3 Reasons to Hire a Remote Developer
Larger Talent Pool
When a company’s hiring pool is restricted to their own city, the potential developer talent may not offer the speciality or level of skill needed to be successful in the role being offered. However, if a company is willing to hire a remote developer, they can expand their hiring pool exponentially by including candidates from around the world. Suddenly a potential list of candidates that used to include a handful of developers, has expanded to hundreds of thousands, if not millions of developers. This is particularly important if a company is looking to develop or accommodate an incredibly niche product. Being able to work with a remote developer from anywhere in the world means a company has a better chance of finding someone who possesses that specialized niche knowledge and experience.
Pulling from a global pool of candidates also helps diversify the talent, culture, education, experience, and asynchronous working schedules in a company. All of which are key components to maintaining a competitive business.
Lower Costs
Along with a wider, more diverse candidate pool, hiring a remote developer means a company can search globally for a team or individual who can deliver on the work needed, at a reasonable price point. A local team may cost too much, particularly for a small or medium-sized business. However, a team halfway across the world, with similar experience and education, can cost far less because of differing local economies or salary expectations. Companies who hire remote developers are also often not responsible for employee benefits. While a business can include extra perks to make the position more attractive, by and large remote developers are responsible for their own extra expenses. These can offer huge cost savings to cash-strapped business in need of a developer.
Hiring a remote developer also means cutting out the infrastructure costs associated with having (or renting) a suitable office space for them to work. A business also doesn’t need to worry about having an innovative, fun, competitive physical space to attract and keep top tier developers when their hire can instead work in another country (or at home). It also means dodging the high costs associated with outfitting your business with the technology infrastructure a developer may need. Depending on what products or tasks they need to complete, technology requirements like software licensing fees and bandwidth requirements can eat up huge portions of a company’s finances.
Hiring remotely also means cutting down on the cost (and bureaucratic nightmare) of acquiring a work visa for an international developer and relocating them from another country.
Better Productivity
Have you ever heard that some people are night owls and others are early birds? This biological preference tends to stay with us throughout our entire lives; from school, to work, to life in general. Every individual is unique, which means every individual has their own biological preference for when they feel awake, engaged, and motivated. For some, they do their best work from 10am to 2pm, while others, from 10pm to 2am. Working remotely means developers can choose their own schedule when they’re most productive. Instead of spending an unproductive 8 hours at an office, they can spend a productive 4 hours at their own time of choose, completing the same task in less time. This is a huge benefit to companies, as workplaces are, statistically, unproductive atmospheres. Everything from personal temperature preference, access to outside views, old technology, bad ventilation, and co-worker noise can severely impact productivity in an office environment. A remote developer, however, often doesn’t have to deal with any of these issues. This means a project can be completed sooner by a remote developer working in a familiar environment, tailored to fit their needs and wants, then a developer working at a noisy on-site office. This can lead to even greater cost-savings for a business if a developer is paid per hour.
On a related note, for some businesses, productivity is still measured by “butts in seats” rather than actual productivity and task completion. This means that, although an employee may be physically in the office and assumed to be working, they could actually be watching Netflix, goofing off, or otherwise not being productive. On the other hand, for remote developers, instead of physical presence, their only measure of productivity is the work they can deliver on. Therefore, there is little incentive to waste time in their working day, as they would eventually have nothing to show their employers. If an in-office developer spends most of their time on social media, generally no one is the wiser; if a remote developer spends most of their time doing the same, they’ll have little output and eventually be fired.
From access to a global talent pool, superior productivity, and the ability to save money on a skilled work force, there are many benefits to hiring a remote developer.
Is your company ready to take the plunge? Calibre Consulting boasts an experienced developer team, ready and willing to serve Canada and the world.