How to Hire Top Remote Talent – The Ultimate Guide

Companies with ambitious and far-reaching business goals are well aware of the importance of hiring top talent. When such a need meets the necessity to cut operational costs, hiring the best professionals remotely becomes a perfect-fit strategy. That’s why in this article, we will explain where to hire developer and how to hire remote developers with expertise that matches your project requirements.

The present and future of remote work

The State of Remote Work – Quick Facts

• Since 2009, there was a 159% increase in the number of remote workers
• 30% of US employees are working remotely
• 40,7 million Americans will work remotely by 2026
• Facebook allows all full-time employees to work remotely
• 85% of Google tech teams are now working remotely too
• Apple allows the staff to work remotely 1 month per year

Remote work is here to stay. Since 2009, there has been a 159% increase in the number of remote workers, and 30% of US employees are working remotely now. It is also projected that 40,7 million Americans will work remotely by 2026, so getting started with remote work adoption, developing effective practices for recruiting top talent, and managing remote teams makes a lot of sense, especially for knowledge-intensive businesses. 

Such industries as healthcare, financial services and IT are the ones with the largest remote work adoption. For example, Facebook tops the list of tech companies hiring remote workers, and also allows all full-time employees to work remotely. 85% of Google tech teams are now working remotely too, and Apple allows staff to work remotely for 1 month per year.

The example of Apple is worth following for companies making their first steps towards switching to remote work. Instead of going fully remote instantly, it makes sense to test this model step by step, allowing employees to work according to a flexible and semi-remote schedule. 

Getting started with going remote – main benefits

Switching to remote work sounds challenging for companies that don’t have a lot of remote team management experience. However, the idea of going remote promises several value-adding benefits for a business. Below are the main ones. 

• Save around $11,000 per employee per year. The opportunity to decrease operational costs is the top reason why companies get started with hiring remotely and running their business processes beyond the office. When remote teams are managed in a smart way, businesses can achieve significant savings on office rent, training (which may be done remotely as well), and equipment. 
• Hire top talent globally. Attracting top talent from a global job market opens up an opportunity to bridge the talent gap, get access to engineers with highly-specific skills and competencies, plus embrace cultural diversity at once. 
• Reduce turnover by 50%. According to statistics, the average cost to replace an employee is $15,000 per worker. Hiring a remote team allows for cutting this figure twice. In addition, it promises better employee retention and engagement. 
• Let the team members be more productive. Remote team productivity is usually higher compared to office ones since the remote staff has better life-work balance opportunities, plus the possibility to tailor the most important tasks to the individual productivity peaks. 

Remote workers also agree that they feel less stressed, compared to their in-office well-being, which in the long run, promises an opportunity to save insurance costs. 

 What should I look for in a remote employee?

Now when it’s clear what advantages remote hiring can bring, it’s time to figure out how to hire remote developers. In addition to matching their core competencies and skill sets with your job requirements, you should also look for some personal traits that make an employee effective and better suited for remote work specifics.

Below are the most important characteristics of an ideal candidate to fill a remote position. 

• Time management skills. Time management skills are especially important for international team members since they are likely to have partially overlapping schedules. In this case, you have to make sure your candidate knows how to work out time zones. 
• Self-organization skills. The ability to plan the workflow independently, set the right priorities, and switch to a more important task quickly is the next personal trait you should look for in a remote candidate. 
• Respect to deadlines. Meeting deadlines accurately is one of the biggest challenges remote teams face. Those candidates with time management and self-organization skills are unlikely to fail the deadline, however, it is better to plan each of the tasks in advance and leave some spare time. 
• Great communication skills and no language barrier. Remote work requires the team members to be great communicators, delivering their messages clearly and consistently. This skill is easy to check during the non-technical interview – just ask the candidate to recall the situations from their experience where communication was crucial. 
• The ability to unplug. While home office employees are usually more productive, some of them aren’t able to unplug at the end of the working day. According to Statista, this is one of the biggest struggles of those working remotely, and in the long run, it affects employees’ productivity. So, ask your candidate about the ways they maintain life-work balance to make sure there will be no overwork and burnout.

How to recruit top talent – comparing the opportunities

Finding top talent has never been easy, however, you have three different strategies to choose from to hire remote workers. Each of them has its specifics and can be tailored to the company’s goals and expectations. Let’s review each of the tactics in more detail. 

Local job boards

This is the most common option for companies willing to hire local talent that will work remotely. But keep in mind that such a tactic requires setting up a recruiting process on your own and is associated with hiring costs which can be pretty high if the talent you are looking for is in-demand. Use the following platforms for local hiring. 

• Indeed. This is the most popular job board in the US. Indeed allows for hiring both remote and local talent, plus it has separate and localized versions for European countries. There are 200 million CVs posted on this website globally so the chances of finding your perfect match here are very high. 
• Glassdoor. In 2018, Glassdoor was bought by Indeed’s parent company, and platforms merged some of their features. Still, they have separate websites and user accounts. Compared to Indeed, Glassdoor is a better option for developing an employee’s brand, but you can hire remote employees from this job board as well. 
• Location-specific platforms. There are also job boards that cover local job offers and host the CVs of the candidates from a specific city or state. Use them as well to have a larger pool to choose from. 

Freelance platforms

For those companies experienced with gathering freelance teams and their management, building a remote team on freelance platforms is an easy and cost-effective approach. One of the main benefits of this tactic is that you can hire the necessary specialist either on freelance terms or attract them to work with you full-time. Below are the top platforms for hiring remote talent. 

