Recession — this pain word has united diverse tech businesses this year. It embraces our countries by fits and starts. For example, Germany survives a deep economical downturn. While The United States has milder conditions: we hear that, in general, job market stays without shortening hires.

All together, stories about layoffs and restricting new hires within the tech industry gain wide publicity and, naturally, make us worried. Some episodes: Reddit has announced 90 layoffs, and Spotify — 200 cuts. We’d keep in mind that sometimes such news is related to the logical stages of the company life cycle — not only to recessions.

Tech stocks’ value and venture capital funding could grow or decrease, but if you solve customer problems and react to topical market demands, it firmly appeals to canny investors.

On June 4, Brian Moynihan, Bank of America CEO, mentioning debts' growth during recession, claimed that “it’s not good for the United States to go through this.” Well, we are about to outline the good side of the crisis, which, certainly, does not underestimate all the material and moral losses provoked by the recession.

Team Scaling: To Wait or Not to Wait? Vet!

A recession could be your chance to get new skills, and to keep growing through rationalization and modernization of your company, products, and services. The sweetest thing about those skills — They. Stay. With. You.

Thus, it becomes easier to transform all the business flows in case of a new global threat or a custom one related to your location or industry.

Serious Audit and Bold Plans Made Jack a Rich Man

The powerful example of growth through unfavorable stimulus is not hard to notice. Recently, COVID-19 has speeded up a launch of an expensive and complicated mechanism for adapting to new realities. Representatives of all the industries started to invest serious money in digitizing customer service and supply chain, as well as in refactoring company structure — and it turned into a technological breakthrough that influenced greater revenues in the long run.

Companies fourfold accelerated their time to revise all the business units and take reasonable actions for business development. Instead of waiting for approvals, game-changing ideas captured fresh attention. Investments in technology helped companies overcome the crisis and blossom.

We were curious about the money spinners in the tech industry in 2023 and now can share some of the facts that could activate you rather than make to lie low.

• Apple started to sell their sensational VR headset, and now the company costs more than ever before.

• PwC has invested $1 billion into Generative AI to transform its customer service. It was the most impressive number among the trending expenses in that direction. It’s an important point to think of, especially taking into account the development of synthetic AI, which is considered to be less harmful for privacy.

• According to Gartner, 72% of tech leaders in Western Europe, the USA, and Canada rise IT spendings to move through the recession with higher incomes than last year.

You might dream to have a good team and look for cost-effective approaches on your way to the top. Overcoming a recession is a skill to sharpen constantly and in many aspects. Let’s start from delegating tasks to the right hands.

So How to Level Up Your Project With a Reliable Tech Team?

There is not much time for mistakes during the recession. Whether you are a CEO, CTO, or founder who personally hires software engineers and other tech staff, or you have in-house HR specialists — a candidate should go through several stages of checking. We usually call that process vetting. And it reminds us of using a compatible framework to prevent the app crash.

Advantages of Hiring Pre-vetted Tech Specialists

In short, hiring pre-vetted developers, designers, and the rest of tech specialists covers the need for exceptional talent to stay ahead of the competition. Also, it’s a possibility to get a better match faster with lower overall budget. Recession calls for belt-tightening measures — you respond accordingly.

• Quick Access to Tailored Talent

  Pre-vetted tech talents are professionals who have been carefully screened, ensuring their expertise and skills match your project requirements. By tapping into this pool of exceptional specialists, you gain access to top-tier talent without a lengthy and resource-intensive recruitment process.

• Increased Agility and Scalability

  Do you need to ramp up your development team to meet increased demand, or hire one or a few tech specialists for a limited time project to optimize costs? You can outstaff your team with professionally tested tech talents to navigate the storm in your tempo and style.

• Expertise in Strategic Initiatives

  Recessions are times to innovate and embark on strategic initiatives for long-term success. Pre-vetted talents are readily available to join your projects, being flexible and even helping your company to adapt to changing market conditions. At the same time, you have the advantage of executing their initiatives efficiently, which might be less transparent if you outsource your tasks.

Methods of Acquiring Pre-vetted Talent

Sounds promising, right? Then, you might wonder where to look for pre-vetted bright heads to invite them to join your tech team.

• Method 1. Serf through freelancing platforms and job marketplaces

  Be ready to ask a lot of questions to double-check information, and keep in mind that usually only a small part of candidates is expert-vetted there.

• Method 2. Engage with coding boot camps and tech academies

  Thus, you get a chance to enrich your team with Junior programmers who have an excellent reputation and can assist your existing or new leaders. In case you aim to attract Middle or Senior software engineers, this method, more likely, will not work.

• Method 3. Contact staff agencies or IT consultants

  As a rule, it comes with Methods 1 and 2 included — specially trained people provide tech recruitment services for you. Outstaffing your tech team is a comprehensive way to optimize resources. This solution enables you to access highly skilled remote tech professionals without paying salaries to HR department or full-time employees.

  Plus, you free up some time as you don’t have to struggle with contract management and other compliance to global or local labor code on your own. Using IT staff augmentation services in the hiring model can save your company labor costs, as you pay only for the agreed period when you really require more “hands”.

But Be Careful

Skipping tailored pre-vetting is okay when speed is the main challenge. Yet, typically, there are more crucial aims to align with. You have certain risks when nobody makes a custom research for the role you want to fill. Some of such risks are potential misalignment with company culture, no control over the recruitment process, possible lack of long-term commitment or loyalty, and higher hourly rates.

Takeaways

A little preparation never hurts when it comes to cost-saving hiring strategies. Think if you want to launch an in-house hiring process or engage agencies. Larger organizations may have extra resources and infrastructure to support an in-house HR team, whereas younger ones might find it more cost-effective to outstaff pre-vetted talent for specific projects.

The complexity of the projects and the required expertise are important decision-making factors. Also, scaling your tech team on your own may seem to be more reliable for projects that involve sensitive or proprietary information, require close collaboration with other teams, or demand a deep understanding of the company's internal systems.

While communicating with third-party talent providers, you may explore many of them:

• Ensure multi-layer security (ask if they are GDPR-, CCPA-compliant and pass ISO/IEC annual certification);

• Promote a responsible and initiative approach to the job among the candidates they bring to your project;

• Attract tech specialists with proved competitions and rare skill sets.

Feel free to email us at [email protected] and share your concerns. We have already empowered companies from more than 30 countries with pre-vetted members. Maybe, we talked to your dream candidate 5 minutes ago, who knows?

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by Kateryna Balakyreva
on June 14, 2023. Share on LinkedIn Post on Twitter

Kateryna joined the IT industry 3 years ago. Reviewing B2B software and related frameworks, she concluded that the best-in-class programs need well-built teams and started to write about tech teams scaling. Her natural habit to improve texts and search for alternative visions comes from working at the publishing house in early youth.