There's a common question we get: is offshore software development overseas safe? I’ve had good experiences with contractors outside of Canada. We maintain relationships with highly specialized talent around the world. I remember the first time I paid an independent contractor outside of North America. It was to do some tech-related work. An old boss directed me to outsource some of our routine tasks to give my team some extra bandwidth. This wasn’t at EastCode but rather at a mental health technology software startup. Why do it that way? It was much less expensive than hiring an internal employee or finding a North American contractor.
The tasks mostly had to do with data entry. I ended up connecting with a young man in India and told him about the tasks. He asked me for $20 USD per hour and I was happy to pay that rate. I felt it was a bit low based on what I would have paid in North America for similar work. I decided to ask him what $20 USD could buy him where he lived and he told me that it had the purchasing power to buy a pair of designer jeans. The contractor surprised me because the brands he was discussing would easily have cost 4 - 5 times more in Canada. He did the work happily and I paid him. He did high-quality work, so we all went home satisfied.
Software Development is a relatively nascent field but it has changed extensively in the last 20 years. The widespread adoption and technological development of the internet have globalized software development. This means that software developers can write code anywhere in the world. Canada is no longer the software innovation hub that it once was. Just as you can get t-shirts printed for low prices overseas, so too can you get thousands of lines of code written for less in many places outside of North America for much less.
Many excellent software development firms outside of Canada will deliver quality results. That being said, it is really important to be on the lookout for those that will not. In this article, I will briefly discuss some of the leading countries to go to for Web3 development and how to protect against one of the most common scams in the software outsourcing world.
Ready to talk about software development for your company? Contact EastCode here.
In my work with EastCode, I have spoken with dozens of people who have decided to engage in offshore software development overseas instead of staying in Canada to get the job done. Ukraine, Estonia, Latvia, India, Pakistan, Singapore, Brazil, Columbia, and Ecuador are all destinations for outsourcing that contacts have mentioned to me numerous times. The driving factor behind this is generally the price: it’s much less expensive to hire a developer in these countries compared to Canada.
To a lesser extent, in Web3 software development (smart contracts, Web3 integrations, and dApp development) the motivating factor for going to Eastern Europe has also been expertise. It turns out that there are highly skilled Web3 developers in Eastern Europe. In addition to being very well-priced, they tend to have expertise that you cannot find in other parts of the world.
Alternatively, if you're looking for a good Web3 outsourcing firm in Australia, go check out Labrys!
What are the results when Canadians go overseas for outsourcing? They really vary. I’ve heard many glowing reviews of contractors from overseas. That being said, I’ve also heard horror stories that range from negligent all the way to fraudulent. There is no real way to tell how well a new software development firm is going to perform. You can do your own research but ultimately the level of deception that some people employ is highly sophisticated.
We hear about a common issue: when a firm obtains your business under the impression that you’ll be working with Developer A and Developer B. In reality, these developers are props for the sales process and after you’ve asked them all your questions, signed a contract, and paid your deposit, the firm will switch them out for Developer C and Developer D. These are developers you've never met and are much less skilled than the initial developers. They’ll maintain the appearance that the original developers are on the project. They may even have an hour or two of involvement per week to keep them current in case you demand a video call with them.
My advice is to ask to speak to client references and ask them difficult questions. No software development firm is perfect, so if you dig you should be able to find some valid criticisms from any past client. You can ask questions such as:
Be on the hunt for genuine answers. If the relationship is real, there will be substantive answers that unearth valid criticisms.
The other advice I like to give to people as they evaluate our competitors is to ask them to onboard you onto software that they’ve developed for other clients in the past. Make sure that they can show you a paper trail between the codebase and the software production environment. This way, you can verify that the company actually wrote the software.
Another option that I highly recommend is to pay a software development firm that you trust to go and evaluate the new firm. Although this is not the most economical option, an established and trusted firm will ask questions that you don’t know to ask because you’re likely not a software developer.
In conclusion, ask difficult questions, look for genuine answers, evaluate existing software, and engage a firm you trust to evaluate prospective firms. At the end of the day, always follow your instincts.
Interested in exploring software outsourcing in Canada? Contact EastCode here.
