Please introduce your company and give a brief about your role within the company?
Mobilunity is a dedicated development teams provider based in Kyiv, Ukraine. Since its establishment in 2010, we have been striving to bring the very best of Ukrainian tech talent to businesses across the world. We have grown steadily step by step overcoming obstacles and developing into a stable well-structured company of 200+ people. We are constantly working to improve and do so with our core belief in what we call the 3 Rs of Nearshoring (Relationships - Recruitment - Retention).
I am the CEO and Founder of the company, and I believe my main role is to bridge together two opposite sides - strategic vision and everyday ‘tiny’ arrangements. The visionary part is about the company’s growth and development as well as client and employee experiences. ‘Tiny’ is about noticing little things and making them happen because they actually form a bigger impact on the service quality overall.
What was the idea behind starting this organization?
I always knew that Ukraine had great potential in terms of talented, well-educated, and sharp-minded specialists, and I believed that it was a high time to go global. Having worked with other software development providers in three Asian countries, few European and few South American, I knew for a fact what advantages I may have here at hand in Ukraine. Being entrepreneurial by nature, I couldn’t miss such a great opportunity. Skillset I was using at different companies and positions before founding Mobilunity was finally combined into a solid role in a newly established company where PEOPLE are the cornerstone - may they be developers, other employees, or the clients.
What is your company’s business model? What are the advantages of your particular model comparing to other models?
Contrary to a more traditional outsourcing model, nearshoring/offshoring is a model where the client gets fully dedicated to them, the remote team, and is the one who actually runs it.
We source the team from scratch and provide this team all the essentials to make their work effective, and we ensure there is proper and constant communication between the team’s management (usually located at the headquarters) and the development team itself.
Our focus is purely on ensuring the smooth and transparent velocity of the team’s delivery. This model has its downsides - as not everyone is able and willing to self-run a remotely hired tech team. Yet, it has numerous advantages, such as speed, flexibility, and cost.
To be more precise, choosing a nearshoring model with Mobilunity, you get a number of advantages:
- Speed - No matter the size of the team, acquisition time is about 4-6 weeks.
- Access/Diversity - If the Ukrainian labor market has talent, be sure we are able to source one for you!
- Cost - Affordable all-inclusive rates that lower overall cost (especially when taking all overheads, HR activities, recruitment, vacation days, social benefits, etc. into account).
What are the key things that help your company to stand out?
We build the company by thoroughly examining clients’ pain points and focusing on what matters the most. We have created what we call the 3Rs of Nearshoring (Relationships - Recruitment - Retention), and that is what makes us different.
Relationships - We always take the extra mile in building relationships. Clients, partners, dedicated teams, our non-technical employees - we have a true interest in understanding their requirements and needs and doing our best to meet them.
Recruitment - Finding a developer with needed skills is not a problem. The trickiest part is building a team that would be motivated, disciplined, deliver, and be a fit for the client. We take into account dozens of factors and operate with a vast talent pool to find the software engineers you need and when you need them.
Retention - We have dedicated team members who take care of all the little things to guarantee that your team has access to all of the Staff Services. As long as you keep your dedicated team motivated professionally, we make sure everything goes well in their everyday office life.
Have your organization and/or business model been affected by the COVID-19? How do you overcome the challenges?
COVID-19 has caused both a negative impact on some parts of our business and brought new opportunities instead.
Needless to say, some of our clients were hit by the crisis, and this led to some operations being cut, and sometimes even to whole activity freezing. Luckily to us, our client portfolio is very diverse, and while we have businesses representing the most affected industries like hospitality/travel, we also have businesses on good growth now, such as insurance or fintech.
But in line with current clients’ operations adjustment, like I said, we also gained new opportunities.
We now have a rise of interest in our services, and it is very much natural given the fact that the whole world is now learning how to be efficient with remote employees, while our model is operating for years having remote management processes in place per design. Remote mode is in our DNA, so no wonder companies turn to models like ours during these hard times. Needless to add, the model is also giving expense optimization opportunities, giving our potential clients more and more reasons to at least talk to us.
What industries do you generally cater to? Do you have a specific technology focus?
Almost all outsourcing providers position themselves as experts in either some technology stack (i.e., Python) or a domain (i.e., eCommerce). We do not put our experts’ expertise as ours, and thus, we are not charging our clients for that vague asset. We are different; we say that we are technology agnostic, and our key expertise is People. Our clients from Fintech, Healthcare, Media, and many other industries approach us because we know how to source software engineers with the needed skill set, how to keep these people in place, motivated and united for the sake of our client’s project success, and how to ensure our client is benefiting from these relationships.
Speaking of current clientele, not by intent, but we are quite represented with industries like Insurance/Insurtech, eCommerce, Digital Agencies, and all kinds of startups.
What kind of payment structure do you follow to bill your clients?
We utilize a ‘cost-plus’ model, putting our fee on top of the developer’s salary. Therefore, the client knows how much a developer earns and can easily choose between different candidates. Our fee contains all supportive costs, including office space, utilities, equipment, recruiting costs, retention activities, taxes, etc.
Our ability to manage operations effectively makes it possible for us to put a price our competitors in Ukraine very rarely can beat. The total cost of ownership for the development team placed through us lets our clients witness the savings on a level of 40-60% to what they would have locally.
Flexibility in contractual terms and pricing models also gives us an ability to engage those clients who may have specific needs out of our standard proposition, may it be recruiting service alone, or, let’s say, setting up an R&D Center in Ukraine.
What do clients need to know/have in order to be successful using this model?
I believe that the most important thing is to remember that the model is efficient only if both parties (client and vendor) are equally committed. I tend to repeat no matter how hard we try, Mobilunity may only do 49% of team retention, and the other 51% is still the client's job. Having the best office and any kind of informal activities would not substitute a client's responsibility for establishing transparent and trusted relationships with their remote team. Clients need to work hard in order to make the remote team feel as a part of one family and treat them equally. Of course, we, as the vendor, are permanently standing by our clients, advising them what is best to do and how to do things. But, down the road, it is always a client’s decision on whether or not to follow our advice.
What was the toughest situation that you had with your clients and how did you cope with it?
We are lucky to be working with good clients, so to say those who share our beliefs and who also understand our model, win-win (Client-Vendor) is extended with a triple win Client-Vendor-Team.
Of course, some complexities happen, but we are proud to be stating there was no case when we failed in finding a solution that all parties found to be a good one.
Any situation becomes tough when and if the client is not listening to what the vendor is warning about. Incorrect process setup, misleading employee experience, unclear product roadmap, contradictory instructions leading to parties’ frustration, differences in terms and mentality leading to internal conflicts or mistrust, inability to commit enough time to handle the case; these are just the samples of what is sometimes happening. But, as I said, all these issues can be properly and effectively fixed once and if the client and the vendor are acting as a team.
What would be one foremost advice in managing remote teams?
The greatest asset of any project is the people. Managing remote teams requires being more patient, attentive, and eager to invest in relationships. Nearshoring is a great model, especially during these uneasy times, but it requires time and effort to be truly fruitful. Treat your remote team equally, and do your best to make them feel a part of your family despite distance and cultural differences.
And second would be, trust your vendor as you pay them for what they are experts in. Utilize their expertise in regards to what they advise you.
With these two pieces of advice, I am sure your nearshoring experience will be a great extension of your organizational models.
