Every candidate should go through no less three interviews that help us find the right person for the job.

Before they are interviewed, the candidate should show some relevant work that will help give us an initial screen and something to talk about in the first interview. They should also get a blurb about Tidepool, the position, and our mission and values so that they can self-screen if our culture doesn’t match the kind of company they want to work for. Mission and Values in particular should be emphasized here so that they understand how important they are to the Tidepool team and make sure they align.

Tracking Candidates

We use SmartRecruiters as our Applicant Tracking System to manage open positions and candidates in the pipeline. In order to prevent "anchor bias" with a candidate, SmartRecruiters does not allow you to see the notes and rating from other interviewers before you post your own.

The hiring manager for the position should take ownership for the position and for making sure all candidates have a smooth experience speaking with Tidepool. Don't leave candidates "hanging", wondering what the process is or where they are in the process.

The hiring manager should make sure the Trello card for each candidate includes:

• Links to resume, profile, portfolio, GitHub presence or other work.

• A link to the job description at tidepool.org/jobs.

• Recommendations for what each interviewer should focus on.

A diverse team brings diverse perspectives, and diverse perspectives help us build better products and more fully deliver on our mission.

...

• Referrals: we promote our job openings internally and encourage Tidepoolers to share our job openings with their networks. We offer no referral fees. We also realize that our networks tend to “look like us”, which might lead to less diversity.

• Social Media: we promote our job openings on our social media channels.

• Conferences: events where our team members speak or participate provide opportunities to source talent that is aligned with Tidepool’s mission.

• Nonprofits partners: we have worked with groups such as YearUp, which focuses on training young minority adults to help launch their careers.

• Job Boards: through SmartRecruiters (our Applicant Tracking System), our job openings get publicized in job aggregators such as LinkedIn, Indeed, ZipRecruiter, etc.

• Recruiters: on rare occasions we work with recruiters to help us expand our candidate base for mission critical job openings.

...

...

...

Screening Candidates

Once we have received applications from candidates, we screen them. We want to make sure that we don’t waste anyone’s time (candidate or interviewers) if the candidate is not a good fit for the role and/or clearly doesn’t exhibit the right attributes to succeed at Tidepool.

A resume or online profile can tell us a lot about what a candidate has done, but the first thing we need to find out is what they want to do next, and whether that matches what we’re looking for at Tidepool. This interview can happen over the phone, via Google Hangout, or at a coffee shop.

The idea is to spend 30-60 minutes getting to know the candidate and letting them ask questions about Tidepool and the position. It should be pretty transparent if the candidate’s experience or interests are misaligned for the job or with Tidepool's Mission and Values.

This interview should also focus on selling Tidepool and recruiting promising candidates, as this is their first real contact with Tidepool and their desire to work here will be formed in this meeting.

The following attributes (also known as core competencies) are related to our core values. Evidence of these is explored as part of the screening stage, and constitutes the foundation for interview questions:

...

In parallel with our recruiting efforts for more seasoned jobs, we are very proud of our Internship Program and our Apprenticeship Program, both of which have been a source of extraordinary talent to feed into the Tidepool ranks over the years.

Interviewing Candidates

After a candidate is screened, they should talk to at least 3 other team members for 45-60 minutes each. These interviews can be done individually or jointly, and at least two people on the panel should focus on team fit and working remotely.

For technical candidates, at least two technical interviews should be done, focusing on specific project work as well as high-level thinking.

...