Looking to hire me?

This page is meant to for anyone who might be interested in hiring me. As pretty much everyone on this field, I get lots of contact request from recruiters, most of these are of really low quality, irrelevant and possibly scams. Recruiting processes in many software companies take lots of time and are usually quite involved. Sometimes you only discover in late state negotiations, that the company is looking for someone completely different or has nothing of interest to offer. Here I have some instructions that will help you make initial contact, that leaves good impression and saves time for both of us.

Contacting me

Best way to contact me is by email. Make sure that email includes full contact information for both you and the company you represent.

Questions for employers

Here I have listed questions I would like to have answered as early in the communication as possible. While I don't expect anyone to answer all of these in their initial contact, you are quite unlikely to get a reply if the first message I get doesn't at least show an honest effort to go trough the list.

Job to fill

Who is the employer? Lots of emails and linked-in posts from recruiters start of telling they have perfect job for me, but they don't tell who is offering such job. If you don't trust me to not go behind your back directly the potential employer to skip your recruiting bonuses, how would you trust me to do the work being discussed or to provide you with accurate information. Why should I trust that this is not a scam if you don't trust me to know the company name. If you don't know the company yet, then you don't have position for me, you are looking to find one for me.
What job are you seeking to fill? For example, software developer or IT consultant might mean very different things depending on company, and even within the company. It would be best to have the job description by someone who actually does that job already, or lacking that, a detailed description by direct superior on what they expect from the job. I want to know what you actually need. Lots of job advertisements list lots of unrelated technologies and tools, that one could learn in few weeks, but fail to describe what they are used for or how much. And they might lack any indication about some major skill or knowledge that would be necessary to work efficiently in the position. Sometimes companies also seem to hire people to do completely different things than what they actually end up doing and having a clear picture of what the intended job is going to be should help avoid this.
Is the job short term or permanent? Six month job might be refreshing, but there needs to be some serious benefits, or other improvements over my current work, if I'm going trough recruitment process expecting to be doing it again soon after.
How quickly are you looking to fill the position? Do you need someone there as soon as possible, or are you looking to have full year of looking for candidates then maybe starting them after few months? Sometimes I might be up to new offer that starts yesterday, but usually I have things I must complete before I can end my current employment. This is mostly about how well our timings match.
Why is the position vacant? Simple question that hopefully has a simple answer. I'm asking it in case it doesn't.
How does the recruitment process work? How many rounds of interviews are there? Do I need to do assignments or evaluations? Will I need to have camera for web conference? Basically how much time I should assume to spend if I do apply to this position. It is not always easy to take time from your work to apply to another work, and taking it out of your limited free time doesn't sound that good either. Something must justify these investments.
What are the work hours? Most companies have some sort of flexible hours, but how flexible are your hours? Do you require daily meeting at 12 o'clock, being able to pick phone between 8 and 16, even if you are working 10 to 18. How regular are the hours? Is overtime common and how is it compensated? Can on easily take unpaid time off? How do you calculate paid vacation days? Even under Finnish law and unions I have seen different enough implementations to offer competitive edge.
Where is the work place? While I'm open to work outside of Finland, I want to be able to reach my place of work without too much problems. Sometimes it might be easier to skip country for a year than to get to other side of town daily. How much of the work time is expected to be local or remote. Will I have most of my work at employee's, their clients' or someone else's properties. While most jobs can be done remotely these days, it would be nice to be able to work locally, at least for the start, so I get to know my co-workers, can sync my day rhythm and routines with them and can get support for setting up my work environment and getting to know existing code quickly.

What is being offered

What are you expecting to pay? I'm not looking to have the initial contact be take or leave offer, but if you have a job you are seeking to fill, there must be some idea on how much you would pay your minimum viable employee to do that job and you likely do have some limit on how high you can go even if the candidate was literal god of programming your stuff better and faster. How are the wages determined in the company and how often and in what scale can new employee expect rises? As stated, recruiting processes usually take lots of time from a candidate, so it would be good to know, that I'm not starting a month long series of mails, calls and homework, just to hear you would cut my pay in half.
What health benefits are there? This is important when the employee is not from Finland, as I am unlikely to know how your healthcare system works and what I have to take care of myself. It is also a way to show that you care about your employees, even if it is only on level that sick workers don't work efficiently.
What opportunities for self improvement will there be? Whole industry seems to be about keeping up with new technology and I would like to know if you support your employees in this. Do employees get access to industry journals and papers? Is there work time dedicated to learning new things? Is it possible to attend seminars, conferences and talks on relevant topics? Does company support attending them financially, such as keeping them work time, paying for travel and tickets? Can one participate in research in this position?
Devices and gadgets? Licences? What do you expect me to work with and is that free to use for things outside of work as well.
Lunch? Culture? Sports? Van for moving? Office space for after hours boardgames? Do you offer other benefits worth mentioning.
Can I leave my mark to history trough this work? Will this job allow me to do something actually important? Learn or discover a new thing? Be part of the creating something that people will talk about after me? Motivation is important part of work efficiency. Self discipline can get one trough difficult mornings and less interesting parts of the work, but to be truly efficient in daily work, on needs motivation, and I'm not easily motivated unless there is a clearly defined goal that I see as worth pursuing.

Workplace and values

What is it like to actually work there? Are there daily or weekly routines? What kind of processes are there in work? Are there expectations on work wear? How is air quality, lighting and noise level?
Do you have a employee I can talk with? Lots of companies ask for recommendations from previous work. I think it is only natural that I ask of them for the work place as well. No one can describe atmosphere and culture of the workplace better than someone who works there. Someone that is not too invested one way or other.
Who owns the company? It might not be important or it be very important. Whose income my work benefits? Why are they in business? Do they have responsibility to match their power?
Does the company stand for something beyond profit? Are there principles or lines the company is dedicated to keep? How does company ensure these principles don't change with the change of leadership or owner? I'm not going to be picky about specifics, but my honour is not for sale, and I will not work for someone who profits by misfortune of weaker.
Does workplace measure employee productivity? If yes, how? Does the company support improving on these areas or reward this productivity in some way?