Lately , there has been a lot of commotion about it. Many companies have difficulties finding the right employees. Moreover, due to the tight labor market, a serious effort is also needed from companies to keep their good employees on board.
Coteng has been investing in the stability of the basic teams since its inception. We are proud to have employees with a seniority of up to 26 years! Loyalty is not only bought with spectacular events such as those often organized today, but is gained by creating an environment in which employees feel valued and good. Of course, this takes time. When corporate profit takes precedence over the interests of employees, loyalty will be hard to find. It works both ways or not.
Two teams in different continents
For more than 20 years, we have two teams divided between Belgium (Antwerp) and India (Chennai). Both teams have similar profiles and are part of the same company. Everyone is on Coteng’s payroll (no offshoring). We do not believe in a model in which Belgium “sells” and India “produces”, as is sometimes done by large companies. For that reason, we form core teams for each project with both Indian and Belgian employees. This way, knowledge is shared in an active way and our employees in the various locations feel more connected.
In practice, this means that we start every working day with a stand-up meeting. In this face-to-face meeting with a video link between the meeting rooms in India and Belgium, the teams briefly discuss the project status and the most important working points.
Thanks to the time difference, both teams can provide support almost 24 hours a day. For our international customers, this is not unimportant. After all, our software solutions are used from China to America and are sometimes company critical. With the combined teams, we can quickly deliver high-quality, tailor-made software solutions and still keep the costs for the customer limited.
Stability in core teams
For most of our customers, we have developed custom software for many years. The stability in our teams ensures that we can quickly familiarize ourselves with the new projects of these customers. This way, we prevent our customer from having to explain his processes repeatedly. We know their business processes down to the last detail and can switch much faster. While a new team has to familiarize itself with the matter with every adjustment, we can pick up much faster and start directly with the core. This allows us to keep investments affordable and ensures us to implement very quickly. A win-win for both parties.
Realized with the support of Flanders Investment & Trade.