Let’s look behind the curtain of setting up a remote development team with Iva Kozlovskaya, a CEO of Qubit Labs – a company listed among the best outstaffing companies in 2018 and 2021.
Iva has been working in the industry for more than ten years, so she knows how to build a dream team.
She started her own outstaffing company Qubit Labs, and since then builds successful offshore software development teams for customer from the U.S., the U.K., Sweden, The Netherlands, Switzerland, Belgium, Israel and Australia.
, so we asked her to share the vision of how the best teams are build.
Before launching our business, we studied dozens of foreign and local competitors. Together with another co-founder, we conducted market research and arrived at an astonishing conclusion.
The companies name their services and promise top quality but never reveal how they are going to achieve it. They rarely explain the process of hiring a dedicated team. How long would it take to find the right candidates? Finally, how can you build an effective team for outsourcing with their help?
Showing such details helps both sides build partnership, rapport, and trust, which are our key principles for running an outstaffing business.
If you want to know how we build teams – read on.
When should you look for a software development company?
The whole story of hiring remote software developers starts with choosing an outsourcing vendor.
The market is packed with IT companies, and there are plenty of other hiring models—recruitment agencies or tech talent marketplaces—so it might be hard to make the right decision at once.
Obviously, you study these things first:
but are these criteria enough to start long-term cooperation?
There are dozens of factors that will influence your choice. But personally, I emphasize three of them – location, corporate values, and legislative compatibility,- says Iva.
When choosing a partner the first things you should pay attention to are:
- Corporate values
- Timezone/Location
- Legislative compatibility
1 – If you appreciate corporate values,
choose a vendor that shares your vision and will be your partner. Unlike recruiting agencies, it helps to create a team spirit among remote employees and takes care of their office needs. You get full-cycle HR support from such a partner, so you must ensure you work on the same goals.
2 – Where your dedicated development team is located defines the work schedule.
You get almost 100% overlap in nearshore countries. If four hours are enough to discuss your daily tasks, the offshore development team model will work for you, too.
3 – The third component that helps to establish a successful partnership is the legislature.
Payment systems, incompatible laws, or sanctions can hinder collaboration with an outstaffing vendor and a remote team, so you should check these points before you sign any documents.
Thus, step one is to choose a vendor and contact it to discuss the project needs and get to know each other. What happens next?
What is the process of hiring developers for clients’ teams?
After we get a request for staff augmentation, we schedule a call with a customer.
Companies get to know each other. Our prospective clients describe their projects and discuss the team’s structure and tech stack.
We also tell them about the average time it takes to build a team, our retention strategies, and team management, which are our clients’ top questions.
The basic steps of finding and hiring a candidate for a client’s software development team look like this:
- Screening for matching candidates in our talent pool;
- English level, soft and hard skills check;
- Interview with a Client
- Trial Period
Let’s get into more detail and answer 3 most popular questions asked by clients:
How long it takes to complete a team?
Recruitment timing is different for any project.
For example, hiring a Unity developer usually takes 3-4 weeks. Elixir is not that popular, so just the pre-screening stage might last for 2-3 weeks. Take into account the number of needed developers – if you want to build a dedicated team of five Unity developers, it will take a little longer.
Will you take care of all back-office processes?
Yes, we do.
Clients take an interest in the conditions of their remote teams. It’s great that they care. They want to be sure that their developers are satisfied with the facilities, equipment, and general atmosphere in the company. Any client wants a loyal team, so retention techniques for remote developers are important.
Who will manage a team?
Usually, clients want to manage their offshore software development teams independently.
If you want to build a complete software development team in Eastern Europe that will basically be an offshore/nearshore software development center, we will start by hiring a product manager. A product manager is responsible for orchestrating the various activities associated with ensuring that a product is delivered that meets users’ needs.
Is there a secret to building a successful team?
The secret is: Client and vendor should work together for achieving the best results.
You should pay attention to main main points about building an offshore development team remotely:
- Tell requirements and discuss your needs;
- Give honest feedback;
- The quicker you give a feedback – the better;
- Choose one vendor and work with them to keep your company’s authority high for candidates.
The process of building an offshore development team for a client consists of several steps:
1. Together with a Client we confirm offshore team structure and tech stack for each position.
Mutual understanding is the key to success. Thus, a provider does its best to discover a client’s needs. To start recruitment, Qubit Labs gets information about the project and the person the client wants to hire—tech stack, seniority level, particular soft skills. The client sends a job description or tells the requirements during the call.
Typically, clients know which specialists they want to hire, and we only follow their requirements. But if a non-technical person addresses Qubit Labs, we can provide consultations on which technologies to use and how many developers to hire.
Also, we need to know an approximate budget for each developer to find the candidates within this sum.
When the information is gathered the hiring process starts.
