[ipaddr]

Tell the candidates what you want: I want someone who has 15 years of c++ experience transitioning into a go lang role. Rather than I want someone with 10 years of golang which will land you candidates with 2-5 years.

"which doesn’t necessarily get me any closer to hiring someone good"

Everyone wants to hire only the best developers. The more developers in the pool of candidates the more picky we become. Everyone has 2 years of Java in the candidate pool? We only want the best.. you need to have 3 years. If everyone had 5 years you need to have 7 years to be considered the best. Meanwhile any average developer in the candidate pool would work out fine.

Trying to find the perfect candidate vs the average candidate is the self imposed struggle employers give themselves. The need to hire the best gets harder the bigger the pool for all.