Software Engineer Shortage Hurting Delivery?

Every day thousands of VPs of engineering are looking for tens of thousands of software engineers. Everyone is fishing in the same local talent pools. But the talent pools have not been restocked for years, so we are facing a crisis. The US only produces 49,500 software engineers per year but there are over 500,000 jobs available that require software engineering. 

To make matters worse Amazon just announced they are hiring 55,000 developers across the US. The market is getting tighter…. and engineering leaders are getting more stressed. 

Let’s think creatively

Option 1: Stick to the plan and hire your own team. The upside is that you have control, the downside is cost and time. Rates are doubling and, worse, so is time to hire. It will take 3-4 months to hire a Team Lead, 3-4 more months for that team to fill with intermediates, and an additional 3-4 months before they are actually productive. That’s 9-12 months before building the product. Bottom line - hiring is great for culture and control, but it won’t meet delivery deadlines.

Option 2: Outsource. Find an agency with a team ready to go. Upside: IF - big if - they are as good as advertised, your new team will be building products within 2-4 weeks of the start date. Downside: a lack of confidence/trust in 3rd parties because they all claim they can do anything. With an overwhelming number of outsourcing options, it takes too much time to vet and filter the signal from the noise. Bottom line, Risky without help. If you pick wrong, you waste more money and time and go back to Option 1. But If you pick right, you can get ahead of delivery compared to hiring. 

Option 3: BOTH (hyper-scale your team). The first two options are not mutually exclusive. Why not hire an outsourced team while you search for more employees?  This strategy ensures that you are meeting your delivery deadlines, reducing stress, AND finding permanent hires that will be with your company in the long run. 

Most importantly, it can help you meet your deployment deadlines, supporting an increase in sales and raising the company value for more growth funding

Reducing Risk with Outsourcing.

When you decide to outsource there are simply too many options. In Ukraine alone there are over 1,600 dev shops. You need a time-efficient way to filter. Outforce.ai has the data on over 5,700 software engineering firms, and vetting processes to match your company with the best teams from around the globe. The result: you select outsourcing teams with confidence.

Today competition can appear out of nowhere. You have to move fast to stay ahead. All the unicorns (Uber, Facebook, Air BnB) grew faster by outsourcing some of their work to keep their first mover advantage. Reduce selection risk by having a curator like Outforce. Build your own team while an outsourced team builds your product. You stay ahead of the competition and increase revenues faster. It’s a win-win.