Important Aspects To Look Out For While Hiring Laravel Developers

With the increased popularity of the web as a platform, web development has become imperative for sustainable business growth. It is the best way to inform people of the products and services your business offers and to stay on top of your game with global visibility. However, to leverage these capabilities, you’ll need to hire Laravel developers who can assist you in all the aspects of web development, such as network security, web content development, web designing, web publishing, database management, and more. But hiring the right professional is not as easy as it might seem.

Therefore, if you’re looking to hire a highly proficient Laravel developer to be a part of your development team, then this blog is curated precisely for you. Take a look at a few of the decisive aspects to be mindful of when recruiting a Laravel developer.

Factors to consider when you hire Laravel developers

Building strategic and effective selection criteria for a successful project as a hiring manager is essential. Therefore, here are the eight things that you must keep as a part of your selection criteria and should seriously consider when you hire dedicated Laravel developers.

Define your goals

Before reaching out to any Laravel developer, it is crucial to determine your goals and accordingly list down your needs. This keeps you focused on your aim and assists you in establishing the steps to follow and progress to make. So, start designing your goals and let them define who to hire next to turn that desired future into reality.

Relevant past experience is the key

Another prominent factor to consider when you hire Laravel experts is their prior experience and work record. It gives you a better perspective on their skills and professionalism, and it's is the best way to predict the extent of their web development and industry knowledge. Start with going through their portfolios and getting the reviews of their previous employers. These reviews will help you measure the span of their talent and support you in hiring a Laravel developer with experience from various niches and industries.

Cost estimation is essential

A successful project requires all the necessary resources, which cost money. That's why you must put together a budget that ensures a quality product with minimum expenditure. You can do so by breaking down the scope of your project into manageable parts to predict the quantity, cost, and price of the resources required to complete the project successfully. Then only look for Laravel developers who are proficient and are under your budget. A clear roadmap on cost will save you from any unexpected payments down the road.

Test technical knowledge of the Laravel developer

The key responsibility of a Laravel developer includes building a new web application or updating the existing ones. This requires strong technical expertise and a certain level of experience in the field. When you hire Laravel programmers, it is necessary to hire someone who can write clean, testable, and scalable code and can optimize it. A proficient Laravel developer must have a good command of PHP and other web development technologies such as HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. It is even better if they are familiar with databases. You must test the knowledge of Laravel developers by asking some technical interview questions and evaluating their knowledge about the project management frameworks like the waterfall model, Agile, Scrum, etc. Familiarity with concepts such as APIs, OOP, Model-View-Controller handling, etc., is crucial. Additionally, the ability to leverage cloud and server management software is highly beneficial for the application's success.

Soft skills are as critical as technical skills

Now, development companies are being integrated with business, and as a result, developers' expectations have evolved as well. Developers are usually a part of a larger team and are expected to communicate and collaborate with their colleagues and other stakeholders. That's why besides being a good coder, a great Laravel developer needs to embrace soft skills, including good communication, curiosity, critical thinking, etc.

Don't forget one-on-one interviews

The personal interview is one of the vital stages in selecting the right Laravel developer. It helps you bridge the gap between the interviewee and the interviewer and aids you in assessing the candidate's potential. You can also understand their technical skills, communication, confidence, and other soft skills. Therefore, you must interview Laravel developers so that you can be sure if you have hired a professional who meets your expectations or not.

Flexibility and customer-centric approach

A skilled Laravel developer must have the ability to build an application that meets your business requirements and expectations. That's why you must ensure that the applicant is flexible and understands the varying needs of the business. They should be comfortable adapting to changes to keep the application up-to-date with the latest technological advancements.

The ability to solve complex problems

A proficient Laravel developer should have the ability to utilize programming languages, frameworks, and libraries as tools to solve complex problems to build a suitable solution. They work together with cross-functional teams and communicate with respective stakeholders to collect the necessary data or information. Laravel developers are responsible for analyzing these data and translating them into technical specifications. Therefore, you must effectively evaluate the potential candidates and choose the right Laravel developer to be a part of your team.

Laravel interview questions you should ask in 2023

As a hiring manager, you must ask the right questions during the interview to hire an experienced and well-qualified Laravel developer. That's why we have compiled together a comprehensive list of Laravel interview questions that can significantly assist you in conquering the battlefield of recruiting a real professional.

1. What is Laravel?

It is one of the most basic questions you can ask a Laravel developer. However, starting the interview with this question can set the candidate in the right frame of mind. Their answer may look like this:

Laravel is an open-source PHP web framework designed to develop web applications using MVC architectural patterns. It delivers an expressive and elegant syntax that helps Laravel developers create a powerful web application effortlessly and quickly.

