Why Hire a Remote Software Developer?
Wondering how to safely hire software developers who are based offshore? Looking for the key tips for finding a great remote software development team to grow your team and company? Read this complete guide to hiring a remote software developer and learn how you can easily grow your business and acquire the needed talent with remote software development.
Let’s be honest, growing any company, especially a technology-related business is usually difficult and expensive. This is especially true in the most developed countries such as United States, Canada, Australia, Great Britain and others.
In these states the salaries and overall costs of employing people which include social security contributions, payroll taxes, etc. are quite high, especially for small businesses who don’t possess great capital and revenue.
Hiring a new employee may require serious expenditures which may not provide a positive return. If the growth of your output and revenue requires more employees then it may prove difficult to grow your business.
For example, if you have a software development team in Silicon Valley, then adding new members will cost you hundreds and maybe millions of dollars depending on how large you want your team to become. Due to this, most businesses can hope only for tiny levels of growth.
Fortunately, there is a solution – enter remote software development.
Why Hire a Remote Software Developer?
The high costs and general difficulties of hiring in-house developers and other members of a development team hint that in-house development is not the brightest idea. It is possible to achieve the same output of the same or even better quality with remote developers. Furthermore, remote development provides you with:
- Significant cost savings
- The needed expertise
- More flexibility
Let’s analyze these notable advantages in detail.
Grow Your Business at Lower Costs
Since hiring a remote software developer usually implies lower costs, this means you can grow your team and business for less money. Developers from countries like Ukraine tend to be as qualified and talented as devs from the US or UK. Therefore, you can expect to get the same or even higher quality of development for less money.
For startups and small companies, every cent counts so even 10% or 20% of savings in development costs can prove a huge advantage. Those savings in turn can be used for other more profitable investments such as marketing, sales, etc. This will allow you to grow your business more effectively.
Increase Your Output and Team Size
Cost savings also allow you to hire more people for less money and increase your output and revenue correspondingly. For instance, if a prospective developer would cost $100,000 a year in the States, a developer of the same level may cost $30,000-$40,000 in Ukraine. This means you can hire two or even three remote developers for the same money as you would pay for one in-house dev. This is a huge difference in output, and ultimately, your revenue and profitability.
Make Your Company More Flexible
Remote distribution of team members adds flexibility to your development process and makes it more robust. First, if there are any problems with your office, the development process is not likely to be heavily affected as most developers are based offshore. Secondly, if there is an urgent issue to be handled, your remote developers can take care of it while your US office is sleeping.
Get Access to Sought-After Experts with Rare Skills
The available professionals in your region may not be sufficiently qualified in the technology you need, especially if it’s some rare, new or unpopular programming language or framework. However, you can always find the right experts with rare skills abroad.
So, now that you know why hiring a remote software development team may prove a very sound and profitable idea for your company, let’s talk about how to actually find the right remote team.
How to Hire Software Developers from Abroad
Finding the right remote team and setting up cooperation with it may prove a difficult and lengthy process. The good news is that many mistakes can be avoided if you know how to do it right. For this reason, we have created this checklist for finding your perfect offshore software development partner:
- Decide if you want to outsource or outstaff
- Select the region which is best known for experts in this technology
- Check their level of English
- Ensure the region is located in a convenient time zone
- Consider only those companies which have sufficient experience with projects of your kind
- Check their developers’ credentials/certification
- Check legal information about the company
- Have your lawyer inspect their sample agreement/payment terms
Yes, that’s a lot of points and these are not even all of those which you had better take care of. Let’s analyze each of these in detail.
Decide If You Want to Outsource or Outstaff
In most cases, you will have to either outsource or outstaff when you wish to hire offshore developers. The former option implies complete responsibility for development of the end product according to your requirements on the side of the outsourcing firm. All you do is provide detailed technical specifications. This option is more expensive and better suited for one-time or short-term projects.
You can read more on this subject in our other article:
If you’re looking for long-term cooperation then outstaffing is undoubtedly a much better option as it is less expensive and provides more control over the development process. By choosing outstaffing you get direct access to and management of your remote developers.
You are the one who tells them what to do and how to do it and controls their work. One of the best outstaffing companies on the market at the moment is CyberCraft which provides dedicated remote software development teams at a low cost to clients all over the world.
Select the Technology You Want to Find Developers For
We assume you already know what technology you need developers for. Not all regions are equally best for a certain stack. You can check regional ratings for all popular technologies to see which countries excel at them at websites such as HackerRank. Perhaps, qualified devs for the technology of your choice are rare in your home country so you may have to search abroad.
Ensure the Region of Your Choice Is Located in a Convenient Time Zone
Just because great developers are based in some region, that doesn’t automatically mean that it’s the best choice. If the time zone is too far away from yours this may create certain communication issues. Therefore, it’s not just enough to make sure that the region you’ve selected can offer you qualified talent but also that it’s convenient with regards to your time zone.
Consider Only Those Companies Which Have Sufficient Experience with Projects of Your Kind
Why would you ever hire someone who has never dealt with projects of your kind? It doesn’t make any logical sense. You want to be working with a company who has done identical or similar projects in the past. Therefore, by all means, carefully check the portfolio of every company you are considering to make sure it’s relevant to your field of work.
Check Their Level of English
A team you are considering may be great in terms of their skills but if they can’t say a word in English then you are going to have problems. Fluency in English ensures avoidance of communication problems which directly affects the development process.
Therefore, if you want development to run correctly and smoothly, work only with those developers who know English well enough to communicate freely.
Check Their Developers’ Credentials/Certification
It’s great that a potential development partner claims that their developers are qualified and experienced but it’s always a good idea to check the credentials and certification of the developers to see if they are really that qualified. Simply request that the company provides corresponding documentation and carefully examine it.
Check Legal Information about the Company
It’s a great idea to check all available legal information about the company you are considering cooperation with. Check if it’s officially registered and how long it has been operating
Also, see if they have any court cases, if anyone has ever sued them. If there have ever been any court proceedings, that’s a really bad sign. This legal check will allow avoiding many unforeseen problems by ensuring you work only with those companies which have a clean legal record.
Have Your Lawyer Examine Their Sample Agreement/Cooperation Terms
Unless you are proficient in legal matters, it’s mandatory that you have your trusted lawyer or someone who is knowledgeable in these matters carefully examine the sample agreement which you selected developer signs with clients.
Otherwise, you should ask him or her to compose your own contract from scratch. You have to be sure that the developer’s terms of cooperation are transparent and fair. So must be their payment terms.
Final Words
Growing your team and business, in general, requires time, effort, and capital. Building an in-house development team is usually quite expensive which may slow down your rates of growth. Luckily, there exists an alternative solution which allows growing your company at a fast pace without high costs.
This is hiring a remote software development team via outstaffing. It allows cutting development costs by a significant degree, increasing your output and growth, making your development process more flexible and gives you access to the needed talent.
We have provided you with a detailed checklist for finding and signing an agreement with the right remote software development team. Now it’s your turn to go out there, find your perfect remote team and grow your business.
