How to Hire Web Developers for Your Team – A Guide

Discover What to Look for When Hiring Web Developers for Your Team or Company

Hiring a web developer for your team can be a time consuming task, especially if you are planning on hiring more than one. When building a team of developers, there are a lot of factors to consider before you can begin searching for the right candidates. For one thing, how can you choose and finalize a candidate without knowing how to hire web developers who are perfectly suited to the task you require?

To put it simply, knowing what to look for in a web developer is essential, but you also need to have an idea of the jobs they will do, and the duties they will be assigned. You will only be able to hire the right team when you are clear on what you expect of them.

But before we start with the process of hiring a web developer, let’s look at why we need to hire a web development team in the first place. 

Why Does Your Business Need to Hire Web Developers?

An online presence today has become essential if the business plans on competing with their competitors. That is because a website and social media presence is considered akin to establishing trust with the audience, as it allows potential consumers to visit and view your website before patronizing your business.

But how can a business go about creating such a website? What are their options to get a robust, visually appealing website, without hiring an in-house team? Well, one of the best options they have is to hire custom web development services from a development agency, and task them with creating your website.

Now, for bigger organizations, who need to constantly maintain and update their websites, hiring an in-house team would be the way to go. But for smaller organizations, outsourcing the development to a web development agency is the best way to go. There are many reasons that hiring a team of professional web developers from an agency can be beneficial, such as:

  • Better cost-time efficiency compared to hiring an in-house team of developers
  • Solutions created by development teams with years of experience
  • Tried-and-true solutions and integrations accessible for a more robust solution
  • The option to get support and maintenance from a team of expert professionals

Defining Your Requirements Before Hiring a Web Developer

Web developer working on his code

Let’s talk about defining your requirements before hiring a software developer, and why is it necessary. Project parameters are a great way to identify what kind of developers you need to hire, with the right kind of skills and experience needed to finish the job successfully.

If you are aware of your requirements, you will be able to choose the right candidates that fit the bill. Moreover, you will be able to eff3ectively convey what you expect of them right at the start, with no chance of miscommunication affecting the team dynamic or the project later on.

And this is especially true of hiring a web developer. In order to hire the right candidate, you need to know who you are looking for – a frontend developer, a backend developer, a fullstack developer, a cloud engineer, or someone else besides them. For example, for smaller projects with basic functionality, a fullstack developer would be the right candidate. But for larger, enterprise level projects, experienced and specialized frontend and backend developers will be required as the project is more technical.

That is why, defining your requirements is necessary in order to find the right candidates.

The Six-Step Process to Hiring the Best Web Development Professionals for Your Team

Now that we know why it’s necessary to hire an expert development team, and why it’s essential to define your requirements before doing that, let’s discuss how to hire web developers for our team.

Setting Your Requirements

Web development projects usually have distinct set of requirements and instructions for each. However, websites with similar end-results usually have some uniformity in functional requirements. However, setting your requirements at the start would give you an idea of the type of web developer you need for your project, as well as the scope of your project.

  • Large/enterprise web projects like commercial apps require a team of highly skilled and specialized professionals, as these projects often work with cutting-edge technologies that are not used by general web developers.
  • Mid-sized web projects include web apps and online stores, which often require a high degree of skill, but usually works by integrating third-party offerings like APIs, chatbots, etcetera.
  • Simple web projects include building simple websites like blog sites or personal websites, which require little to no specialized skills besides general web development knowledge. At the most, you will be creating a CTA, a form, or a button from scratch, while everything else will usually be part of the template you use.

Identifying What Type/s of Web Developers You Require

Now, once you know the general scope of the projects the developer will be asked to fulfill, you will be able to identify the specific types of web developers you need for your team. For simplicity’s sake, let’s consider that there are three basic types of web developers.

  • Front-End Developers

As the name suggests, the front-end developers are tasked with creating the visual part of the website, such as the layout, the UI, and other elements that a visitor interacts with generally. However, they are not a web designer, who creates the framework of your website’s design, and are the ones who judge the design according to UX design basics.

Front-end developers take the design and convert it into a functional website using technologies like Node.JS, React.JS, Angular.JS, HTML, CSS, and JavaScript.

  • Back-End Developers

Back-end developers are tasked with creating the functionality, or the back-end of the project. These highly skilled specialists are responsible for implementing your web project’s features, and integrate them with the front-end layouts in order to allow them to work as expected.

They also optimize your website for better performance, by optimizing load times, integrate third-party tools, or resolve technical issues. And they do that using technologies like PHP, Python, Java, as well as a number of database tools like PostgreSQL, MySQL etcetera.

