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It’s been estimated that almost 50% of newly hired employees fail in their jobs within the first 2 years and the first 3 months are the most crucial for their success. As I discussed in my previous post there are various reasons why newbies fail. Is it only dependent on their own behavior or attitude? Is it only down to the internal reasons? What about the external factors such as the impact of the company they start working for?

Apparently, the only constant thing in this world is change. Also social trends change along with the customs and we need to get used to completely different etiquette rules to survive in the jungle of social media. Like with any other form of communication people get to like us or we simply annoy them.

When using social networks we may also offend people and put them off for not following some basic rules of polite behavior. Below I’m presenting the list of practical tips on how to use Twitter in a way that we avoid irritating our potential valuable followers. I hope this list will make things easier for all of us.

If you have just started a software developer’s career or changed a workplace these tips may comae in handy while establishing yourself in a new environment. It’s not easy to earn colleagues’ respect and reach the “core” of the company. Many fresh graduate developers fail at the very beginning for a variety of different reasons. I already presented a few tips on how to succeed in a new workplace in my previous post. Below you can read more tips that may help you survive in a new job.

Are you starting your developer’s career? You stand 50% chance of losing this job within the first two years, the study revealed. Surprisingly, many great and talented people fail. I can imagine that after so many years of studying you don’t feel like getting fired. More importantly, it’s becoming the place you start spending 1/3 of your life at. You try to make yourself comfortable here and make other people feel the same with you around. How to settle yourself smoothly into the job? How to win colleagues’ respect?

According to the study by Leadership IQ around 46% percent of newly-hired employees will fail within the first 2 years in the new job. By failure they mean terminations, leaving under pressure, receiving disciplinary action, or receiving very negative performance reviews. This rate is also nothing different among software developers. Why people who have the right skills to do the job fail? They were carefully screened and made their way into the company. Then they get quite successful at the very beginning and suddenly something changes. Is it their fault or the company’s? Based on our experiences below I’m presenting the possible explanations for their failure and the examples of fatal mistakes when starting a new job:

Nowadays, more and more employers use the behavioral interview to evaluate a candidate’s experiences and behaviors.  It is a great tool to determine the applicant’s potential for success. In my previous post on how to recruit a perfect software developer I described this interview method already. The question remains: how a candidate should prepare  for such experience? We will give you 12 valuable tips!

In my previous post I started discussing the interview techniques which definitely help stimulate an open dialogue with the candidates. I described the STAR methodology which is based on behavioral questions that involve describing real situations from the past. Secondly, I put high emphasis on forming the right open-ended questions that are not suggestive and don’t trigger purely yes or no answers.  Below I’m presenting the remaining 6 techniques that ensure hiring success and help recruiters find the right person for the job.

In my previous post I presented the qualities of a perfect software developer that both fellow developers and managers would like to see in the team members. My survey revealed that being a good developer is more than delivering a perfect and well structured code. So while recruiting a developer we should focus not only on the past experiences and technical competencies. To make sure we choose the right person for the job we need to verify if the candidate has sufficient social and emotional intelligence and the attitude we value. This post describes two techniques to achieve this.

It was already in the late 50s when psychologists discovered that IQ was not enough to guarantee a glittering career in life. The research involved children whose intelligence was first measured and then after 20 years the top performers were found to take a closer look at their lives, both professional and private. To researchers’ astonishment, there was no rule that those who scored highest in their intelligence tests succeeded in their lives as well. The question emerged: what does it take to achieve success in all aspects of life? After some years they came up with an answer: Emotional Intelligence.

There is no escaping the fact that a good code is written by a good programmer. Obviously, we need good programmers if we want to satisfy clients’ needs. However, while recruiting a developer you cannot forget that a  good developer is more than a language syntax source. He should bring more than technical competencies alone. Our research & experience revealed that, yet again, it’s more about social and emotional intelligence as well as thinking patterns and overall attitude. Before we add any new member to the team we should always specify what kind of person we would like to work with? Who is the best fit to the team?