Years ago, a friend at a conference turned to me and said, “Hey, you know testers. Would you take a look at this list?” Not only did I look at the list, but I knew so many of the 125 people on the list that it was a pleasure to help out with highlighting their accomplishments. One thing I noticed is that people who are fans of another person’s work will often share their positive feelings about it without being specific.

For someone who has no experience with that individual person, knowing about the positive interpersonal interactions is important but not sufficient to make a decision about following up on the introduction. I noticed that some of the testers I knew who others shared were “awesome”, “amazing”, or “fantastic” had tangible accomplishments that deserved that space in this listicle. I ended up spending at least an hour editing and updating content to provide more active testimonials for following these community members and to encourage people to engage with them for collaboration, including public speaking opportunities.

When I looked at the article, I saw a lot of effusive praise that the recipients earned and that I also frequently felt for them. However, what I noticed was what wasn’t included. One listed tester was a keynoter, and no one had highlighted that. Another created a framing of problem-solving that helps me. A third wrote a book. And so on.

I’m not writing a listicle today, but I am writing recommendations for my colleagues. Why? I have lost a job before and I feel for them. Even when faced with being let go in a large group, losing a job feels personal and like a critique of the person who no longer has that way to financially support themselves or others.

I’m not an expert on this, but I know how to start. No one has trained me in how to do this correctly. This is just what I do that helps, according to the folks who wrote that article and to people whose work I recommend. Given the recent layoffs, I wanted to share my thinking since we have a great opportunity to support our colleagues who find themselves in a stressful and discouraging position. (I was going to say “tough spot” but that’s not effective in defining and addressing the problem we can help to tackle.)

I’ve been doing this a while, so I just tacitly follow my process. On Friday, a fellow Toastmasters club member asked me how I do what I do, which made me think through what I would recommend. Here’s the list that came out of my mouth. 🙂

emphasizes context, concrete examples, and highlighting transferable skills

I think an effective recommendation emphasizes context, concrete examples, and highlighting transferable skills. Imagine that you are helping your colleague or friend to prep for an interview where the interviewer asks, “Can you tell me about a time when you X?”

Since the job seeker may not know ahead of time what positions are open, I try to make the recommendation easy to understand, not context-free. Context of the work experiences matters a lot and helps to illustrate how potential employers can understand the relevant abilities of my friend or colleague to their work situation. That helps a person to see why this person is a good candidate.

Now, I haven’t tackled the AI screening process, but I assume we have an SEO kind of problem to solve here with keyword inclusion for automated scanning – or even human searching. I would expect to see job listing content injected into applications for a given position, possibly with customized resumes for the job listing. That’s a whole separate part of the problem, so I’m going to leave it at that for now and go back to my recommendation of a person.

Since most job listings I’ve seen in the software industry talk about specific technology stack or technical skills, I try to include those without making my recommendation into a repetition of the resume or a list. I work them into the concrete examples of my direct work with someone so that it’s clear this isn’t just interest or curiosity but actual hands-on experience on the job. If there are measurable results, even qualitative ones, then I recommend you include those. That might require consulting the candidate you’re recommending to get the right numbers or to fact check your claims. I think that’s fine. I don’t think a recommendation has to go sight unseen until publication. I’d much rather get the statements corrected ahead of time.

If you know what the person you’re supporting is looking for next, then tailoring the content to the intended audience, such as recruiters and hiring managers for a specific company, is helpful.

When I worked in testing, someone introduced me to the heuristic framing of What? So what? Now what?
In this case, the now what is definitely consider this person for your job opening. That leaves the what and why to care about the examples. The “so what” is the significance, so be sure to work that into the examples of what you observed on the job while working with someone.

This is by no means a complete rubric, but I wanted to get this out there for folks who are having trouble starting. There’s no wrong way to start! Get your thoughts down and then get another set of eyes on it to see whether it’s helpful. If you know someone who can give feedback other than the candidate, even better! Feedback is a gift, even if what you hear is there’s more work to do.