Careers Finding a Job IT Recruiter: Job Description, Qualifications, and Skills Print Prostock-Studio / Getty Images Finding a Job Job Searching Skills & Keywords Resumes Salary & Benefits Letters & Emails Job Listings Job Interviews Cover Letters Career Advice Best Jobs Work-From-Home Jobs Internships Table of Contents Expand IT Recruiter Job Responsibilities Companies Recruiters Work With Qualifications for IT Recruiters Jobs Marketed by IT Recruiters IT Recruiter Compensation By Alison Doyle Updated on 12/15/20 Information technology (IT) recruiters help companies hire people for open IT positions. As a recruiter, you'll seek out candidates who have the specific skills an employee wants, such as programming skills or technical expertise. Sometimes, people in this role are independent contractors who find prospective employees for client companies. However, in other cases, IT recruiters may work in-house as part of the larger human resources team. Whether you're in-house or a contractor, people in this role are often seen as indispensable, since hiring is quite competitive for people with IT knowledge. Find out more about what it's like to work in this role, and what skills are needed. IT Recruiter Job Responsibilities Sourcing Candidates IT recruiters may work on attracting applicants passively, or may actively reach out to prospective employees individually (through networking social media sites such as LinkedIn or through schools or programming boot camps). Screening Candidates Once an individual expresses interest and enters the application process, recruiters screen the candidate for the client company's job requirements and qualifications, as well as checking to ensure a good fit with company culture. Arranging Interviews If the candidate passes the initial stage of assessment, the recruiter arranges interviews between the job candidate and key staff within the client company. Coordinating Compensation Packages After the decision is made to offer the position to the candidate, the recruiter explains the compensation package the company is offering and helps navigate any negotiation over salary and other benefits. Companies Recruiters Work With If you become an IT recruiter, you may find yourself working with a wide range of companies, since nearly every industry, from media to commerce, requires IT employees. And you'll likely fill many different types of roles, including both permanent positions and temporary, project-based jobs. Qualifications for IT Recruiters To be successful as an IT recruiter, you'll need to have certain skills and qualifications: Education: Most people in this role will have a college education. What you major in isn't necessarily important, although a technical major, or at least related coursework, might give you an edge down the road. You may also opt to pursue recruiter certifications or other professional development to gain more expertise. Communication skills and other soft skills: In this role, you'll need to both read potential candidates for a good cultural fit and entice candidates to work for the company you represent. Certainly, having strong communication skills is important, since you'll often need to be a conduit between hiring companies and candidates. The most important soft skills include a strong social aptitude, the ability to communicate effectively, relationship building, and top-notch organization. Technical knowledge: While you don't have to be able to code yourself, or have an in-depth understanding of IT software and hardware, you should be conversant on technical matters. This background knowledge will help you understand what hard skills are important to hiring companies, and allow you to be able to talk the talk with job prospects, answer their questions, and determine whether their particular qualifications match what the employer is looking for. Jobs Marketed by IT Recruiters Information technology recruiters work to fill both in-house and contract jobs. They may specialize in one type of position or type of candidate, or they might be generalists who can do it all. Most have acquired the technical expertise and knowledge to fully understand the nature of the jobs for which they are hiring. To evaluate an IT candidate properly, a recruiter needs information technology skills. Information technology recruiters find qualified candidates for a wide variety of jobs. Some examples include technology deployment, IT asset management, cloud computing, security systems, network design and integration, network maintenance, end-user services, communications technology and applications for business analysis, reporting, and data science. IT Recruiter Compensation The IT recruiter acts as a liaison between the client company and the candidates for the position throughout the entire recruitment process and is compensated by the hiring employer either directly or indirectly. Recruiters who are not employees of the company itself may either work for recruiting firms that are hired by client companies, in which case payment comes through the recruiting firm according to its own compensation policies, or they may be individual consultants who work on a contract basis directly with the company. In 2019, the average salary for a human resource specialist was just under $62,000 and the industry is expected to grow 7% by 2029, faster than average.