Working With an International Workforce

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Many small and medium-sized businesses in Melbourne, Australia often find the need for IT projects but don't have dedicated IT support.  IT consultant Martin Kingsley saw through this opportunity and built a one-man company, Just Make It work, that develops IT solutions. News of it spread quickly due to word of mouth, and soon after, he could not find the time to proceed with projects by himself.

Martin thought of hiring locally, but had second thoughts. He liked the freedom he had been enjoying for the last three years and he was sure that increasing his local workforce would demand more time. He also found the hiring and interviewing process difficult and time-consuming. Plus, he liked the idea of being able to tap into an international labor pool.

His solution was to hire freelancers. "Although I am able to both scope out and develop many of these solutions myself, this is not always the case," said Martin, who resorted to hiring independent workers. However, he shared that finding, interviewing, and hiring qualified professionals can be difficult and time-consuming. He shared that the projects would drag on as the recruitment process continued, and many never saw fruition due to the lack of available talent.

This was where he found Freelancer.com effective. It was the largest of the sites he explored and it also seemed to attract the largest number of professionals in the IT industry. The user interface also clicked with him. "I liked the unified project management dashboard that contains new bids on my projects, messages sent between myself and freelancers, shortlists of bids made, and all the other information I could possibly need," he said.

Martin's most recent project completed at Freelancer.com was to replace a café owner's traditional punch card-based customer loyalty program ("Buy ten coffees, get a free coffee") with a digital system. Through the platform, he was able to source a talented developer who understood loyalty programs and could work to deliver a fast and robust QR code recognition system that would run locally with no server infrastructure or expensive barcode reader involved.

"The project went swimmingly. The application was developed quickly, matched my requirements, tested well in a real environment and received support immediately. I was also supplied with the full source code." His freelancer Olegf from Ukraine was chosen because of his detailed specifications and great communications skills. He paid Oleg $444 for his work, a fee that is twice more expensive locally.

Martin said he looks forward to collaborating with more professionals around the globe in the future. "Platforms like Freelancer.com greatly help small business owners. I already recently completed another project -- a logo design for my business and there will be more to come."

Looking for assistance for your business? Try posting a project now!

Posted 30 March, 2015

Nikki Hernandez

Wired and Inspired | Content Coordinator, Freelancer.com

I'm the coordinator of Freelancer's Case Study Program. I write inspirational success stories of employers and freelancers. When not busy writing, I play video games.

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