How to Hire a Front-End Developer

A well-designed product not only brings aesthetic value but also creates the impression of a product you can trust. But to create an attractive interface or UI, you should hire front-end developers.

We are familiar with the pain that you encounter when trying to hire front-end developers. So we decided to create a clear guide that could help you to deal with the question of how to hire a good front-end developer. Let's start with the basics then move on to choosing a developer.

Who is a front-end developer

A front-end developer is an engineer who creates the client-facing part of the site - the user interface. He or she is responsible for the code performance and maintenance in all browsers and on all devices. Therefore, it is very important that the front-end developer is constantly up to date with the latest innovations to successfully adapt sites for new devices. The front-end developer is a person who needs to know three main languages in web development: HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. Additionally, there are many tools in front-end development, such as React, Redux, Relay, CSS modules, etc. All these frameworks are necessary to meet the ever-growing demands for creating fully-functional and high-performance sites. 

The skills of the developer are growing as knowledge of technology and the number of projects completed increases. Therefore, it is common to separate developers into junior, middle, and senior levels. However, each company has unique requirements for these levels. The distribution looks like this:

Sources: glassdoor.co.in, upwork.

What should you do before you hire a front developer

First, you need to plan your budget. There are a couple of methods to accomplish this task. If you’re building a start-up, you should analyze the market and find out how much it costs to hire a developer. If you have  a more established business, you should look into your financial plan and understand how much money you can allocate for the current developer position. Each developer can have different knowledge and technology stack. Therefore, you need to choose a candidate only with those skills necessary for your project.

Where to find a good front-end developer

There are two ways to find programmers on job search platforms.

The first method is to write a job posting on a site and wait for someone to respond to it.

The disadvantages of this approach:

• - A lot of resumes come from candidates who do not meet the requirements,

• - It can take far too much time to hire the great engineer.

The advantage of this method:

• - All you need is to create a vacancy and choose a suitable candidate.

If your job description does not receive responses, you should review and change it. You can also promote your vacancy to reach as many people as possible.

The second approach is to hire developers through recruiting companies. These companies have a base of trusted developers. As a client, you will need to fill out a form and provide requirements and project details. The recruiter will then select candidates for the project, interview them, and transfer all data to the client. The customer can also conduct the interviews themself. Using a recruiting company helps you to hire the perfect engineer much faster and easier.

How to write a front-end developer job description

What should be in the ideal candidate’s resume? Work experience, case studies, a list of programming languages and technologies, and knowledge of English.

Here is an example of an ideal job description: "We need to develop a small website that provides information about the company. The site should be high-quality, responsive, adapted for desktops, tablets, and mobile devices. The design and layout are already there; it remains only to write the code. And for such a project the responsibilities and qualifications we need are:

Responsibilities:

• - Create an adaptive website for desktop, notebooks, tablets, and mobile devices

• - Write high-quality and easy-to-read code with comments

• - Build reusable code and libraries for future use

Skills and Qualifications:

• - 3+ years of development experience

• - Strong knowledge: HTML, CSS, SVG

• - Strong knowledge of frameworks Angular, Vue.js, or React

• - Strong knowledge of languages JavaScript, TypeScript

• - Backend frameworks: Node.js

• - Understanding of code versioning tools like Git, or SVN

• - Familiarity with Photoshop and Adobe Creative Cloud

• - English level: Excellent communication skills, both verbal and written

How do you shortlist candidates for front-end development

Before starting the interview, you should have a specific list of questions to help you choose the ideal candidate. The list of questions should fully cover the technologies used in the project. It is also essential to ask soft skills questions. These questions will help to find out whether the developer can work in a team and how comfortable it is to work with them.

Try to ensure that questions reveal employee performance. The main task is to find out the candidate whose future performance meets your expectations. If, during communication, you have an additional question for the candidate, don’t hesitate to ask them. Your goal is to get the complete picture of the engineer. 

