How we helped UpsellGuru hire engineers in Portugal

A German hotel-tech startup of under ten people needed engineers beyond its home network, employed locally. We found them in Portugal and put them on our payroll.

6Engineers hired in 15 months
<10People when we started
2xCompany size since then

What UpsellGuru says about us

“Working with RemoteCrew is always easy and pleasant. They are always open for feedback and available for a meeting. They really take the time to understand what kind of profiles you look for and adjust their candidates pipeline accordingly.”

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Matteo G.

CTO at UpsellGuru

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4.9/5 on

TL;DR

  • Who. UpsellGuru, a SaaS platform that helps hotels upsell services and optimise the guest experience. Based in Germany, under ten people when we started.
  • What they needed. More engineers to keep up with demand and build the product.
  • Why it was hard. Their network was in Germany, where they competed with large local companies for the same people.
  • What we did. Found engineers in Portugal through our community, job board, local channels and network, and employed the ones they chose on our payroll.
  • What happened. UpsellGuru is now twice the size, with six engineers hired through us in 15 months.

About UpsellGuru

UpsellGuru is a SaaS platform that helps hotels upsell services and optimize the guest experience. The company is based in Germany and had a relatively small team when they started working with Remote Crew (under 10 people).

The business was growing and doing relatively well, but it needed more engineers to keep up with demand and build the features its product required.

The brief

Find qualified engineers outside Germany and employ them locally, for a team of under ten competing with large German companies for the same people.

The 2 problems we had to solve

Problem #1: "Our network is in Germany."

Hiring was not easy, especially at the beginning of the venture. Their network was essentially in Germany, and it was hard to compete against large local companies domestically.

What we did

Daniel, one of our Senior Recruiters, collected the requirements and filled out the Role Intake Document with the team. We published the role in our community, on our job board and in local channels, and reached out to qualified engineers in our network who were looking for opportunities.

Problem #2: "We need to employ them locally."

Finding the engineers was only half the problem. UpsellGuru also needed a way to employ them where they lived.

What we did

We made offers to the candidates they selected and employed them on our payroll, the option the team chose as the way forward.

How we actually ran it

  1. The Role Intake Document. To understand properly what the team was looking for.
  2. Community, job board, local channels and outreach. Published in our channels and sent directly to qualified engineers in our network.
  3. Detailed interview notes. A quick headline summary per candidate, plus a fuller breakdown of experience and technical level.
  4. Batches, not a firehose. UpsellGuru interviewed the candidates we shared and picked the ones they liked most in each batch.
  5. Offers and our payroll. We made the offers and employed the engineers they chose.

What UpsellGuru ended up with

  • A company twice the size of when we started.

  • Six engineers in Portugal hired in 15 months, employed through our payroll without a local entity.

Written by

Miguel Marques

Miguel Marques

Founder @ Remote Crew