Who Is Luis Paiva
Luis has focused his career on leading high-performing teams in the tech industry. He is currently the SVP of People, Operations and Technology at BairesDev where he leads the company’s client services, delivery, technology, peopleX and executive assistant areas and is responsible for the strategic companywide focus on people, expansion, technology, productivity and quality.
Since its launch in 2009, BairesDev has successfully brought together two invaluable assets – tech and talent.
The leading technology solutions company was able to foresee the importance of remote work years before the pandemic changed work habits and recognize the value of scouting top-tier talent outside of metropolitan cities. With unmatched expertise in digital transformation and a keen eye for recruiting the best software engineers, BairesDev has managed to offer the best to clients and employees.
In this exclusive interview for Spotlight, SVP of People, Operations and Technology Luis Paiva shared the secrets of their recruitment strategy, trending software developments and what it takes to become part of a company like BairesDev.
Spotlight: According to the US Labor Statistics, employment for software engineers will grow by 21% until 2028. How are you contributing to this growth, and how many open positions and applications do you have annually?
Luis Paiva: BairesDev received more than 1 million applications this past year, which continues to surge. Despite the economic slowdown, we are still growing; in 2023, we expect to hire another 2,000 tech professionals. The more important way we contribute to the industry's growth has as much to do with location as with vocation: the world has become a tech hub. Remote work is not an option; it is mandatory, and tech applicants want it. This requires new flexible models and looking for talent everywhere. As a fully distributed company, we are bringing opportunities to talented people across the globe and tapping into previously untouched resources of skill and brilliance.
BairesDev prides itself on picking the top 1% in the industry. Can you share a bit about your recruitment strategy and how it allows you to attract high-tier IT specialists?
The key to our recruitment success is simple: Diversity, which we mean not only as a buzzword but as a fundamental guiding principle. Our proprietary AI recruiting suite is a complex machine learning-powered algorithm that matches criteria such as industry expertise, technology stack and IT infrastructure, among others, to come up with the best, most qualified BairesDev engineering team for clients. It enables us to hire top professionals from all over the world, regardless of age, gender, ethnicity and other bias factors that sometimes impact the hiring process.
Our rigorous screening process, consisting of technical tests and interviews to determine cultural fit and language proficiency, allows us only to hire 1% of our applicants. Our team of 4,000 professionals in more than 40 countries across the globe is truly the cream of the crop. As we look for talent everywhere, areas less saturated with big tech companies and industry players are ideal geographic areas for finding talent. More than 30% of our talent resides outside capital cities, and between 2021 and 2022, we have seen a 65% increase in geographic talent dispersion.
What steps should aspiring software engineers take to give themselves a higher chance of being accepted by top agencies like BairesDev?
Be problem solvers! Like other top companies, we're looking for people who are methodical and smart, able to work independently and generate value right from the starting point, and who delight in meeting complex challenges in stride. For technical skills and knowledge, all hired candidates at BairesDev must showcase a high English language proficiency, expert-level tech skills, credentials and top scores in several tests. We also look for cultural fit and ensure all team members have excellent communication skills.
Businesses who wish to work with BairesDev can choose from various outsourcing models such as Staff Augmentation, Dedicated Teams and Project-based. How can businesses know which best fits their requirements, and how do you select the experts who will work on these projects?
We realize that clients have different needs and benefit from other working arrangements, which is why we offer a wide array of modular solutions to fit our clients' every conceivable need. From fully managed teams to individual expert software developers, we specialize in reliable end-to-end delivery of tailor-made technology solutions for startups, SMBs and enterprises.
BairesDev's major competitive edge is speed and precision. We can hire top talent and assemble expert teams more quickly than competitors, rapidly forming expert teams in two weeks. We provide the flexibility to scale or reduce the scope of projects without compromising quality or the original plan established with our client. We are allies to our clients in their digital acceleration to adapt to market needs. This is possible because our AI recruiting suite matches our client's needs with our talent pool to select the best professionals depending on their industry experience, tech skills, project scope and others.
Google, Pinterest, and Associated Press are some of your clients. Can you share some high-profile case studies where your teams were crucial for development?
We currently serve more than 450 clients worldwide across 100+ industries, from Fortune 500 companies to startups. We worked with a top social network platform to improve its advertising tools. We rebuilt the architecture of the ads manager, allowing our client to continue to scale its application. This improvement increased their revenue and created efficiencies by reducing runtime by 16 times. By helping internal teams optimize their cloud usage, we helped the company save approximately $800K annually.
What software development projects are your teams best suited for, and what are the most common technologies or services your teams are handling currently?
We have diverse and senior talent teams with experience in over 100 technologies. Dissecting our client's projects, .NET, Java, JavaScript and Python, in conjunction with Big Data Data, are the technologies constantly in high demand. Most skill demands were equally affected by the market slowdown in 2021; however, Golang is one tech that has kept a consistent market demand. Application modernization continues apace due to legitimate EOL concerns. We've done interesting work using AI/ML technology/techniques across multiple industries and have developed a strong reputation for providing real-world expertise in this area. Our Sales Force and Service Now expertise is also in high demand, and we've been providing these services to several high-profile enterprise clients.
Currently, we work on projects for more than 100 industries. It's very versatile. In 2022, for the first time, we started working on projects for industries such as Defense and Space Manufacturing, Farmtech, Market Research, Philanthropic Fundraising Services and Supply Chain-enhanced logistics.
Industries categorized as "traditional" are looking to be more efficient and get closer to the end customer. Many are attempting to augment or even displace their traditional distribution channels. As more technology-oriented offerings disrupt the market, players are looking for ways to catch up. For example, leasing and commercial real estate are exploring ways to leverage technology. We have seen the usage of 120+ technologies in this industry and a post-Covid uptick in demand.
We have seen impressive software developments these past few years: blockchain, Web3, Metaverse, etc. What are you most excited about in 2023 and why?
The financial crisis has deployed an adoption of existing technologies that have yet to be widely used. It will become essential to explore new frameworks and methodologies when it comes to project management. These will have to respond to new ways of planning, testing and swift iterating before deliveries. New industries, like crypto, the metaverse and cloud innovation, may develop advanced methods to tackle project management. We are seeing that new technologies are rising, such as Apply, Workato and Anaplan. Also, new themes are going around, like Web3, Machine Learning (ML), Artificial Intelligence (AI), Blockchain (not crypto), Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data and Service Now.
Amidst the recession, companies will focus on initiatives with defined short-horizon benefits. We see investment in projects that will provide immediate, visible value to clients and the organization and away from some highly innovative but high-risk projects. This efficient approach to prioritization will continue into the following year.
Thank you for your time, Luis Paiva. Best of luck to you and BairesDev!
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