How to hire Junior Tech Talent without the risk

Many tech teams have experienced a lot of churn with people over the last few years, and even in normal times it’s common for parts of your experienced workforce to leave or retire. The natural option is to replace like for like, with similarly experienced people who can add value quickly. Finding these people is a challenge, with (66%) of large UK businesses saying they struggle to recruit employees with the skills they need (source: Skills Gap Statistics UK 2023 | Oxford Learning College). While this may cover a variety of roles, the demand for technical people in organisations remains higher than the supply.

The option of replacing experienced leavers with junior people entering the tech workforce for the first time might seem like it’s fraught with risk, effort and time. Tech leaders may question using junior people, asking how quickly they can add value, what the overheads are and how they will continue to learn without taking time away from other people. Although hiring junior people may take some additional effort and time, this is likely going to be much less than you think, especially if you use the right service provider who understands these challenges.

Key Challenges When Hiring Junior Tech Talent

Hiring junior tech professionals can be a valuable long-term investment, but it also comes with its unique set of challenges. This can include:

• Ensuring people have the right skills to meet your business needs
• Delayed impact on delivery
• Increased overheads of providing additional support
• Meeting requirements for continuous learning demands
• Retention and career uncertainty

How Can a Tech Academy Address These Challenges?

Skills and competencies

Corecom Tech Academy works with clients to understand the skills and competencies that are important to your team’s delivery, helping us to provide the right training to ensure people a fundamental understanding of delivering software in teams and to ensure they are conversant in the tools and technology you use.

We can also provide a more strategic skills and people assessment, working with you to understand and plan your talent pipelines in order to meet your technology roadmap.

Sharing our experience

It’s true that people entering the tech workforce might not be able to add as much value and as quickly as experienced people, but realistically how long does it take for an experienced hire versus a junior consultant or similar? Typically it might take a few weeks for an experienced hire to get up to speed as they work out how systems work, the way projects run, and who the right people to talk to are.

Junior tech professionals with a solid foundation and eagerness to learn will have similar questions about your company’s specific processes and tools. These are essential for anyone starting in your organisation to understand. Yes, they may take a bit longer to navigate processes in the initial stage, but with the right support, they’ll start working independently in just a couple of months (… or less!).

Entering the workforce

When junior talent enter the workforce for the first time they often require a little bit more support than others. This might be in the form of additional feedback and mentoring or to answer the many questions they might have.

Corecom Tech Academy assists junior tech talent through additional peer-to-peer support led by our fantastic network of experienced consultants who offer expert guidance and practical advice. This can help newcomers with:

• additional informal training.
• understanding how things work in your teams.
• providing tips and guidance.
• the collation and provision of feedback to people.

Training, technical support and learning opportunities

In the initial months of a person’s career in tech they may need additional training and opportunities to learn. This may be the result of a specific need to meet project delivery requirements, or as part of the person’s longer term learning objectives.

Providing individuals with the opportunity to learn from peers and more experienced people alike, within your teams and outside your organisation can be an extremely valuable way of helping progress quickly.

Corecom Tech Academy provides ongoing technical support through our trainers and experienced consultants, as well as a range of learning opportunities from additional formal training to communities of practice and more.

Starting a new career in tech can feel uncertain, and it’s natural for junior employees to question if it’s the right path. That’s where the support is truly needed.

Through a rigorous recruitment process and a significant investment in initial training on their part, this allows candidates to feel fully supported and motivated. Sometimes a specific person might not be right for your team, but in reality this is no different to hiring an experienced person.

In many cases, junior tech talent brings energy, curiosity, and a strong drive to prove themselves. With the right support and development opportunities, they can quickly become incredibly valuable assets to your business.

How Can We Help?

Corecom Tech Academy is an inclusive and diverse technology academy for passionate people looking to start and progress their careers in Software Engineering, Business Analysis, Quality