The position of a frontend developer is currently, without doubt, one of the hottest jobs on the market.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the demand for frontend and web developers between 2018 and 2028 will increase by 13%, which is a significant percentage:
Frontend development projects are also among the hottest freelance jobs. Many companies outsource frontend development tasks dealing with HTML, JS, and CSS code to freelance developers. Upwork, for instance, has an army of freelance frontend developers who offer their services for the hourly fee between %10 and $50, depending on experience.
The work of a frontend developer, as much as of an app developer or a web designer, is mostly project-based. That is why it has been a trend to hire freelance frontend developers on a temporary basis to complete certain short-term projects, such as:
- the design and layout of a product/website
- content optimization
- optimizing buttons and navigation
- implementing design for mobile websites
- maintaining software workflow, etc.
Due to the fact that frontend development jobs are mainly project-based, there’s rarely any need to hire the whole frontend development team.
But look at this from a different perspective.
Hiring different frontend developers to help you with your project is like hiring different artists to finish the same painting – it won’t turn out well. This alone is a good reason to hire in-house frontend developers, who will work as a team to ensure the prioritization of user experience and maintenance of user-friendly website and app interface.
Here are some more reasons in favor of hiring a frontend development team for your business.
Reason #1: Quality of Code
Since we’re talking about the necessity of hiring a frontend development team for your business, let’s talk about money. In particular, what your bad hiring choices can result in from the standpoint of your budget.
When hiring several freelance frontend developers to support your projects, you buy a pig in a poke. Even though their experience may be on display, there’s rarely any proof to it.
Bad hiring decisions can cost your business a lot. Devskiller counted exactly how much hiring a bad frontend developer can cost a business, taking into account:
- cost of hiring
- compensation
- cost of maintenance
- productivity loss
- and disruption
A whopping $485,371.38.
These are just your expenses on an employee, without the money you’ll have to spend fixing the bad results of their work.
A study described by Pull Request, claims that bad code can cost your business up to $85 billion annually – the money that can be spent on developing a product of high quality.
By hiring a frontend development team, you hire professionals who will be responsible for writing a semantically correct code that corresponds to the best standards of web development. Moreover, they will be responsible for writing a commented code, which will help all team members have equal access to website maintenance to make it easier.
Should any issues with the code occur, with the in-house team you won’t have to hire other frontend developers to fix the low-quality code. “After hiring a team of frontend developers, they had to spend 3.8 hours a day fixing the buggy website code, previously written by several different developers”, says Chris Cole, a senior frontend developer at TrustMyPaper. The company lost over $40,000 because of low-quality code.
By having an in-house frontend development team, you outsource them the task of writing and maintaining high-quality code. If any issues occur, the team will quickly detect them, and your business won’t lose a dime to fix them.
Reason #2: Product Optimization
A team of frontend developers is responsible for making your product/website user-friendly. In other words, while a team of backend developers cooks the candy, a team of frontend developers designs the candy wrapper.
In terms of product optimization, frontend developers are responsible for the following tasks:
- UI design that puts your business objectives and the needs of your target audience together to create a user-friendly interface.
- Website optimization, which includes browser compatibility to make sure that your website corresponds to the standards of different browsers, etc.
- Search Engine Optimization to build better websites.
Additionally, frontend developers are responsible for app optimization if your business has one. “We hired a team of in-house frontend developers specifically to do version control, testing, debugging, and responsive design for our app”, says Melanie Perkins, the COO at Studicus. The team of front-end developers also works on creating and launching new app features, which positively affect user experience.
All these tasks contribute to creating and maintaining a product for a better user experience. With an in-house frontend development team, it will be easier to track down any issues that may obstruct product optimization, such as pagination used for the wrong purpose, duplicate page titles, difficult-to-scan content, and other problems that affect the usability.
Reason #3: Full-Time In-House Technical Expertise
Generally speaking, having a team of frontend developers is important for your business because you need a professional point of view on any web development issues as well as to help you create a custom design that is characteristic of your business objectives and the needs of your target audience.
Besides, to help your business stay relevant, your frontend development will be responsible for implementing the modern frontend technologies, including JavaScript, jQuery, CSS3, and HTML5 on an ongoing basis. Such consistency is important for your business to remain competitive.
How to Hire a Stellar Team of Frontend Developers?
Now, as we’ve covered the main reasons why your business would benefit from hiring an in-house frontend development team, let’s take a look at the peculiarities of the hiring process.
Before you start looking for frontend developers to join the team, you need to follow these steps:
Step #1: set the skills you are looking for
Step #2: how you will test these skills
Step #3: outlining the soft skills
Let’s take a closer look at the above-mentioned steps.
Step #1: Outlining the Skills
For a basic project, frontend developers should have the following skills:
- HTML/CSS
- JavaScript (JQuery is desired but not obligatory)
- Experience with JavaScript and CSS frameworks
- Version control
- Debugging
- UI & responsive design
- Experience with browser developer tools
- Web performance testing
In addition, you might be interested in asking for the skills related to app development as well as the knowledge of search engine optimization.
Step #2: Testing the Skills
There are several ways to test the frontend developer’s skills. Since the recruitment process for developers usually takes 2 or 3 interviews, you can implement all these strategies.
First, you can start with questions. Go with questions that are as detailed and into-the-subject, as possible. In other words, go with the questions that cannot be googled and prepared for in advance. Here’s are some examples:
- What can you do to ensure that your website design/app design is user-friendly and accessible?
- What do you do to structure your CSS code to make it easier for other frontend developers to work with?
- Explain the concept of CSS float.
You can also include questions that involve a candidate referencing their previous experience, like what issues they dealt with during previous projects, what they did to solve them, and what they learned from these issues/what new skills they acquired.
To test the skills of your candidates, you can also go for online tests. There’s a variety of sources to test:
- JavaScript skills
- JQuery skills
- Knowledge of HTML 5
You can have your candidates take a number of tests during the interview besides the regular questions about the experience to select and sort the best ones who will join your frontend development team.
Step #3: Include Soft Skills
Since you’re hiring developers to work in a team, they need to possess soft skills, necessary for the effective teamwork:
- understanding of client experience
- written and verbal communication
- open-mindedness
- leadership skills
- mentorship skills
- critical thinking
When hiring senior frontend developers, they should also have a good understanding of how to delegate tasks to make the teamwork more efficient and easy-to-track.
Final Words
Your business can benefit from hiring frontend developers in a number of ways:
- your product will have a custom design in line with your business’s objectives
- user experience will always be a priority
- you’ll have a full-time in-house team of experts who will make sure that your business and product remain competitive
With this and our brief guide on how to find the best candidates, you’ll hire the best team of frontend developers, who will become an inalienable part of creating your business’s story of success.