How to Select Remote App Developers for Web & Mobile App Development Projects

Looking to hire an app developer for your project/s? Well, that’s a tricky task. You will find a huge number of options in the market and choosing one may become a humungous task because there is so much to consider and so much to eliminate.

Do you want to hire a freelance developer for a one-time project? Will you require a team of website developers? Should your app developer be on-site or remote? Or do you wish to outsource the complete development task to a software development company? These are the questions you should consider before you dive into the hiring process.

In this blog, let’s talk about the key steps that you need to take if you decide to hire a remote developer for your company. We will also talk about the key soft skills that you need to check for, before onboarding your new employee.

Steps for Hiring a Remote App Developer or Website Developer

Finding and hiring the best app developers and website developers for your team can become an easy task if you take the right steps. The method for hiring an on-site and a remote developer is almost the same with just a few small differences that we will discuss as we go. Let’s start then?

Understand your Requirement

The first and probably the most crucial step is to understand your requirement clearly. As your yourself questions like, do you need an app developer, a website developer or someone who can do both efficiently. Next you need to know if you want to focus on any particular technology.

Hiring can be done with a particular project in mind or multiple upcoming projects that will require a developer. Therefore, it is only obvious that your requirement will change. At this stage, make a detailed requirement document, discuss it with your other team members, add or delete points if needed and then proceed to the next step.

Create a Job Description

Once you know who you want to bring on board, create a detailed job description (JD) that covers all the job responsibilities along with other crucial details such as skills required, technologies required, job location, experience level, package, etc.

Be very detailed in terms of the skills, the knowledge a candidate must have. Ask for samples and follow them up with a proper test that covers all the nuances. Same goes for the responsibilities. Do make an exhaustive list so that there’s communication gap or confusion at a later time.

Spread the Word

Once your JD is ready, it is now time to put it across various job portals and social platforms. Pick the platforms that will be relevant for the opening and post the JD. You can also choose platforms based on whether you are hiring for a full-time position, part-time or freelance.

Sort and Evaluate Resumes

Start going through the responses by sorting them by years of relevant experience. You need the best candidate, so get in touch with the applicants who have more experience and have worked on projects similar to your requirement. From there, you can move in the decreasing order of experience.

Schedule Interviews

Call the shortlisted candidates and schedule interviews. This step will include multiple rounds of tests and interviews till one or more candidates are chosen for the job. Add every day’s tasks to your tests to get a clear picture of a candidate’s capabilities in say, building a module, fixing a bug or rewriting a section for better results.

While sorting the resumes, be mindful of skilled candidates as well. There may be candidates who are extra-ordinary but do not have the years of experience you need. Be extra-vigilant while short-listing and be open to giving them a chance. Also, schedule atleast one round of face-to-face interview.

Make an Offer

This is the last step in the process where you make an offer to the selected candidate and bring them onboard.

Top Must-Have Skills in Remote Website or App Developer

Hiring a remote worker is different than finding someone for an in-office position. The difference is not in terms of their core skills, rather it lies in their soft skills. A remote developer can and must have all the core skills that a full-time employee is required to have, such as knowledge of latest development tools, a certain year of experience and specializations needed for the company specific projects. Along with these, a remote app developer must also have:

Excellent Communication

Face-to-face communication is easy and remote communication is marred with misunderstandings. But that does not mean we can skip communication/collaboration altogether. A remote worker has to communicate with his team mates and in order to do that effectively, he/she has to be on top of the communication game through all the channels.

The remote developer has to be a prompt responder on chat, email and even call to appear always available. Communication is one of the exhausting processes for remote employees but since it is a must, your remote app developer should be open to communication at all times.

Extra-ordinary Problem-solving Abilities

Remote developers work alone, therefore, they do not have the type of physical, technical or moral support that they may require on a daily basis. To win at the remote work game, a remote employee has to be a champion problem solver. He/she must be able to workaround routine issues that may come up with the internet, laptop or even power backup.

A remote employee must also be good in people skills so that he/she can efficiently handle issues with the team mates. So, the point is that a remote employee should be a self-sufficient person who can have a productive day despite of all the routine issues.

Good Organizing Skills

All types of jobs need organizing skills for efficiency and productivity. The same goes for remote jobs and infact remote workers need some extra organizational skills as compared to their onsite counterparts. This is because when you are on-site, in office, you have to follow a proper, pre-set time table, a pre-defined schedule and a number of preset rules regarding other aspects of office working. In case of remote developers, while they may have their schedule defined for them broadly, a lot of nuances are left to them.

Therefore, use of reminder apps, planners and alarm systems is often suggested to maintain a productive schedule. Proper organization is not just for time, it is also for work space, online and offline resources and even the storage of data on the devices.

Brilliant Planning Skills

Remote work calls for proper planning at various levels. A remote app developer will have to be excellent at both personal and team level planning. He/she should be a master at syncing tasks and them driving tasks or projects to fruition while taking care of everyone’s skills, schedules and turn around times.

It won’t be wrong to say that it is somewhat difficult to work remotely without good planning skills. A lot needs to be managed in remote setups, right from proper communication to goal setting. Without the skills for making both short term and long-term plans, remote app or website development may turn out to be a huge, messy pile of tasks with no beginning or end.

Highly Self-Motivated

Remote working means, flexibility in place and time along with no monitoring or supervision. While it sounds great, these liberties also make going off the track very easy. Most of us function well only under authority and may mal-function in absence of it. Jokes apart, remote work requires high-self motivation to stay committed to work and deliver on time.

Along with self -motivation, remote work also requires discipline and a passion for the job. Otherwise, it is very easy to get distracted and end up missing deadlines or underperforming.

Finding remote app developers can be easy if you understand your requirements clearly and have a clear set of expectations. We hope that the steps and soft skills listed here will help you create an effective job description that will bring in the right candidate.

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