Ultimate Guide: How To Hire a Dedicated Development Team in Ukraine
Today, large enterprises and startups have many opportunities to find experts around the world. For example, you can hire several remote specialists for your project and manage them yourself. You can also choose to outsource and have separate divisions of your business in different countries. Or you’re able to hire a dedicated development team in Ukraine to cover the needs of your product at an affordable price.
Ukraine is a popular technology hub where most international IT companies can find experienced developers with relatively rare skills. It is no longer a secret that Ukraine has become a “European Silicon Valley” for several reasons, and the affordable hourly pay of Ukrainian specialists is just one of them.
Liubov Rudnieva
Head of Business Unit
- IT Industry In Ukraine During The War
- Why Should You Hire a Dedicated Development Team For Your Business?
- IT Outsourcing Industry In Ukraine
- The Main Reasons Why Your Company Need To Hire a Dedicated Development Team in Ukraine
- How To Hire a Dedicated Development Team
- How pwrteams Can Help You to Hire Dedicated Team in Ukraine
- FAQ
What attracts investors and international companies to the Ukrainian labor market is the rapid growth of the technology ecosystem. Based on State of European Tech 2019 data, Ukraine ranked 9th among European countries regarding the number of software development professionals. In addition, a Stackoverflow survey showed that 17.4% of software developers in Ukraine are individual contractors, freelancers, or individual entrepreneurs.
IT Industry In Ukraine During The War
It has been a challenge for Ukraine’s IT industry to adapt to the stressful situation. However, the country has been putting in great effort, and—so far—the results are paying off. The IT sector still works perfectly, showing its strength even in the conditions of the war. According to Forbes, the IT sector is one of the most powerful in Ukraine. Almost 44% of all Ukrainian service exports in October 2022 were delivered by outsourcers. Constant rocket attacks and other problems don’t seem to scare IT professionals. Companies maintain their productivity at a high level and only continue to show growth in the market.
Specialists in this field can choose their schedules and are not restricted to particular working hours or locations. This allows teams to work anywhere in the world. Many projects were started even in times of partial electricity outages. And most of these projects have been successfully completed and brought to the clients. Ukrainian IT professionals are being constantly praised by the international community for the talent and hard work they put into what they do.
The industry contributed over $6 billion in export earnings to the Ukrainian economy in the first ten months of 2022. It has increased in comparison to the same period the previous year. After the invasion, companies were forced to make a number of quick decisions to maintain their operations. A crucial component of all Ukrainian warfare operations is adaptability and desire to improve.
According to the founder of Dou/Dijini (Tech jobs in Europe and remote) Max Ischenko, the labor market is moving up, and the IT industry is better than we could hope for. He states that the number of candidates in the network is constantly increasing, as well as the level of feedback on vacancies.
Many businesses have managed to keep all of their clients thanks to their ability to adapt. This shows that the clients have already ensured the quality of the IT services that the country provides. Since the onset of the full-scale war, a significant number of people have established businesses by registering as individual proprietors (in Ukraine, called FOP). This demonstrates the persistence of Ukrainian entrepreneurs and shows their willingness to work even under the hardest circumstances.
Why Should You Hire a Dedicated Development Team For Your Business?
The dedicated team model is a widely used method of implementing HR practices today. You will not need to hire an in-house specialist to complete your project. In most cases, business owners hire international teams on a long-term basis to create a strong relationship between supplier and customer.
This method is quite flexible and considers the interests of both customers and vendors, so cooperation is beneficial for everyone.
Moreover, in the case of working with a dedicated team in Ukraine, you will not need to worry about office equipment, specialized software, perks, etc. You work with a group of talented programmers who are working remotely on your project and communicating with you daily.
IT Outsourcing Industry In Ukraine
Based on this data, Ukraine ranks first in Europe and fourth in the world regarding the number of freelancers that are located there. More than 80% of orders carried out by Ukrainian engineers are related to software development.
The talent pool in Ukraine is much larger than, for example, the Philippines. At the moment, there are more than 1000 IT companies in this country that offer outsourcing services. The Ukrainian IT market is growing by almost 20% annually.
The main features of a dedicated software development team in Ukraine include:
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High quality
Ukraine has a reasonably strong education system, especially regarding disciplines such as mathematics and computer engineering. Of course, the country does not have such universities as MIT, but graduates of the Lviv and Kyiv Polytechnic Institutes are appreciated even in Silicon Valley.
The number of IT professionals is increasing as it’s one of the highest-paid areas. Today, many schools and courses provide retraining for both high school students and people from different fields who have decided to change their profession.
If we talk about startups, then Ukraine has good indicators. Among the main “heroes” of Ukrainian IT are the following organizations: GitLab with investments of $ 267 million in 2019, Grammarly, and Liki24.com. Moreover, such tech giants as Samsung, IBM, and Atlassian also have their R&D centers in Ukraine.
