In today’s digital economy, every company needs a web development team, but finding the right talent to fit the bill can be a challenge. In 2016, there was an average of 46,950 unique job postings a month for web developers in the United States, but only 6,955 monthly hires, CareerBuilder data shows. Here are three keys to hiring and management a high-performing web development team.

More than half of employers say they’ve seen a negative impact on their business due to this type of skills gap. To close the skills gap, it’s crucial to have an effective strategy for recruiting the right team for your project, as well as a good project management strategy to retain talent. 

Define Your Project Requirements Precisely

Crafting a precise description of what type of skills your project needs is the foundation of a good web developer hiring strategy. Building a website has two key components: design, which involves the graphics and layout that determine how your site looks to the end user; and coding, which involves your site’s under-the-hood functionality. Graphic designers specialize in image design, while web designers can do both image design and site basic layout, and web developers can do advanced site layout such as customized layouts, custom apps and integrations with third-party apps. Some contractors can perform more than one of these functions, but typically, you’ll need to hire multiple team members.

Make sure you clarify which skills are needed for your project when writing your job description, so that you can attract recruits with the right skill set. Including a design mock-up, samples of sites you want to emulate and a description of what you don’t want can help increase the effectiveness of your posting. Be sure to include a time frame as well so that applicants have a realistic understanding of what type of deadline they have to meet.

Use a Strategic Screening Process

The next step is setting up criteria to evaluate applicants’ skills. These criteria should include both hard technical skills and soft skills. Hard skills for designers include experience in Adobe Photoshop or Illustrator or similar graphics programs. Hard skills for web designers include these skills as well as computer language skills in CSS, CSS 3, HTML, HTML 5, jQuery and PHP. Web developers should possess these computer language skills as well as knowledge of JavaScript.

In addition to these hard skills, you should evaluate applicants’ soft skills. How fast they respond to your communication can be a big indicator. During your interview, you should discuss your project with them in detail to make sure they understand your requirements thoroughly.

It’s also important to verify credentials before hiring. Ask to see previous work and references. On many freelancer sites, you can also see customer ratings and reviews from previous clients.

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Set Up a Good Project Management System

After hiring the right team members, a key to success is using a good project management system. An effective project management system should allow all team members to communicate in real-time and to see the current versions of files and current website progress.

The best way to achieve this is to use a unified communications platform. Unlike email, which makes it hard to update new conversation partners to threads they missed or to ensure that everyone is looking at the current file version, a unified platform includes an interface modeled on social media so that all team members can see the same conversation and file version. At the same time, team members can also exchange private messages through instant messaging or integrated email, communicate through phone or video chat or share files. Screen sharing is also available, which can be useful when discussing site design options.

A good unified communications project management system should also include analytics capability that allows you to track team progress and efficiency. This can enable you to keep your project on track as well as adjust and improve your collaboration processes to speed up your project completion timetables.

Defining your project requirements, using a strategic hiring process and setting up an effective project management system are three keys to successfully hiring and managing a web development team. Implementing these strategies can make your hiring process go smoother and get your website done faster.