• Upwork. Upwork doesn’t need a long introduction – there are 12,500,000 freelance developers for hire on this platform. This application also provides a secured space for collaboration between a freelancer and a customer, with a guarantee of receiving payment in response to the services provided. 
• Toptal. This is a less popular platform compared to Upwork, but the competition for the best talents isn’t as fierce on Toptal. Keep this opportunity in mind when choosing between freelance platforms. 
• Fiverr. Fiverr is a great place to hire creative talents, for example, designers, copywriters, video makers, and marketers. Consider this platform for complementing your tech team with creative minds.

Talent sourcing companies

For the companies with no experience in remote team hiring and managing, IT recruitment services are the most winning option. Partnering with a talent sourcing company, like Bridge, allows your business to avoid hiring-related headaches and associated expenses thanks to the company’s expertise and its best practices for remote recruitment. 

Bridge would be happy to help you with gathering a remote tech team according to your project requirements and managing it in such a way as to reach your business goals in the shortest possible time.

Get in touch with us for the first consultation and accurate hiring costs assessment!

Leading countries with the best tech talent and remote development team experience

Where to look for tech talent? There are several winning destinations to hire remote specialists from, so let’s take a deeper look at each of them. 

Latin America: Mexico, Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia

Latin America is a great destination to consider for the companies which need to hire an affordable workforce skilled in the most popular web and mobile development technologies. According to the Global Skills Report 2021, Argentinian developers have strong data analysis skills, while the ones from Mexico are good at Java and C++ development. Another reason to hire developers in Mexico is a great talent pool of 223,000+ programmers. 

The cost to hire them is pretty affordable as well – the hourly rate of the tech specialists from Latin America is up to $50 per hour. 

Let’s gather a remote development team together! Contact us to get started with recruiting the best professionals from Latin America! 

Eastern Europe: Ukraine, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czech Republic

The Eastern European countries can also boast of huge tech talent pools, top-notch development skills of the local programmers, no language barrier, and convenient time zone overlap. The cost to hire developers is a little higher compared to Latin America though, but their skill level and English proficiency are higher as well. 

Read This Before Hiring Software Engineers in Eastern Europe

Poland, for example, is ranked third by Hacker Rank and stands out with its Java, Python, and C++ development skills. Ukraine, in turn, is one of the leading outsourcing destinations globally. Despite the invasion of Ukraine, the Ukrainian IT industry is still on the rise, making this country a perfect price-quality match. 

Feel like Eastern European programmers can drive your project growth? Drop us a line to meet them in a flash! 

Western Europe: Portugal

Among all the Western European countries, Portugal stands out with the reasonable costs for programming services perfectly matched with the high software engineering skills level of the local developers. The Guardian calls this country a new Silicon Valley located in Europe as this country has all the conditions essential for making a successful investment.  Portugal is economically and politically stable, the cost to hire programmers from there is up to $50 per hour, plus Portuguese developers are known for their communication skills, which make this location a great choice for remote projects.

Would you like to hire your remote team in Portugal? Bridge would be happy to source them for your project development! 

Remote tech team hiring tips and tricks

Hiring a remote development team for the first time can be overwhelming. Follow the tips below to facilitate this process and attract top talent to your project. 

Hiring Developers Is Not That Scary: 5 Step Guide to Connecting With Skilled Programmers

1. Tailor the hiring strategy to your project specifics and budget. For example, companies experienced with hiring and managing remote teams can recruit locally on their own. Those aiming at hiring on a budget are welcome to find the necessary specialist on a freelance platform. Hiring from a talent sourcing vendor is a good tactic for both as it allows for saving time and resources while getting competent support and assistance. 
2. Choose the destination wisely. Each of the countries we have overviewed above suits different needs. Latin America is good for hiring an affordable workforce, European programmers are better skilled compared with Latin ones and have no language barrier. Portugal, in turn, may be a win-win match for most of the projects. 
3. Decide on the engagement model. There are also different ways to run your project development remotely. For example, you can gather a full-time remote team from scratch, augment your in-house team with remote talent or consider sourcing as a service. As for the latter, the talent vendor will provide you with the list of vacant candidates to reach out to according to your project requirements. 
4. Interview the candidates on your own. Technical and non-technical interviews are unskippable stages of the hiring process when you recruit your remote staff on your own. Even if the necessary specialists were sourced by a vendor, you are still welcome to interview them, validate their experience and ensure a personal fit. A lot of companies hire third-party technical specialists to help them with interviewing. We, at Bridge, can also offer you a dedicated platform for hiring and interview scheduling. With the help of this app, you can easily create a job requisition, review the candidates we can instantly offer, schedule an interview with them, plus manage your remote team. Payroll and accounting features are in-build as well. What’s more, we would be happy to assign a dedicated Project Manager to support you along the way. 
5. Establish clear communication and collaboration practices. Establishing clear communication and terms of collaboration is essential for managing a remote team successfully. Using modern collaboration tools is the best practice in this case.  Consider such platforms as Trello, Jira, or ClickUp for developing seamless workflows, Slack and Microsoft Teams for team communication, plus Zoom and Google Meet for daily meetings with your team and video conferences with stakeholders. 

Ready to gather your perfect-match remote team right now? Let’s run it together – just get in touch with us for an instant start! 

Conclusion

Gathering a remote tech team becomes a value-adding opportunity when your hiring strategy is matched with your experience and project goals. Those companies in need to hire top talent urgently are welcome to consider IT recruitment or team augmentation. Partnering with a tech talent sourcing vendor is the smartest choice for the projects striving for flexibility, and cost-effectiveness through each of the development stages. 

Bridge is here to support you with recruiting, hiring, and managing your remote team – tell us more about your project now to get instant help! 

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