How to source and shortlist {role_name}

Where can you find qualified {role_name}?

  • Professional network
    • Leverage your professional network and reach out to former colleagues, industry peers, and tech community members to ask for referrals.
  • Educational Institutions:
    • University Career Centers: Reach out to universities known for strong computer science programs, 
    • Coding Bootcamps: Consider graduates from coding bootcamps focused on backend development, such as General Assembly or Coding Dojo, where many students specialize in API development.
  • Company Career Pages:
    • Your Company’s Career Page: Ensure your job openings are well-promoted on your company’s career page, with detailed job descriptions to attract candidates specifically looking for API roles.
  • Role-Specific Job Boards:
    • API-Specific Job Boards:
      • API Jobs: A niche job board focused on API-related positions.
      • Stack Overflow Jobs: A broader tech job board with a dedicated section for backend and API developers.
    • General Tech Job Boards:
      • Indeed
      • Glassdoor
    • Geography-Specific Job Boards:
    • United States:
      • Dice: A leading job board for tech professionals.
      • SimplyHired: Offers a wide range of tech-related job listings.
    • India:
      • Naukri
      • Shine
    • UAE & KSA:
    • Remote Positions:

What are the best practices for headhunting {role_name}?

  • Engage with Developer Communities: Participate in online forums and communities dedicated to API development, such as Reddit’s r/programming or specialized API groups on LinkedIn. Engage with members by contributing to discussions, sharing job openings, or hosting webinars.
  • Leverage Employee Referrals: Encourage your current tech team to refer candidates. Developers often know other professionals in the field and can recommend strong candidates.
  • Personalized Outreach: When reaching out to potential candidates, personalize your messages by highlighting specific aspects of their work or contributions that caught your attention. Mention specific projects or technologies they’ve worked on.

"Find Talent Quickly" – Leverage Headhunting and Referrals

How to shortlist candidates?

Once you have started to get applications from applicants, a thorough screening process and shortlisting of prospects will help you make the most of your time spent with the most qualified ones. 

Automated shortlisting tools :

Automated screening quickly filters out unqualified candidates, saving time for manual review. This allows the manual process to focus on the most promising candidates, ensuring the best ones are considered for further evaluation.

Screening questions to auto-shortlist based on predefined criteria

like qualifications, location, experience, and skills. Either use job board or use an ATS such as whitecarrot. Here are some questions for {role_name}

  • Experience with API Development:
    • Question: "How many years of experience do you have in designing and developing APIs?"
    • Auto-Reject Criteria: Less than 2 years of experience.
  • Experience with RESTful Services:
    • Question: "How many years of experience do you have working with RESTful services?"
    • Auto-Reject Criteria: Less than 3 years of experience.
  • Location Flexibility:
    • Question: "Are you located within [specified location] or willing to work remotely?"
    • Auto-Reject Criteria: Not located within the required area and unwilling to work remotely.

Skill based question to auto shortlist candidate

Analyze the skill test data to automatically shortlist top-performing applicants. (recommended screening test time - 15 minutes). Here are some skill test questions for {role_name}

API Design and Development

Assessing the candidate’s understanding of API design principles.

  • Question: "Which of the following HTTP methods is used to update a resource in RESTful services?"
    • A) GET
    • B) POST
    • C) PUT
    • D) DELETE
    • Correct Answer: C) PUT
  • Question: "What does the term 'idempotent' mean in the context of RESTful APIs?"
    • A) An operation that produces different results each time it is performed
    • B) An operation that produces the same result no matter how many times it is performed
    • C) An operation that must be performed only once
    • D) An operation that modifies the state of the server
    • Correct Answer: B) An operation that produces the same result no matter how many times it is performed
  • Question: "Which status code indicates that a resource has been successfully created in a RESTful API?"
    • A) 200 OK
    • B) 201 Created
    • C) 204 No Content
    • D) 400 Bad Request
    • Correct Answer: B) 201 Created

API Security Best Practices

Testing the candidate’s knowledge of API security.

  • Question: "Which of the following is a common method for securing APIs?"
    • A) API Key
    • B) OAuth
    • C) JWT (JSON Web Token)
    • D) All of the above
    • Correct Answer: D) All of the above
  • Question: "What is the purpose of rate limiting in API security?"
    • A) To ensure API keys are not exposed
    • B) To control the amount of data sent in a request
    • C) To limit the number of requests a client can make in a given time frame
    • D) To encrypt API responses
    • Correct Answer: C) To limit the number of requests a client can make in a given time frame
  • Question: "Which of the following is a primary concern when implementing API authentication?"
    • A) Caching of API responses
    • B) Protecting sensitive data in transit
    • C) Minimizing API response time
    • D) Ensuring backward compatibility
    • Correct Answer: B) Protecting sensitive data in transit

API Documentation

Evaluating the candidate’s ability to document APIs effectively.

  • Question: "Which tool is commonly used to automatically generate API documentation?"
    • A) Postman
    • B) Swagger
    • C) GitHub
    • D) Jenkins
    • Correct Answer: B) Swagger
  • Question: "What should be included in comprehensive API documentation?"
    • A) Endpoint details and example requests/responses
    • B) User manuals for the frontend interface
    • C) Server configuration files
    • D) API response time metrics
    • Correct Answer: A) Endpoint details and example requests/responses
  • Question: "Which of the following helps in maintaining up-to-date API documentation?"
    • A) Continuous integration tools
    • B) Code comments
    • C) Automated documentation generation tools
    • D) Manual updates by developers
    • Correct Answer: C) Automated documentation generation tools

Note - Auto reject candidates if scores less than 70% in this section

One way video interview

Recruitment Bullet

Use tools like hirevue, whitecarrot.io to ask candidates pre-recorded questions about their experience and skills.

Recruitment Bullet

Use sample question given in scorecard.

Collect other information 

Recruitment Bullet

Collect data from shortlisted candidates, such as salary expectations and visa status.

"Shortlist in Seconds" – Use our CV scoring feature to get top candidate recommendation

Manual candidate profile shortlisting:

Recruitment Bullet

Thoroughly review the CVs of the top scoring candidates from the automated process

Recruitment Bullet

Look for evidence of the required skills, experience, and achievements

Recruitment Bullet

Review the candidate’s portfolio or GitHub repositories to see examples of their work.

Schedule recruiter calls with the candidate

Recruitment Bullet

Use a tool like calendly or whitecarrot to allow candidates to self-schedule calls based on your availability

Recruitment Bullet

Confirm the call details (date, time, dial-in info) with the candidate via email

What questions to ask in the recruiter phone screen?

Recruitment Bullet

 Use scorecard for rating candidates for recruiter

Recruitment Bullet

Sample scorecard : 

Criteria Sample Question Rating (1-5) Comments
Technical Skills Describe how you would design a RESTful API for a new feature.
Problem-Solving Ability Can you describe a time when you had to troubleshoot a particularly difficult API issue?
Communication Skills Explain a complex API concept, like OAuth, to a non-technical stakeholder.
Cultural Fit How do you handle tight deadlines when developing an API?
Attention to Detail Describe a time when your attention to detail made a significant impact on an API project.
Recruitment Bullet

Check for consistency in responses from the candidates.

Recruitment Bullet

Record such scorecards in an ATS like whitecarrot or use google doc