  • Full-Stack Developers

Full-stack developers offer the best of both worlds, albeit at a cost. They offer both front-end and back-end functionality, and are quickly becoming popular around the world for the ease of work they provide.

And while these professionals often charge more than specialized web developers, they can be economical for smaller projects. For larger projects however, their lack of specialization can be hindrance in finishing the project on time.

Identifying the Ratios of Skilled Professionals Needed for Your team

Generally speaking, a team of web developers should have a healthy mix of both full-stack and specialized development experts to offer both speed and a high level of skill at the same time. But how can you decide the ratio of general purpose to specialists within your team?

To put it into perspective, let’s look at what each individual offers. Full-stack developers offer versatility in terms of deliverables, as they are able to work on both the front-end and back-end of the project. That means they can be assigned a task as per the team needs without worrying about the necessary skills.

Specialized developers on the other hand, can only work on tasks that relate to their specialty. That means that in case a team is working on the back-end of a project, the front-end developers would have nothing to do in that time. That makes specialized resources a liability for smaller companies, as they can end up costing more than they generate.

Looking for Your Ideal Web Development Professionals

Web QA tester

The next step is to find the right candidates. But where will you be able to find such professionals?

Many websites online have huge pools of candidates for businesses to choose from, which can be a bit confusing for many. However, there are three main options for searching the right web development candidates. Let’s look at them in a little detail.

  • Hire Freelancers

Freelance web developers are quite common nowadays, who work independently on small to medium size projects. However, they can be a bit out of their depth when it comes to complicated projects.

However, for simpler projects, you can hire a web developer on platforms like Upwork and Fiverr.

  • Build an In-house team

Building an in-house team can be of great benefit, especially if you have a project that requires constant maintenance and updates. However, that can be quite expensive for smaller businesses, as well as a waste of time and resources for simpler projects.

You can find the candidates for in-house web development teams on platforms like LinkedIn, Indeed, and local job boards in your area.

  • Outsource the project

If hiring an in-house team is not the right move for you, and you do not want to risk hiring a freelancer, then software outsourcing is the perfect mode of operation for you. By outsourcing to a professional web development company, you will get experts to help you create a robust product, without worrying about the development yourself.

Shortlist, Interview, and Test the Candidates

Developers having interactive coding test

Once you know the type of developers you require for your project, the next step is to test, interview, and shortlist the right candidates. There are multiple ways to do that. You can look at their portfolios to check out the type of web projects they have worked on, and in what capacity.

Moreover, you can devise an interview questionnaire that could be used to test the technical knowledge of the candidate based on the type of role they are applying for. For example, a front-end developer can be asked technical questions regarding front-end development. This will help you get a read on how much the portfolio and the technical knowledge of the candidate matched each other.

Finally, you can also test the shortlisted candidates on their technical skills by assigning a coding test. There are many examples online which can help you devise a comprehensive coding test to select the right candidate.

Choose a Mode of Payment

Finally, the mode of payment for your developers. Depending on the type of web developers you’ve chosen to hire, you can have a number of payment options. Specialists are generally paid per hour, meaning that they will be paid for the number of hours they work. That works better than hiring them on full-time.

Outsourcing companies generally charge per project, where the payment is released once the project is finished and delivered. And before you finalize the candidate, you need to discuss the mode of payment with them in detail, so that everyone is on the same page regarding it.

To Summarize

Overall, knowing how to hire web developers for web app development can be especially beneficial, especially in today’s digital age. Companies often need to hire developers or outsource their projects to development agencies whenever they need to create, edit, or scale their web product, which can be difficult to do if you do not know what to look for in a web development candidate.

Therefore, if you are looking to hire the best web developers for your team, you are in the right place.

FAQs

How much does hiring a web developer cost?
On average, web developers charge around $70-80. But depending on their expertise, they can charge more or else. Incidentally, this price is also dictated by the geographical region of the person you are hiring.
How do I hire a web development team?
There are a few ways through which we can hire an entire web development team. Generally speaking, the process may differ slightly from position to position, but the general process is the same as the one described earlier.
– Identify and specify your requirements
– Assess each independent developer’s skills
– Hire the specialists you need
– Assess the experience levels for each team member
– Decide on a payment method
How long does it take to hire a web developer?
Generally, companies can expect the process of hiring a web developer may take anywhere from three to six weeks. However, in rare cases, the wait has been as little as one day, or it may even take a few months even.
What are web development services?
Web development services include all types of services involved in developing a web-based project like a website or a web app. It generally counts both web design and development under the web development services umbrella, which means that these service providers will deliver a ready-to-deploy website.
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