If You Want to Hire Software Developers in Ukraine, You Should Be Aware of the Timeframes within Which This Can Be Done
Developing one’s software in Ukraine has been increasingly in vogue among Western businesses. However, many overseas companies, eyeing up Ukraine as both a well-known talent pool and, often, a cost-saving bonanza, are still poised for the move. There are all kinds questions those companies are concerned with. Has the influx of IT projects overheated the market yet, and will they be able to make their deadlines if they opt to hire software developers in Ukraine? Will there have to be any compromise on quality, previously unknown reasons for delays, or additional costs involved due to the growing inflow of overseas clients Ukrainian software development companies are dealing with now?
We’ll spare you the well-known facts and stats most articles about similar topics feature (such as, for example, Ukraine having the largest number of software development professionals in Eastern Europe, which is, certainly, true). Rather, we’ll dwell on how long it actually takes to hire one or more software engineers in Ukraine while relying on a local software development partner.
Looking for a Nearshore Software Development Opportunity to Cut Your Development Costs and Your Product’s Time-to-Market?
3 Ways to Staff Your Project with a Software Outsourcing Provider (Including One in Ukraine)
This would most probably come as no revelation that the vast majority of offshore Top Software Development Companies of 2020 are in no position to provide you with an appropriately qualified development team immediately on demand.
At best, some of them can provide 1-3 software developers who currently make up their “bench team” (several developers who are temporarily engaged in some kind of a not so important internal project and who are on standby for one of the company’s upcoming client projects). Actually, this is precisely what we do when our clients want their projects to take off sooner (and we deem it to be a good practice to follow, as the core of a client’s Dedicated Team is then formed by well-proven and highly skilled engineers we have known for a long time).
Another way to expeditiously staff a Dedicated Team would normally be to provide (the client’s project permitting) Junior developers, trained internally and capable of solving the tasks to be solved under the stewardship of their more experienced colleagues (something we do too if/when preferred by our clients).
In both cases, you can count on being provided with at least part of the developers you need with almost immediate effect.
But, as you’ll have guessed by now, in most instances, a typical software outsourcing company has to hire the developers you need externally.
What happens in the latter case and what are the implications of choosing this option as the team creation scenario for your project?
Having Developers Hired on Your Behalf by a Software Development Company in Ukraine
At first blush, having your team of software developers put together for you from the ground up doesn’t somehow seem as much of an attractive option. In actuality, the scenario does have a couple of undoubtable benefits.
Learn more about how to hire software developers in Ukraine ...
Firstly, the experience and qualifications of the hired experts will be in strict compliance with your requirements. Secondly, you will be able to attract those developers, who are genuinely interested in your project and your product (for example, because they just get a kick out of developing the kind of software you develop, or just want to acquire more related industry expertise).
What are the cons of this approach?
Actually, there is just one considerable disadvantage and it may pose quite a serious risk to a software development project: your team must be created fast enough for you to stay on top of your deadlines. In this sense, there are two major factors involved:
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In order to be able to do the required project planning, you must have a clear idea about the average duration of the more typical recruitment cycles in the software outsourcing location of your choice.
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You have to be able to determine your software outsourcing partner’s hiring capacity.
As far as Ukraine is concerned, it should, first of all, be mentioned that recruitment cycles here are generally shorter than those in the West.
As a general rule, a recruitment cycle comprises the following stages:
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Finding candidates who can be interested in the client's project and whose skills, experience, and qualifications seem to be in sync with the client’s requirements (1-3 weeks).
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Conducting a preliminary interview with the candidates, or providing them with a test assignment and analyzing the results submitted by them (1-2 weeks).
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Organizing an interview with the client’s technical experts, or supervising the completion of a test assignment, provided by the client (1 -2weeks).
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In the event that the client finds a candidate who is suitable for the project at hand, it takes around 1 week to discuss and agree upon the conditions, on which the candidate will be willing to join the client’s project, and to sign an offer.
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The period of time, required by the candidate to complete their current tasks, fulfill their current contractual obligations, and leave their current employer (2-4 weeks).
