Lately I’ve seen a lot of posts about errors candidates make in interviews. Now I am going to write a list of error employers make when looking for candidates.

1 - Adding them in LinkedIn without asking or even introducing themselves.

Guys,we get it, you are important. Now, please, the thing is YOU came looking for us, not the other way around. Introduce yourself. Why are you adding me as a contact? Keep in mind we do not know each other. For me this is the professional equivalent to “hey, wanna hook up?” in a dating site.

2 - Recruting agencies special: Not disclosing which company they are recruiting for

Yes, I can understand you want to be discreet and everything, but again, you came looking for a candidate. Do you really expect a (hopefully) talented person to engage in a (possibly) lengthy selection process when they know nothing about their employer?

3 - Not stating salary / compensation

If you are out there looking for talent, that talent is most of the time already employed. Why waste your time and the candidate’s time by making him/her go to interviews just to know the salary bracket? Also, even for unemployed talent, they will be drawn to the offers that give the most information. Hiding this crucial piece of info makes no sense to me.

4 - Keeping a you're _sooooo_ lucky attitude

Yes, we are lucky because most of us love our jobs. That’s it. You came looking for us, not the other way around, this is a key concept. You are the lucky ones if we are the top-notch employees you are looking for: we make more money for you than from you.

5 - Not having tech people at the interview

Personal interviews are fine, but we usually want to discuss details. Which technologies are we going to use? How many users? How many people are on the team? Is there a lot of turnover? Do we have a VPN so we can work remotely? Frameworks? And these are just basic questions most of the time HR cannot answer. Please, please, please, have a tech person there.

Have I left something out? (Pretty sure I have). Don’t hesitate to comment and expand this list :D