March 29, 2024 Why You Should Hire South African Tech Talent
By Baxter Juds
The tech market is a highly competitive field, and to stand out in the industry you need to ensure you have the best development talent. South Africa has over 130 thousand programmers, making it have the highest concentration of development talent in Africa. South Africa is also in a fortunate time zone for European countries and the eastern time zone in the United States, making real-time communication easy. Most educated South Africans are fluent in English since it is the language that business and academia are conducted in, plus it’s one of its 12 official languages.
South Africa also has a thriving tech industry with nearly 500 startups pushing boundaries and disrupting markets. AES Global has been working within the tech space for more than seven years and has made connections with thousands of amazing tech talent within the space. We can connect you with the right fit for your company, but first, let’s explore in detail why you should hire South African tech talent.
1. Diverse Development Talent
South Africa is a multi-racial and multi-cultural society with a societal emphasis on embracing its diversity. This means you can access a plethora of perspectives to innovate and improve the way your company functions. The more ways you can look at a problem the more solutions you can find. As we’ve mentioned before there are 12 official languages in South Africa, each representing a unique and vibrant culture, with their own way of looking at problems and finding solutions.
Some cultures are not represented in our official languages, including the largest Southeast Asian community outside of India. While there is a large amount of diversity, these groups have been working together for some time, with the ability to understand and respect each other's cultures and ideas. This means that you can get access to all the benefits of a diverse group without having to worry about culture clash.
2. Top Quality Talent at a Fraction of the Price
With global-ranking universities like the University of Cape Town, Stellenbosch University, and the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa has the technical depth to rival any country. However, there’s one additional benefit, because of favourable exchange rates, and a relatively low cost of living in South Africa, the pay for a highly skilled South African Developer is incredibly favourable.
The top-end, truly unicorn developers would likely be looking for around €8,000 (£7,500) with junior developers looking for a salary of around €1,700 (£1,500). Comparing that to UK Developers who can earn up to twice that amount, there really is a supreme value in working with African talent. This means your business can reinvest the money you save on tech talent into marketing, R&D, or any other area where you might need more resources.
3. Thriving and Dynamic Tech Environment
With nearly 100 tech incubators in South Africa, local tech talent has a vast library of resources, connections and experiences working with cutting-edge, disruptive technology. Take DataProphet for instance. DataProphet uses real-time data to isolate and resolve any issues in production lines, saving companies money, and time and altering their processes to compete in their market at the highest level.
Takealot is a web marketplace that dominates the South African local market, with its emphasis on unique solutions and customer satisfaction, allowing it to provide the best service at a fraction of the cost.
Considerations to Make When Hiring South African Tech Talent
One potential issue that is worth observing when hiring tech talent from South Africa is the roaming blackouts that happen in this country. Commonly referred to as load-shedding, this could potentially cause problems for South African workers operating remotely. However, there are plenty of ways to mitigate this issue.
For one, you could request that any applicants have an Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS) which would prevent any downtime due to a power failure. You could also offer to provide one for a potential worker, seeing as they are relatively inexpensive in South Africa due to the market demand and favourable exchange rate, this could make it much enticing for a South African developer to sign with your company as it is a valuable benefit.
Work With AES Global and Find the Best Tech Talent in South Africa
AES Global has been in operation since 2017, we have worked with industry leaders both locally and internationally, and have placed thousands of developers in fulfilling roles. Our team uses a headhunting approach and works to understand our client's needs to find them the perfect candidate for the role.
Our team fully vets each candidate and ensures that they have the right skills, attitude, and culture fit to have a seamless integration into your business. If you are interested in finding the best tech talent in South Africa, get in touch with us today.
