Keep in mind that we should never stereotype and some of the things that we will mention below are not true for all Indians. A lot of US companies want to outsource departments, projects or jobs to India because of the fact that this can help them to save money. However, this wish to save money does not always bring in the best possible results. While there are many Indians that can be incredibly valuable to your business, finding one to actually hire is a lot easier said than done. This is because:
A Really Bad Time Difference
We usually have a time difference of around 12 hours and that makes it so tough to find perfect moments when to speak. It is really important that you solve this one way or the other. Some Americans stay up late to talk to their Indian employees while some Indians do the same thing. If you need to have constant communication, this will be tougher than you may believe.
Lack Of Suitable Knowledge
One of the first things that you will notice when you want to outsource and you want to hire someone from India is the job title that they hold. Unfortunately, you cannot use that in order to assess his/her skill. The title of Software Engineer might be used and obtained by someone that went to a 6 months tech school and that should not actually be allowed to do any coding for you.
Because the US and different Western countries pump billions in the Indian IT professionals, we are faced with a really strong internal dynamic that sees people without actual computer skills getting a computer degree and then looking for work on the internet. The truth is that it is really tough to find a highly talented Indian developer or employee in the IT sector.
You Can Have Huge Problems
That is especially true in the event you are a good person. There are many Indians that will simply learn some thing from people that sell get rich quick techniques, will create only profiles and will apply to jobs. When they get one, they wing it. You will be hit with various arguments like “don’t pay me” or “you will ruin my family” when you want to give a bad feedback. We have many scammers out there but we also have the problems of communication, trust and honesty to deal with. Since the time zone is different, we have cultural differences and can be faced with scammers, the entire outsourcing adventure can turn into a huge hassle.
Salaries Can Lead To Inexperienced Developers
The salary of a developer is limited in India. In order to make more money, he needs to manage something. Because of that, we have quite a large void when looking at the developer pool. Sometimes you end up with a poor project manager that was a really good developer. You can even find great managers with bad developers under them. You can end up with great resources presented while the sales process happens and after that, the talent pool dedicated to your company is not the same.
It is hard to find great developers that are talented and over 28 years old. It is a lot more common to work with someone that has little business experience.
Motivation Can Be A Problem
If you currently have a project that will take months to properly develop, there are moments when not much progress is made. That is because Indians actually have a talent in working while not accomplishing much. We cannot say what that happens but many developers in the country will like it when something is stagnant or chaotic. It is maybe because many are young and do not look at the big picture. Constant monitoring is almost always necessary.
We hope we did not upset anyone but this is something that we have to understand. Make sure that you always monitor what is going on in the event you outsource to India and run a US company.