a leading provider of staff augmentation services for IT companies, ABBTECH helps tech professionals find placement in all types of businesses, from startups to Fortune 500 corporations. So, visit our career portal and reach out to our recruitment team to find companies where you can apply your skills, training, and technical knowledge.

Why You Should Hire the Candidate with Soft Skills

When you’re hiring for a position, you’ll probably be looking for two kinds of skills: hard skills and soft skills.

If you work in information technology hiring, most applicants already have hard skills. They’re the technical capabilities related to your position requirements, such as coding.

Soft skills describe abilities to relate and work with others. These skills include leadership, creativity, flexibility, organization, and conflict resolution. These abilities translate across a variety of industries and are typically innate – rather than trained or taught.   

Soft skills are sometimes brushed over in the hiring process. Candidates who have them can make invaluable additions to your workforce. Here are some of the main ways that prioritizing soft skills when you’re staffing your company can pay off.

Soft Skills Matter More Than You Think

It’s easy to underestimate the role of interpersonal skills in your workplace. While it’s common to think of “people skills” as a trait of customer-facing careers, they move your internal organization forward as well.

Except for certain highly technical and labor-intensive work, most jobs center on some variation of human interaction. Even tech-heavy careers in fields like web development, network administration, and cybersecurity require teamwork and communication.

In addition, if an otherwise promising candidate is missing important hard skills, you can usually close the gap with training – especially if the candidate shows flexibility, eagerness and an aptitude for learning.

Whether or not you’re hiring for a customer-facing position, it’s always worth looking for a candidate who is kind, cooperative, and a good communicator.

They’ll Make Your Team Happier

Hiring a candidate with strong interpersonal skills also has benefits for their coworkers.

Studies show that job satisfaction goes up 50% for employees who build a strong relationship with another person in their workforce. Facilitating bonds within your workplace isn’t just about everyone getting along—it’s great for retention, too.

By bringing in candidates with qualities like empathy and friendliness, you stave off burnout and invest in your company’s long-term well-being.

Adaptability is a Superpower

A sound employment acquisition strategy is about more than finding the right candidate for right now. It’s about finding the candidate who can switch gears, solve new problems, and adapt to changes as they occur.

There’s no such thing as a perfect job candidate. However, hiring a candidate who is flexible and able to learn at a quick pace may result in them growing into the perfect employee.

If you’re looking for a way to make hiring easier, consider ABBTECH. Our recruiters are highly trained in evaluating both technical and interpersonal skills so that you get the best-fit candidate for your unique environment. Get in touch to find out how ABBTECH can help you add skilled tech professionals to your workforce.

3 Reasons to Stop Professional Ghosting

Named after the phenomenon popularized by dating apps, professional ghosting refers to when a candidate or new employee disappears from the hiring process without warning.

Not only is professional ghosting on the rise, it’s also something that many members of the workforce are willing to defend. According to a study, 40% of employees believed it was acceptable to ghost during the interview stage of the hiring process.

Technology makes it easier than ever to leave the hiring process without follow up. In addition, the sheer volume of opportunities online may make it difficult to track applications and action items. However, there are several critical reasons you shouldn’t ghost a recruiter or new employer.

Confrontation is Healthy

Even though it may feel uncomfortable in the moment, turning down a job offer is an important professional skill. In the workforce, you’ll often find yourself in situations that require you to manage conflict, deliver bad news, and say no.

When you choose ghosting over having a conversation that makes you uneasy, you lose a valuable opportunity for this form of career development.

Taking the time to write an email or call your recruiter is good practice for larger-scale confrontation down the road.

It’s a Small World

Maybe you’ll never run into the recruiter you ghosted again.

Then again, maybe you’ll end up assigned to that recruiter or recruitment agency the next time you apply for a job. There’s no way to know—which is why you should always avoid burning bridges in the professional sphere.

Vanishing midway through the hiring process leaves a bad impression. It especially stings if you’ve had extensive correspondence with a hiring manager or anyone at the company where you were an applicant.

On the other hand, withdrawing from the hiring process via a formal, diplomatic message can salvage that professional connection.

It’s Inconsiderate to Ghost

The most important reason not to ghost is that it’s impolite, unprofessional, and unfair to your recruiter.

The process of vetting, interviewing, and onboarding a new employee is expensive and time-consuming. When candidates disappear, they leave behind a mess for the talent acquisition team to clean up.

Avoid the temptation to ghost by finding out exactly what a job entails before going into an interview. Staying informed throughout recruitment helps you set expectations and hold yourself accountable.

It’s easy to stay informed and organized in your job search with ABBTECH. Our recruiters are superior communicators. We will facilitate your job search process with regular updates, interview notifications and reminders. We’re with you every step of the way for support and feedback.