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Profitability
According to a survey of the Ukrainian tech market, in 2020, the average salary for a software developer ranges from $ 780 per month at the entry level to $ 4,000 per month at the executive level. A mid-career developer typically earns between $ 1,500 and $ 2,600 per month.
The availability and professionalism of the dedicated team in Ukraine specialists increase the demand for their services among international companies. Nevertheless, the Ukrainian IT sector continues to grow and welcomes new investors and companies who want to locate their R&D offices.
The Main Reasons Why Your Company Need To Hire a Dedicated Development Team in Ukraine
We can say with confidence that Ukraine is one of the fastest-growing IT markets of the decade. With an ever-growing number of experienced engineers and software development companies, this country is rightfully considered one of the leading IT markets in Europe. In addition, the number of software specialists has grown significantly over the past few years to over 110,000.
Let’s consider what are the main reasons to hire Ukrainian developers:
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Quality services
Developers in Ukraine have always been distinguished by their thinking and creativity. Ukrainian specialists are constantly developing their professional skills and looking for ways to obtain new information. Such well-known projects as Grammarly or Monobank were created in Ukraine.
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High level of education and professional experience
They’re highly educated and just as good as Silicon Valley engineering and experience. They’re performing far much better than the companies we’ve worked with in the past.
It’s worth noting that Ukraine was the technological center of the USSR for many decades. Almost every major city in the country has technical universities that have many technical specialists graduate every year.
Moreover, every IT or outsourcing organization has its courses for programmers and testers and designers, managers, marketers, and others in the field. It helps provide the company with a qualified workforce.
Ukraine ranks 4th in the world in terms of the number of people with higher educational backgrounds and second in the number of master’s degree holders.
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Professional skills
Ukrainian professionals annually work on a large number of different services and products. As a result, they have many other skills and their knowledge of programming languages help them successfully work on your projects.
We’ve been extremely satisfied with their work, both that of the developers and the QA teammates. They provide test-driven development, proper documentation, consistent creation of unit-testing, and consistent refactoring of code. It is fair to say that they helped us to improve the overall quality of our operations. We learned a lot from them and their experience in working with big corporation.
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Favorable payment
Just a few years ago, the cost of software development in Ukraine was quite meager. However, due to the high demand for services, the development companies decided to raise their prices. But despite this, for customers from the USA or Western Europe, this cost is still beneficial.
Thus, if you decide to transfer your company services to Ukraine, you can reduce your costs by 30-50%.
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Cultural mentality
There are many resourceful people who live in Ukraine who are suitable for modern IT companies. It is known that Ukrainians are hardworking. Moreover, they are pretty creative and intelligent and always strive for high quality. Their out-of-the-box thinking and outstanding technical skills often bring significant business benefits. Due to this reason, European and American companies will not feel cultural differences in terms of the necessary cooperation.
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Timezone
In Ukraine, there is a very convenient time zone – GMT+2 (in summer – UTC + 3). It means if the customers are in Europe, business hours will be practically the same as the working hours in Ukraine.
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High level of English
Almost all Ukrainian specialists have a sufficiently high level of understanding of the English language, especially since most of the documentation and technical specifications are written in English.
Every IT company either has a full-time teacher or provides courses in the best language schools in the city. Thus, developers and other professionals work on their English at least two (sometimes three) times a week. If you want to communicate directly with the technical team, you will have no difficulty.
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Work ethic
Ukrainian ethics includes conscientious work, high quality, and due diligence. Ukrainian people are considered savvy, especially when the pressure is to find ways to complete a task before a deadline. They are highly motivated to advance and grow as professionals. Also, many foreign organizations leave positive feedback on cooperation with Ukrainian engineers on Clutch.co. and other similar sites. So, you can read them at any time!
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A considerable number of development companies
In Ukraine, there are more than 1600 companies providing software development. The Ukrainian IT industry is growing by about 25% every year. Based on Clutch data, 28 organizations in Ukraine are engaged in machine learning, and about 50 companies are involved in big data analysis. Also, based on this report, in Ukraine, 57 companies operate in the field of AI.
In addition, according to Clutch listing on 20.12.2021 the prime spheres Ukrainian IT Service vendors work in all major industries, the most popular of them are IT, Finance, Medical, eCommerce, and Business Services.
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R&D Centers
You may not have thought this, but in Ukraine, there are many research and development centers of well-known companies such as Microsoft, IBM, and Google. Many of them are located in this country thanks to a robust and innovative economy.
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A large number of technical graduates
Ukraine contains over 370 universities that annually graduate qualified specialists, and about 34,000 are IT experts. For example, in 2015 alone, there were approximately 60,000 IT specialists in Ukraine. Today this number has grown to 150,000 engineers.
