Software Shops and Name Recognition

Many engineers envision working for major technology companies: Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Apple, Atlassian, eBay, JetBrains, Meta (Facebook), Redhat, Microsoft, Oracle, and Salesforce.  Sure, you'll be a small fish in a (very) big pond — at least initially — but the panache, salary, and potential bonuses make it very appealing. How about future job hunting? Piece of cake. Ah, I can see it now...

Of the 12.2 million workers in the US tech industry, the majority of us are employed elsewhere. But what is elsewhere? How do we find those other shops, much less learn about their business, technology, culture, and fit?

Many software shops — especially the smaller ones — operate in some level of obscurity and, aside from receiving media coverage, often remain so. My LinkedIn contacts continually list employers I know nothing of; others I learn of only through job hunts. I don't believe I am unique.  

The challenge is raising corporate visibility — positively — which hopefully results in higher-level candidates applying (or even cold-calling) and reducing attrition of current employees. The goal is to change from a pitstop in a career path to a longer-term, career-defining destination.  

But can software shops achieve this? Have your employees become your biggest advocates!

Blogging

Encourage employees to write about their technology experiences and interests; support by providing time and mentoring.

Everyone learns by reading Medium or DZone articles, answers to StackOver questions, and Baeldung tutorials. After reading an article, I realize I knew that! No matter how junior or senior, everyone has something to contribute. Often it's just getting pushing yourself or getting shoved to put virtual pen-to-paper.

I believe both work-related and personal-interest posts engage the reader to learn more about the author's company. Work-related posts lead to questions about products, architecture, and frameworks. Personal interest posts lead to Wow, where can I work with interesting people like that? Readers look at LinkedIn profiles for contacts who have connections or even check the current job openings. The more positive vibes, the better.

Blogging also raises individuals' self-confidence: the initial rush of clicking Publish is quickly exceeded by seeing analytics showing how many have actually read your post.

Speaking

Encourage employees to speak at user groups, tech conferences, and other events; support by providing time and mentoring.

Though the outcome is much the same as with blogging — increasing the company's name recognition and street cred — speaking has a different vibe: it's live and IRL, it's personal and interactive, it's dynamic and challenging, and it's very rewarding.

Speaking at public forums gets your name — and your employer's — in front of a new audience with a different, diverse background, e.g., industry peers. Most technical talks reflect work experiences — the cooler, more fun, and exciting, the better — which increases name recognition and interest for the company.

Companies assist by providing internal opportunities — i.e., technology research findings, feature reviews, training, lunch-and-learns — to allow speakers to gain experience and confidence.  An explicit mentoring or buddy system helps new speakers identify content and structure the talk.  Stepping from behind the curtains to the podium is a huge challenge for many, but can be successful with the right assistance.

Contributing

Actively participate in the community.

When you take from the community, look for opportunities to contribute back.

Take Open Source Software: Today, almost every solution created includes Open Source Software (OSS) components: at least one and usually substantially more. Software-as-a-service apps often require an attribution page to meet OSS licensing requirements.

The ever-increasing use of OSS in business-critical apps means companies can't rely on someone working feverishly every night to help them. Instead, tech firms provide resources to work on OSS projects directly for their benefit and indirectly for everyone else.  Some companies contribute financially via non-profit organizations — i.e., the Apache Foundation, the Eclipse Foundation, and the FreeBSD Foundation. However, direct engineering work may be more useful. For example, FreeBSD is the underlying operating system in multiple Dell products, and I know Dell engineers who became FreeBSD committers.

Other Ways to Contribute:

• Answer questions on forums like Stack Overflow, Code Ranch, Reddit, etc.;
• Mentoring through organizations like Rewriting The Code, The Black Technology Membership Program, or any other that interests you;
• Get children excited about technology through programs like Devoxx4Kids, Girls Who Code, or robotics.

Yes, these other ways likely require you to commit personal time, but the rewards, both personally and professionally, are immeasurable.

Hosting

Local meetups and user groups often need organization assistance and places to meet.

In my hometown of Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota, the number of user group events noticeably dropped even before COVID, and any post-COVID resurgence must be still-to-come.  A big problem is organizational: finding speakers with topics, scheduling locations and publicizing, and arranging food or snacks.

Have experience or expertise that you think is generally interesting to others? Have an office well-located and capable of hosting non-employees for presentations? Then volunteer for the company! At the very least, the company gets kudos for hosting, but it's also another opportunity to share what the company does with outsiders. And an opportunity to bring people together, share interests, and exchange ideas is an opportunity to see who might be available to help in the future.  You never know! 

Corporate Benefit

Anything and everything is a chance to increase the company's name recognition, speaking in particular, where attendees' first inclination is to review the LinkedIn profiles of the speakers.

Obviously, there's a cost when allowing (encouraging) employees to put aside their day-to-day work for external-facing initiatives. I am not advocating a formal Google 20% model, and when handled correctly, employees won't feel guilty. For example, use Summer Fridays as a target day to focus on these external initiatives and cultivate the culture to execute year-round. Of course, there's always the chance your rock-star technologist gets lured away, but she might have left anyway.

Ultimately, the trust and respect shown your employees results in positive feelings about the company, which they share with friends/peers/recruiters, who talk positively about your company to their friends/peers/recruiters, which opens up channels and opportunities down the road,

Undoubtedly not everyone is going to be interested, but it is life-changing for those who are.