Should I Create Social Media Guidelines for My Employees?

In the workforce, social media is often a loaded topic. The question of whether to address its use by employees—and if so, how—is a difficult one for many employers.

Anxiety over social media use runs both ways. One study found that 51% of employees are concerned that their online activity will be held against them in the workplace.

The solution is implementing clear guidelines. In setting standards for appropriate social media use, you can resolve uncertainty about what’s appropriate to post and help employees balance professional responsibilities with their personal lives.

Not sure where to start? Here are some goals to have in mind when creating your guidelines.

Build Digital Literacy

When you develop guidelines for social media use, you have the chance to impart general education about how to navigate and behave in online spaces.

Employers may find it helpful to go over basic etiquette and provide resources that help interpret the popular expressions seen in web communities today.

In this way, you will help employees improve their overall digital literacy and represent themselves well online.

Promote Your Company’s Accounts

Point employees to your company’s social media accounts for examples of professional presentation and usage.  

By following your official accounts, employees can stay up-to-date on how your company uses and optimizes these platforms.

When employees engage with your company’s content, it’s also beneficial for your online presence. On some platforms, like LinkedIn, connecting with employees is a major strategy for recruitment and brand promotion.

Set Cybersecurity Standards

Establishing social media guidelines presents an opportunity to give employees guidance on protecting their accounts.

Take the time to review your cybersecurity policy with your employees and reiterate the importance of compliance in all areas, to include social media.

Inspire Positive Representation

Above all, employees should strive to represent your company well in all their digital interactions. Remind them that they are the faces and spokespeople of your brand.

That doesn’t just go for full-time, long-term personnel at your company. By including temporary workers, contractors, and others in your social media guidelines, you shape an environment where everyone can be a positive representative of your company.

When you need to hire professionals who can be trusted to represent your company well, ABBTECH has you covered.

Contact us to learn about how our IT staffing services can fit your company’s needs, your requirements, and your culture.

Adhering to these best practices for both phone and virtual interviews will keep your interview professional and stress-free.

Phone and Virtual Interview: Best Practices For Job Seekers

Phone and virtual interviews have become the go-to way for hiring managers to vet candidates. Considering that 74% of recruiters find video interviews make the hiring process easier, they’re likely here to stay.

By adhering to best practices for remote interviewing, you can impress recruiters and improve your employment opportunities. Use these five tips to keep your interview professional and stress-free.

Prep Your Interview Space

Whether you’re interviewing via phone or Zoom, your environment should have good reception and no distractions. If possible, take the call in a private room where the chance of background noise is minimal.

If your interview is over video, tidy the surrounding area and remove distracting objects from the camera’s view.

Hold a Rehearsal Interview

Prepare yourself by coming up with responses to standard interview questions ahead of time. Common topics to prepare for include employment goals, personal strengths and weaknesses, your ability to work as part of a team, how you overcome challenges in the workplace, and addressing gaps in your resume. You should always plan your interview responses according to the business and type of job for which you are interviewing.

Test your microphone and camera before a video interview so you won’t have to troubleshoot during the call. Position the camera so it is level with your face. If you wear glasses, adjust your lighting to prevent glare.

Practice speaking into the camera, watching your posture and natural mannerisms. You should appear professional and engaged onscreen.

Stay Focused

During the interview, give the hiring manager your full attention. Stay engaged and interested. Try to limit voluntary fidgeting, checking your watch, multi-tasking, and unnecessary background noise. If you’re on a video call, maintain eye contact by looking into the camera.

It’s often difficult to read cues during a virtual interview. You can avoid interrupting by waiting a moment after the interviewer asks a question to make sure they’ve finished speaking.

Be Confident

Speaking with confidence is critical to nailing an interview. Whether you’re a seasoned contractor or you’re reentering the workforce after some time away, showing conviction in your abilities leads interviewers to take you seriously as a candidate.

Send a Thank-You Email

Finally, while you should always thank the hiring manager at the end of your interview, it’s a good idea to follow up with an additional thank-you message. This is a great opportunity to reiterate your interest in the position and highlight a few of your key strengths as a match with the position requirements.

Recruitment professionals speak to dozens of candidates each week. Sending a short, courteous email to thank the interviewer for their consideration helps you stand out from the recruitment pool.

Call ABBTECH Today!

ABBTECH places IT professionals in positions with small businesses, startups, and Fortune 500 companies nationwide and has nearly 30 years of experience in staff augmentation services.

Start your job search with ABBTECH today and connect with an experienced recruiter. Once we find a great match for your skill set, our personnel can assist you with every stage of the placement lifecycle.