IT Nearshore Services: The answers your company needs

You must have heard about Onshore and Offshore. We’re pretty confident we can say that Nearshore is the win-win solution between these two. Putting it into words, nearshoring is the practice of having work or services performed by people in nearby countries. With this geographic and cultural proximity, you’ll enjoy the benefits of Offshore and Onshore solutions while suppressing the common downsides of those solutions.

When someone refers to ‘nearshoring’ probably the first thing coming to people’s minds is related to software engineering. That happens because more than anything else, companies have been opting to nearshore their software development work needs. 

But why is getting software developers from nearby countries so popular? Companies have understood that it is really hard to find and keep talent in that area. And besides that, technology professionals can deliver top-level work despite not being physically present.  So, IT Nearshoring came as the perfect solution for most of them. Knowing that it’s possible to have a team of competent, efficient and reliable IT talents working from a neighbouring country took a weight off their shoulders.

They can have their remote team only about 4 hours away. And since time zones are similar, that team is working at the same time as their in-house teams. It also means that both internal and remote teams might meet in person, which, from our point of view, is great.

There’s a myriad of reasons why so many companies rely on nearshore companies to get software development work done. For some of them, it might have been due to a lack of qualified professionals in their area. For others, the reasons might be related to how hard it is to keep the workflow of a team of developers – you need developers and most of the time quality assurance professionals, team leaders and many others to get the job done. 

Nearshoring that section of companies means not only a decrease of general costs but also that it becomes possible to focus on the core business. It also allows companies to solve capacity issues, enhance their services’ quality, and more. 

Nearshoring is much more than cutting costs. It implies a few rules – but mainly, the provider has to understand the clients’ industries and respect their needs. Otherwise, how could they help their clients reach their goals? That’s why we say that it’s all about how it creates true partnerships.

It’s true to say that, in general, IT nearshoring comes as the right solution for companies in need of high-quality IT teams. But not only. High-quality is not only about technical expertise, but also many soft skills.  For instance, adaptability is a fundamental skill. Companies need to have remote teams as engaged as other teams at the office. That’s why it is fundamental that software development nearshore workers are able to quickly assimilate the company’s culture. Nearshore offers a great balance between hard and soft skills – and that’s ultimately the reason why so many companies are choosing it instead of other types of solutions.

Time and location are undoubtedly crucial. So as it is having a team of people who are easily adaptable to the companies’ culture and have great English language skills. And let’s not forget about the main point – the quality of IT professionals. 

Nearshore remote teams should be as close to the client as any of their in-house teams. This should be true whether their in-house professionals are working from home or working in the office. From our perspective, it all comes to getting the best service provider having in mind these criteria:

Portugal has excellent IT professionals. And even if, on the whole, IT talents in Portugal are high-quality, we only hire the best, most qualified and fit for the job. Currently, the high standards of e.near’s Human Resource team established our hiring rate in only 3% of all applications.

We have 8 core service areas: Strategic IT Consulting; User Experience & User-Centric Design; Project Management; Quality Assurance; CloudOps; Web Development; Mobile Development & Internet-of-Things (IoT). We are Industry experts since we’ve been developing projects for clients in 92 subsectors across 19 major industry groups from FinTech to Gaming/Gambling.

We’re located in Portugal, right in the union point of 3 continents. Our offices are close to the airport, so we’re only about 4 hours flight away from every European country. And our location is so privileged that we’re really close to North America and North Africa too.

Besides that, we’re lucky for having the same time zone as London. It allows us to work and solve all problems in real-time with almost all European countries. A part of the USA and Africa has a fair amount of working hours overlapping with ours too. This means that our teams don’t have to wait long hours for replies – and the same happens for our clients. Both communications and work are more effective due to our time zone.

In Portugal, the population is very familiar with the English language. It is taught in all schools since the third grade, so we’re a country of fluent English speakers. In fact, Portugal ranks #7 in English proficiency according to EF English Proficiency Index. Nevertheless, we only hire professionals, Portuguese or not, who prove to be proficient. This advanced knowledge and familiarity with the idiom avoids misunderstandings with clients and facilitates all communications. 

Our company culture promotes the perfect adaptability of our teams to the policies, laws and different ways of working from companies worldwide. We are known for having a multicultural workplace full of hardworking, friendly and adaptable professionals. And although high levels of professionalism are expected from our collaborators, we know they can only thrive if we help them do their best. That’s why we promote a proper work environment which includes, besides lots of training, team building activities as well. We know work is better when people are happy.