Hiring Rails full-time Rails developers is hard. Surging demand. You will likely fight other companies for every recruit. Freelance consulting rates are going through the roof.
Don’t use Monster.com or recruitment agencies. Use your feet instead; find out where Rails developers meet each other and go there. In San Francisco it’s the Ruby Meetups, in Toronto check out PubNite. WorkingWithRails.com can also be useful. If you must post to job boards, try 37 Signals and add your job posting to SimplyHired.
Look for open source contributions. Being intimate with the open source workings of the Rails community is crucial. Open Source contributions such as releasing a Rails plugin, or fixing bugs on projects like Beast, or Rails itself, demonstrates exposure to other Rails code bases.
A university degree is not important. I hate to say it-I’m personally a graduate from Canada’s highly-regarded Math/CS program at Waterloo-but several of the best Rails developers I know didn’t study computer science at all. Hire perpetually. You’ll find that I always have an open Rails developer position, because when demand outstrips supply, you should hire when you can.
If they are using Mephisto or Typo then they’ve been exposed to an established rails code base and have successfully deployed it and even customized it.
As my company does social media software, engaging in the blogosphere is good experience. How else can you really learn the nuances of FeedBurner and Technorati, etc., if you haven’t had a blog?
Lastly there’s the psychological effect of identifying yourself publicly as a Rails developer. That’s a commitment, and addresses my Tip #3 about finding candidates that have self-selected to do Rails.
Does someone have to become an expert in Rails before even having the opportunity to work with and learn from others? It reminds me of all the “junior developer posts” that asked for 6 months commercial experience in VB – like you can get that as a graduate. While I can see that for the ideal candidate I’d be interested in what you’d ask for for a junior developer.
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