How To Hire a Dedicated Development Team
Once you’ve decided to start hiring a dedicated software development team in Ukraine, you need to do a deep research. To find the right specialists, consider these points:
- Freelance platforms like Upwork
- B2B portals like Clutch
- GitHub or StackOverflow
These sites will provide detailed information about the company or developer, previous projects, prices and other necessary information. This will help you better understand if the service provider is right for you and select the most suitable candidates.
After you have chosen a supplier, you need to assemble a team.
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Step 1. Requirements
Write your requirements. This includes the project description, job descriptions, team size, and your vision for the workflow.
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Step 2. Team
Ask your vendor for available developers to get started on your project. If there are no accessible specialists, submit your requirements to the intermediary so that this company can start searching.
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Step 3. Selection of talents
The vendor HR team evaluates engineers to find out their experience, technical skills, English level, and interpersonal skills to provide you with a list of the right people for your project.
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Step 4. Team integration
You can see the entire process of integrating dedicated professionals into your current project. Also, choose the preferred management approach and the tools the team should use.
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Step 5. Collaboration
You get the Ukrainian software team you want to start working on your project. The main difference is that such specialists work remotely, and the software outsourcing manager takes over the administrative tasks.
How pwrteams Can Help You to Hire Dedicated Team in Ukraine
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How pwrteams helps to set up a cross-border team?
Founded in 2008, today pwrteams is a leading international staff augmentation company headquartered in Luxembourg and New York and servicing its international customers out of Eastern Europe. It employs 300+ tech professionals serves 80+ customers across 16 countries.
We crafted a transparent business model aiming to solve traditional customer roadblocks while outsourcing, such as employee turnover, cultural differences, management overheads, and evolving needs. With pwrteams we have created a remarkable business experience that is as close as possible to having your own employees as if we build and operate a new customer office in Eastern Europe. Additionally, our option to spin-off and acquire your pwrteams team as a fully owned daughter company in Eastern Europe open-up new strategic scenarios.
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What are pwrteams’ staffing models?
We provide options both for long-term strategic outsourcing for 1 year projects and longer missions. Also we can hire experts for client’s peak periods from few weeks up to 6 months. We are 100% flexible and are focused on finding the best option for every client. The team set-up can take 3-6 days or several months depending on client’s requirements and needs.
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What does the staffing process involve?
- You can participate in the hiring process, and only you make the final decision
- You set the rates for each employee yourself
- Each specialist works only on one project. The team won’t have any parallel projects
- The supplier company assumes responsibility for all issues and what is not covered by you
- You prioritize work and tasks
- You get the desired results of your project
- You have access to a massive pool of talent from the Ukrainian software market
By collaborating with dedicated teams, you have a lot more control than meets the eye. Of course, it will take your professionals some time to understand the product code and properly develop the necessary solutions. Thus, the primary purpose of outstaffing is to ensure that you only pay for the time the team spends on your project.
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How does pwrteams’ team conduct interviews with candidates?
The interview is the most crucial step in which you need to assess the developer’s skills. In this case, the interview process includes some communication channels involved at different stages of communication.
Phone call: It allows us to understand and discuss the selected person’s expectations, goals, ideas, experience, and skill level. In most cases, the duration of such an “interview” does not exceed 20 minutes. It’s a relaxing time for both the candidate and the interviewer.
Video call: In this case, the interview will be more detailed and may last more than an hour, possibly an hour and a half.
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Points that we pay attention to when conducting an interview
Hard skills: In this case, our technicians can test the technical skills of the engineer. We select a lead developer who has the appropriate experience and skills in this area for such an interview. We also conduct on demand client assessment to better evaluate practical knowledge and skills of the candidates.
Soft skills: In the case of soft skills, we can check how a person behaves in a team, his communication skills, priorities, and more. We also pay a decent attention on cultural fit of a new teammate in the client’s organization and ensure the high motivation of an employee in the future.
FAQ: Dedicated Development Team Model
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How to Assemble Dedicated Experts?
Putting together a full team of developers or other professionals can be a daunting task. In this case, a dedicated team model lends you a helping hand. It will allow you to find and hire a ready-made group of the necessary experts and eliminate the need to spend time searching and hiring.
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What Are the Benefits of a Remote Development Team?
A remote dedicated software development team is one of the most efficient and reliable ways to save your resources. Moreover, some of the most well-known global giants such as Google or Apple choose remote developers because they are much cheaper and can work more productively than local employees.
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How to Manage Dedicated Programmers?
In most cases, you get a project manager to coordinate all development processes and submit weekly reports.
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How to Test Engineers before I Hire Remote Developers?
One of the correct ways is to check the portfolio or some parts of the code from previous projects. In addition, you can also ask the developer to create some light project to better understand whether a person is right for you as well as being able to evaluate the quality of his work.
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How Teams of Dedicated Developers Compare to Hiring Freelancers
Of course, freelance offers ample benefits for hiring professionals. But the dedicated software development team has a lot more to provide you with. It includes high-quality work, a creative approach to the project, a European mentality, a high level of English, and a work ethic.