The first selection takes 1-2 weeks. During this time, we check our pool of developers, contact them, and conduct the first interviews. To find a person with particular soft skills, we use our pool of questions, which consists of three parts: priorities, attitude to work, and previous experience.
If a candidate matches the requirements and finds the vacancy interesting, we send his/her CV with a comment about soft skills to our client. Then, the client decides to accept or reject a candidate.
2. The next step is an interview.
At this stage, we play the role of mediators. Recruiters choose a convenient time for the interview, schedule it, and watch to see if everything goes well.
Preparing candidates for an interview is also a vendor’s responsibility. Candidates need to know basic information about the project. Besides, developers often ask about the number of team members, the company’s goals, and its plans for the future.
We receive feedback about candidates’ performance in 1-3 days. If a reply is negative, recruiters pass on the information and explain the client’s decision.
It is important to note that recruiters keep looking for candidates at all stages until the clients find the right person. If the candidate is a good fit, we make an offer to the candidate and hire a developer for a dedicated software development team.
The procedure will differ if a client wants to assign candidates a test task to determine their suitability for a software team.
It can be assigned either before or after the interview. The hiring stages are not fixed, so the client is free to arrange them in the order that he/she prefers.
3. Hiring a developer
Finally, if a client wants to hire the person, companies set up a call and agree to the terms and the first working day of a new employee.
Onboarding and work integration a keys to an effective software development team
It is important to integrate an offshore development team or a dedicated developer with the customer’s team.
What is essential?
- Cultural fit
- Work process
- Task management
- Communications
We need to establish a smooth communication process for the client and his/her software development team. Thus, we need to clarify who is responsible for managing offshore developers from their side and which devices and equipment they need.
We have to ensure a newcomer’s successful adaptation. Both companies have to participate in the process. The clients prepare internal systems—accounts, emails, access to bug tracking tools, etc. They also need to integrate the person into their corporate culture.
It’s nice if our client spends some time introducing a candidate to the team, explaining the responsibilities, and telling us what to do in case of an emergency. In our turn, we are responsible for HR and administrative parts at all stages. – says Iva.
Here are the main steps of our onboarding process:
- Pre-boarding
- Orientation
- Onboarding
- Integration
- Retention
The business model of outstaffing is flexible, but the adaptation stage for software developers is a must. It boosts understanding between parties and helps a newcomer blend into a team faster.
When the rapport between the client and remote developer is set, it is time to think about two more things:
- motivation
- retention
The vendor has to:
- create comfortable working conditions for the dedicated development team
- devices
- perks
- benefits
- teambuilding
Meanwhile, the client should
- Treat remote dedicated developers as a part of his/her company;
- Employees always appreciate when their opinion is taken into account;
- Visit a remote office or invite offshore developers to the company’s headquarters;
- Practice pair programming draws a team together.
However, clients and vendors are responsible for monitoring the software development team’s mood. We contact the client to see if everything is going well on that side.
Communication with clients plays an important role, especially during a probation period. If there are any issues with dedicated developers, tasks, or communication, it is better to find them out and fix them early on.
To make it easy for clients to share their impressions, they can fill out a questionnaire or schedule a call to discuss. In case of negative feedback, we define the problem and look for possible solutions together with the client.
Does the management of an offshore development team differ from in-house?
The most popular options for managing an offshore development team are:
- The client manages the team independently and remotely using their own workforce
- Hires part-time Project Manager
- Hire a full-time Project Manager
- Hires Product Manager
It all depends on the number of developers in an offshore development team and the team structure that the company needs.
Management is a specific distinction of outstaffing. Usually, the client manages dedicated developers, and the vendor constantly supports the client-developer communication.
Remote team management has some peculiarities that you need to take into account. For example, in the offshore development team model, you may work in different time zones.
The client should schedule the meetings during the overlap and use this time for communication/meetings with an offshore development team. Also, prepare for lots of written communication or short calls to discuss tasks.
There are various types of management support for the client’s offshore team. The first is hiring a project manager. But what if you don’t have enough workload to hire a full-time PM?
Iva comments on this issue: We made it a rule not to impose our opinion. We hire only the workers that the client wants. If they ask us for a consultation, we provide one and can only suggest who to hire. We think it is a fair business model.
If a client needs a project manager, we will fill this vacancy
So, here is how our company works in a nutshell. It processes your request, sieves applications, arranges interviews, and cares for team morale.
Recently Iva published a book called “Offshore Team 101. Don’t Hire a Team Until You Read This Book”, you can download it here:
AI Developer Hubs Report
The Best AI Developer Hubs: An Overview of Seven Locations and Salary Benchmarks Delivered by Qubit Labs.
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If you have any questions about building an offshore development team or how it works, you can contact us or schedule a consultation call with Iva.
We will be glad to answer your questions!
