Respect Your Future

We decided that we want to open an Offshore development center for several reasons, such as the prices and the difficulty of recruiting…We heard recommendations and decided to choose Matrix Eastern Europe. The first employee of Argus started working with us 6 months ago, and today we already have 14 people. In terms of professionalism and motivation, people there appreciate the fact that they have a job. I refer to them as part of Argus employees for everything, they are part of the team in Israel, and they also work on the main product of the company.

Here in Israel, people work partially from home and from the office, so what does it matter if you work from your home in Israel or in Poland if you work remotely either way?

We were unable to recruit employees in Israel, as there was a lack of tech talents. We knew that one of the solutions is to go Offshore. We chose Bulgaria because of the cost issue, which is significantly lower in Bulgaria. We were also looking for a place that is located next to Israel because of the time zone… and Bulgaria has the same time zone as Israel has.
I wanted a place that would take away all the responsibility involved with starting a company, setting up offices, recruiting IT and an Administrative Manager… and Matrix gave me this whole package of services including closing the cultural gap.

I had a good feeling after the meetings with the team in Matrix. I knew that they will help me with what I needed and be there for me, and they did. Moreover, they explained all about the pros and cons of every decision and process… so we eventually decided to build a team in Bulgaria… The HR team at Matrix Bulgaria manages a lot of welfare activities for the employees there and they really work hard on the retention and the recruitment of the right people, and at the end of the day, this is all that matters.

The main reason we chose Bulgaria, is the skilled people. In other words, the skillset they bring to the table – the programming languages they know and the extensive knowledge they have is, in most cases, much wider than in Israel. For instance, the solutions they come up with are more creative and interesting. I am very comfortable working with my team in Bulgaria, they are very loyal and do an amazing job. I am personally very pleased and I will continue to enlarge the team there.

When we started working with Matrix Eastern Europe, we had nine people on our team in Bulgaria. Today, we are close to 40 – half our people – making this our largest branch. There are several reasons this model works so well for us. First, Bulgaria has a large pool of quality talent, at a much lower cost than we could find here, and they are in the same time zone as Israel, which makes working together easier. On top of that, Matrix Eastern Europe has wonderful premises, incredibly experienced HR and support staff and, crucially for us, ISO 27001 certification which meets the security requirements of our business when serving banking clients. Finally, Matrix Eastern Europe helps us to maintain strong links and communication with our staff in Bulgaria, so that they feel like an integral part of our business – which they absolutely are!

In January 2019, we were going through a period of huge growth. Our clients required high-quality, English-speaking, 24/7 support. With Matrix Eastern Europe, we opened a 24/7 support center that we manage ourselves, giving us the right balance of support and autonomy. Our initial goals were aggressive – to recruit, onboard and train seven people in one month. Not only did we achieve this, but we have also gone on to grow our team in other fields and areas of expertise. Now, most of our customer tickets are dealt with by our team in Bulgaria, and we get excellent feedback about them. Matrix Eastern Europe truly are our partners – quite simply, they make our lives easier.

After the crash of the euro around five years ago, we had to tighten our belts. We began to consider establishing an offshore location, where costs would be lower, but where we could also find quality people with a high level of English. Asking around our networks for advice about who could support our new endeavor, many people told me: Matrix Eastern Europe. With their help, we opened our Bulgaria team of four people; today we have 50 and we’re still growing.

The support we have had from Matrix Eastern Europe has been outstanding; as well as advising us on recruitment, they have run workshops for our managers about differences in business culture, work processes and behavioral habits, to enhance our relations with our Bulgarian staff. The Matrix Eastern Europe team is very attentive, responding quickly and professionally to our needs, and the needs of our employees. We consider this partnership to be critical to our success.