What are good interview questions to ask a front-end developer

And now for the fun part - to weed out candidates who are not suitable for you. Check out their CVs, or resumes, and choose the most interesting people for the project.  With those who are suitable, you should conduct an interview and ask specific questions. Here are some variants:

Question 1. Tell me about the projects you’ve worked on.

What the answer tells you: Previous works show how large or small the developer’s projects were. Make sure you hire a web developer for his knowledge and skills, and not just for eloquence.

Question 2. Tell me about a project that disappointed you. What would you change to make it better?

What the answer tells you: A good programmer is constantly improving his or her knowledge and skills, and also does not make the same mistakes twice. This question helps to understand whether the developer understands their projects.

Question 3. How are you keeping up with the latest changes in front-end development?

What the answer tells you: The world of IT technologies is developing rapidly.  It seems that every week something new and revolutionary appears. And a good programmer is always up to date with the latest innovations.

Question 4. If you were going to start your project now, what technical components would you use?

What the answer tells you: This question perfectly shows the knowledge of the front-end developer. If he or she is going to use certain technologies without going into detail, level of knowledge may be superficial. But if the developer describes in detail the entire stack of technologies, including which libraries or plugins they will use, then it is obvious that they are following the latest innovations and technologies.

Question 5. Do you test your code? How exactly?

What the answer tells you: If your budget involves self-testing the code by the developer, you should definitely ask them this question.  Good code means a less buggy web site and less amount of code fixes. A good engineer should value testing and respect the QA process because it will cut down the time to find bugs and cost for the job.

Question 6. How do you make a project time estimate?

What the answer tells you: The ability to set correct deadlines is a skill that every good programmer should possess. That is why you should ask the developer how much time they will perform certain tasks and compare them with standard estimates for developers of the same level and stack in your team.

 Question 7. How do you balance work with your personal life and hobbies?

What the answer tells you: It is important to ask about the free time of the developer. And if the developer does not have enough time for a hobby, you can conclude that he/she may not be good at time management.. However, it is also important to understand the context. After all, the developer may have different family responsibilities or activities that can take up a lot of free time.

Question 8. How fast can you begin to understand a new technology?

What the answer tells you: This question makes it clear how quickly the developer acquires new skills. Technologies are changing rapidly, and a programmer who knows a lot but adapts slowly is worse than a developer who isn't fluent at the moment, but instantly gets new things quickly. But it is worth saying that studying a fundamentally new technology for a current developer usually takes a lot of time. If your candidate is not fluent in the required technologies, perhaps the best solution would be to hire another person.

Question 9. Ask a candidate about technologies from your project’s stack.

What the answer tells you: Depending on the technology stack that was indicated in the CV, it is worth creating a list of technical issues. These technical questions will give you an understanding of the developer’s level of knowledge. It’s also a good way to weed out those who wrote certain technologies in their resume, but don't have enough skills to work with them.

Question 10. What is the difference between a class in ES6 and a constructor function in ES5?

Answer: First, let's look at examples:

// ES5 constructor function

function Person (name) {

this.name = name;

}

// ES6 class

class Person {

constructor (name) {

     this.name = name;

 }

}

They look pretty similar when viewed with simple constructors.

The main difference in the constructor occurs when using inheritance. If we want to create the class `Student` (which will be a subclass of the class` Person`) and add the field `studentId`, then, in addition to the above, we must do the following:

// ES5 constructor function

function Student (name, studentId) {

 // Call the constructor of the superclass to initialize the derivatives of the superclass of members.

   Person.call (this, name); // Initialize your own subclass members.

  this.studentId = studentId;

}

Student.prototype = Object.create (Person.prototype);

Student.prototype.constructor = Student;

// ES6 class

class Student extends Person {

constructor (name, studentId) {

super (name);

     this.studentId = studentId;

}

}

Inheritance in ES5 syntax is much more verbose, and in ES6 more understandable and digestible.

Summing Up

Yes, it's hard to find a great front-end developer. But by remembering the basics, the hiring will occur in a matter of time. The main thing is to determine the scale of the project and choose the set of skills and responsibilities that the developer should possess. We hope this article has helped you. Now it’s time to find your ideal front-end developer! Good luck!