2. What is new with Laravel 8?

If you want to assess the Laravel developer's knowledge of the latest update, you should ask this question. Laravel 8 is the latest update of the framework with several exciting new features. Ensure that the Laravel developer's answer includes the following characteristics -

• Laravel Jetstream - It is the new application scaffolding for Laravel that provides various built-in functionalities such as Login & registration, email verification, two-factor authentication (2FA), session management, and more.

• Model updates - The model update in Laravel 8 has brought back the app/Models directory. Now Laravel developers need not manually create the folder.

• Migration squashing - Laravel 8 introduces another exciting feature for Laravel developers. Migration squashing allows developers to condense migration files into a single SQL file.

• Improved rate limits - Laravel developers now have a new and more convenient way of preventing APIs from being overloaded with requests.

• Job batching - This feature allows Laravel developers to group many jobs in a batch for parallel execution, consequently making it easy for developers to handle many jobs at the same time concurrently.

• Better maintenance mode - Laravel 8 brings back an enhanced maintenance mode, and it allows Laravel developers to take the application down while upgrading the system.

3. Why Laravel is the best PHP framework? Explain.

You don't want to hire Laravel developers who can not accurately explain the benefits of the framework that they are utilizing. Some of the advantages include -

• Supports object-oriented libraries - There is no doubt that libraries play a critical part in efficiently developing any web application. Laravel developers can utilize object-oriented and pre-installed libraries to solve problems and build robust applications.

• MVC architecture support - One of the prominent features of Laravel is MVC or Model View Controller-based architecture. Laravel developers can significantly improve performance for both small to large business applications.

• Artisan CLI for commands - Laravel developers can use Laravel's own Command Line Interface (CLI) for quick, easy, and simple web development.

• Template engine for stunning layouts - Laravel has a built-in templating engine known as Blade Template Engine. It is a powerful, lightweight, and preset engine that allows Laravel developers to quickly and effortlessly build web applications.

• Eloquent ORM - This feature allows Laravel developers to maintain straightforward communication with the database objects by using a formal or expressive syntax.

• Application testing - Laravel offers default testing opportunities that Laravel developers can utilize to ensure the quality of the product.

4. What is Route, and why do you use it?

The route is creating a request URL of your application and is defined inside the /route folder located in the roots directory. The best thing about these URLs is that they are both human-readable and SEO-friendly. Laravel developers can use the following Route methods -

• get
• post
• put
• delete
• patch
• options

5. What are bundles in Laravel?

Bundles are also known as Packages that Laravel developers can utilize to extend the framework's functionality. Laravel developers can also create custom packages as per the requirement of the application.

6. List the names of databases that Laravel supports.

Like any other modern application, Laravel applications also interact with the database. The framework supports various database systems to simplify data storage, analysis, and manipulation. Currently, it supports four databases that Laravel developers can utilize: MySQL, Postgres, SQLite, and SQL Server.

7. Can Laravel be used for full-stack development?

Full-stack development refers to the development of both the client-side and server-side of the web application. Ultimately, it means building the front-end and back-end with database integration along with debugging the application. However, when it comes to Laravel, which is a server-side PHP framework, it is a preferred choice for making progressive, scalable full-stack web applications. Laravel developers can combine Laravel with Vue.js for back-end and front-end development, respectively.

8. Explain Relationships in Laravel.

The eloquent relationship allows Laravel developers to relate the tables in a very easy format. The list of different relationships available in Laravel includes -

• One to One - Provides the one-to-one relationship between a model of type A and one model of type B, and vice versa.
• One to Many - Provides the one-to-many relationship between a model of type A and multiple models of type B.
• Many to Many - Defines the many-to-many relationship between one model of type A and multiple models of type B, and vice versa.
• Has One Through - Allows Laravel developers to link models through a single intermediate relation.
• Has Many Through - Allows Laravel developers to link models through multiple intermediate relations.

Conclusion

Onboarding a skilled Laravel developer takes up a lot of time and resources. You will have to go through thousands of resumes and interviews to screen and hire a Laravel developer who has the right technical skills and can culturally fit into your team. Consequently, it makes the whole recruiting process a daunting, expensive, and time-consuming task. That’s why it is necessary for you first to know the priorities and things to assess to make a profitable decision.

If you want to hire a knowledgeable and ethical Laravel developer, one of the best platforms to opt for is Turing.com. It is a company that goes above and beyond to make sure that you hire the most suitable professionals for your business. Its unique AI-backed Intelligent Talent Cloud helps you source, vet, match and manage the most skilled and eligible Laravel developers remotely. Turing company applies a perfect amalgamation of efficiency and thoroughness in evaluating the candidate's experience, skill, knowledge & performance. Turing lets you tap into the planetary pool of talents with strong technical and communication skills in this remote-first world. You can now hire Laravel developers who are ready to work in your timezone at unbeatable prices.