While software is said to be eating the world, software developers and other technical talent remains in short supply. Not only is this seeing major tech companies compete hard to hire the best engineers, but it has also meant a rise in the use of remote working freelancers or turning to offshore agencies. The problem with either solution, however, is the same: how to ensure outsourced work will be of high quality and that the individuals working on your project will be a good fit with the rest of your team.
Enter YouTeam, a U.K. startup and recent graduate of Y Combinator, which has created what it calls a marketplace for offshore talent. The company’s platform connects individual developers at agencies (and large companies that have spare developer capacity) with companies needing to add to their own development teams through outsourcing. In this way the aim is to bridge the gap between hiring an individual freelancer and the added vetting and accountability using an agency affords.
For the agency worker themselves, they arguably get a reliable and potentially more interesting stream of work without the hassle of spending time looking for and pricing the next gig. For the company seeking to outsource development work, they benefit from the vetting a reputable agency provides, and the fact that YouTeam sits in the middle, including taking payment and handling any disputes.
“In many offshore markets in Europe, Asia and Latin America local development agencies are the gateway to the best talent,” says Mishchenko. “But the way the market works is completely wrong. Our bet is simple: it is people that matter much more then companies, and so you should meet the people first. And that’s exactly what happens on the YouTeam platform. First you find engineers that you want to work with – and only then you get to meet their agencies. So now employees also have a say over which projects they want to work on”.
cool