As some of the above stages can overlap or run in parallel, the duration of a recruitment cycle can range from 4 to 10 weeks.
While IT recruitment is, certainly, a complex process and one influenced by a range of factors, there are also several useful recruitment-related generalities that can help you do your project planning timewise if you want to hire developers in Ukraine:
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The recruitment cycles for an array of the more wide-spread programming technologies are generally shorter than those, for older or less wide-spread technologies. In particular, these more wide-spread technologies include Java, .Net, PHP, the Frontend technologies, Android and iOS.
Incidentally, it is relatively also easy to find good QA Engineers or a skilled Project Manager.
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The technologies that are more difficult to find and that are associated with longer recruitment cycles include С++, Golang, ROR, and Python. You will also likely spend a longer period of time on finding a highly qualified DevOps engineer or Business Analyst.
The above happens because there is generally less demand for these kinds of experts on the part of Western and other overseas clients. Correspondingly, fewer developers and other IT professionals choose these technologies and areas as their specialties. However, if your IT partner specializes in such a technology, there should be no problem for them in providing you with the experts you need because they offer in-house training, or just have an affiliation with the corresponding local developer community.
Programming Languages' Popularity (in Ukraine). According to a Research by the DOU
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While the time, required for hiring a developer, can also vary seasonally and geographically (for the purpose of this article, we are considering the well-known Ukrainian software development centers of Kyiv, Kharkiv, Lviv and Dnipro), hiring a senior developer with a good command of one of the more wide-spread technologies, for example, Java, will take roughly 5-7 weeks.
As a rule, you can hire a Middle Java software development engineer within 4 weeks. Hiring a Junior Java developer should take you no more than 2-4 weeks. Finding a good Java Architect would be an even tougher row to hoe, but it would typically be possible to find one within roughly 8 weeks, provided you have a sufficient budget.
Things are a bit easier with .NET. It is quite possible to find a smart Junior .NET developer within 4-5 weeks, while in the case of a Middle .NET developer one will have to spend an average of 4-6 weeks to achieve a good result.
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As mentioned previously, the less popular technologies, such as ROR, C++, Golang and Python usually require longer recruitment cycles.
Let’s take Ruby-on-Rails as an example.
A good Junior RoR developer can take up to 5-7 weeks to hire, while to hire a Senior or Middle RoR developer you will need an average of 6-10 and 5-8 weeks respectively. In the case of Senior RoR developers, some extra effort and additional expenses may have to be involved.
It is also important that you take into consideration the time required by a developer to leave their current job and join your team. Usually, the duration of this time period is defined by the contractual obligations between the developer and their current employer. For Ukraine, this time period, usually, constitutes 2-4 weeks.
It should also be noted that the duration of a recruitment cycle can also be influenced by some requirements that are associated with the knowledge of a specific framework, library, or business domain.
The Hiring Capacity You Should Expect Your Outsourcing Partner to Have
Whenever it deals with the creation of a more or less sizable Dedicated Team from scratch (say, 6-10 developers and other team members) and with a bunch of nasty deadlines and formidable milestones to cope with, you must also factor in the hiring capacity of your offshore IT partner. It's about their ability to hire a certain number of experts within a certain period. Your offshore IT partner may also use PEO services to ensure the project's scaling.
In this regard, in order to give you an idea about what a company our size can do (we are now 100+ strong now), we will use ourselves and our principal development technology, - Java, as an example.
So…
If you approached us as a client, how many Java developers would we be able to find and hire on your behalf within a timeframe of one month (given a median budget, a moderately favorable season, and considering our HR Department’s meticulous hiring practices and approaches)?
Most likely, we would be able to find and hire 2-3 Senior Java developers, 4- 5 Middle Java developers and 8-10 Junior Java developers. Do those numbers sound like they would be hard for you to handle/achieve locally? If they do, you should probably look into the opportunities, afforded by such a first-rate offshore software development location, as Ukraine, a lot more closely.
If you want to know more about how long it takes to hire developers with a good command of a specific programming technology in Ukraine, just get in touch with us, and we will gladly share this information with you.