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It might be a small world, but anyone who’s ever tried to find their next critical hire will tell you that it can feel like looking for a needle in a haystack.
When it comes to growing your team in multiple locations across the globe, guesswork isn’t a great strategy. Understanding the best places to find the right talent for your specific requirements is always a faster way to hitting your growth ambitions.
First, you need to know which talent you’re looking for and exactly where to find them. But it’s not just about pinpointing the right place on the map.
Your business is unique, and your requirements for talent are likely to ask for a specific set of skills and attributes, at a cost that makes sense. You could, for example, go to any major city in the developed economies and hire a world-class developer – but you’ll have to pay top dollar to get them.
Looking at growing economies in other parts of the world, or adjacent to your own HQ, can save you a fortune in salary costs without having to compromise on quality.
Working with an Employer of Record (EOR) partner like Global Expansion also means you don’t have to set up an in-country entity to get started. EOR services also take care of the admin around local labor laws, tax and compliance.
So how do you choose which location (or locations) will work for you? Even though technology and remote working makes the world of work a much smaller place, the breadth of options it creates means having the right strategy for international talent acquisition is an absolute must.
In the not-too-distant past, office-based working was the default. By definition, it meant your talent pool was limited to a commutable radius from your premises. Nowadays, hiring where the talent is creates all kinds of opportunities:
- Borderless talent search: different countries have different talent pools. Why restrict yourself to one location if another one can help your business grow?
- Cost-effective talent: we live in a turbulent, unpredictable world. Investors like to see companies balance the tricky value-for-money equation. If you can demonstrate you’re getting the right skills for the right price, you’re already ahead of the game.
- Depth of talent pool: if the base of your operation is in a country where there are one or more large global market leaders, you might find they have their pick of the best people. So go somewhere else for larger talent pools which mean you don’t have to compromise.
The Global Expansion guide to global talent
We’d love to give you a comprehensive rundown of every country and the talent opportunities of each. But that would be less of a blog post and more of a book. Suffice to say that your best course of action depends on your priorities and specific requirements.
We have, however, put together a short overview of emerging territories worth considering, as well as a reminder of some long-established talent hotbeds and why they’re still well worth a look. If you have some other specific requirements, remember we work in more than 200 countries – so get in touch for more tailored advice for your business.
India
It’s for good reason India has been synonymous with outsourcing for decades. The sheer size of the population and the level and quality of tech talent is well-tested. With a fragile trade accord now in place between the US and China (at the time of writing, at least), India is in a position to reap rewards. It has a strong IT sector, bolstered by Apple’s decision to shift some iPhone manufacturing to the country. India’s pharma industry is a top three global player. In Bangladesh, the average salary for a software developer is around $5,000, according to Glassdoor.
Yes, there might be some time zone issues for companies based in western economies, but the quality / cost ratio means India is a great option for many businesses.
Latin America
Not only does Latin America offer time zone and language benefits for companies based in the US, but workers based here come with a deep understanding of American culture and business.
Brazil
Part of the original BRIC bloc which has expanded in recent years, Brazil has a unique position in South America. Despite the political tension between the US and China, Brazil has growing links with both countries. After decades of STEM investment, it provides ready access to software developers at lower costs than developed economies, as well as a multi-lingual workforce.
Mexico
Existing strong ties with the US, not to mention tech hubs and a deep talent pool, means Mexico is in demand for its skilled workforce. Average hourly rates are favourable too; while software developers command $77 per hour in North America, their counterparts in Mexico average an hourly rate of $61.
Argentina
Looking for designers and developers? Argentina’s ranked second in the region for software development and English is spoken widely. Hourly rates are $51, so find the right people and you can get plenty of value for your investment.
Eastern Europe
Eastern Europe, for the most part, has the advantage of stable geopolitics, especially in those countries which are members of the European Union. Clearly the war in Ukraine has inflicted serious economic harm, not to mention the unfathomable human suffering, and recovery there will be challenging. Despite this, Ukraine’s IT sector was worth $7.3bn in 2023. Across the region, English is widely spoken and time zone differences are pretty moderate across the European Economic Area (EEA) – there are only three hours between Portugal in the west and Eastern European countries like Romania and Bulgaria.
Poland
With companies like Google, Intel and Siemens opening major operations in Poland, the country has established itself as an economic force to be reckoned with. In February, Google and Poland announced a strategic AI partnership focused on “energy, cybersecurity and other areas”. There’s a rich pool of tech talent here, as well as construction trades and skilled engineering professionals.
Romania
The average developer salary in Romania is $56,000 – a similarly-experienced role in the US could fetch three times that. With competitive costs, excellent tech and language skills, the country’s service sector has been its economic backbone. Heavy industry, manufacturing and agriculture are also significant players, and its inexpensive labour makes it a great place to find good people.
Czech Republic
“For tech think Czech” could be a (slightly cheesy) slogan of the Czech Republic. Developer skill is renowned here, with the country ranked 30th in the Global Innovation Index 2024 by the World Intellectual Property Organization. You’ll be fishing in the same talent pool as Microsoft and Oracle, both of which have a presence in the Czech Republic, but otherwise its IT sector isn’t super saturated. There’s also a century of experience in the car industry.
Before you book those flights
Sticking a pin in the map and hoping for the best is rarely as productive as you’d like. The best talent strategies focus on maximising expertise and effectiveness with cost and value; technology now means that cross-border hiring isn’t the logistical challenge that it once was.
But we live in a volatile world. We get that there’s comfort in familiarity when the unknown can feel pretty overwhelming and fraught with risk.
Employer of Record (EOR) services can be a good way of establishing a presence without committing major investment in setting up an entity, finding and kitting out an office, and hiring permanent staff.
An EOR allows you to hire and onboard people quickly, with your EOR partner taking care of contracts, legal requirements, tax affairs and local compliance. So all you need to do is find the right people.
With a whole world of talent to choose from, the question is really about which territory (or territories) makes the most sense for you. Then you can get on with finding the best people to help your business grow.
