[dblumenfeld]

For a non-programming recruiter it is way to easy to get impressed by a good talker who knows how to throw in appropriate buzzwords in a conversation. You can judge communication skills, but how on earth would you judge whether the prospective hire can code correctly if you cannot code yourself? IMHO the best way to go is to find a fried of a friend who is a programmer and get an opinion from him/her. It would also not hurt to run a candidate through 3rd-party test that require actual programming (my favorite is codility.com, but there are several other websites that provide similar services).