We have over 120 active Toptal developers and designers from Croatia alone, and continuing to support local development and design communities is something that’s really important to us, both in Croatia and elsewhere.

Our goal is to empower talented developers and designers from all over the world to live location-independent, work with amazing companies worldwide, and be compensated well for their talents.

The great thing is, as many of our community members have realized, this remote work model enables you to do amazing things. Many of our community members are constantly traveling the world and working on great projects from the road.

Here are some of the tips for escaping the office that we’ve learned as traveling freelancers:

  • Incorporate a passion project into your trip: It adds structure and leads you to all kinds of amazing experiences. Two Toptalers, Zoran and Lora Plesko, took their band on tour for a roadtrip through Europe, doing freelance iOS development to support themselves. At Toptal, you can do what you love, from wherever you want.
  • Staying in places for a month or two helps keep costs down:  For many places, traveling just isn’t nearly expensive you might think. If you take your time visiting places, you’ll usually be able to negotiate special midterm discounts on most accommodations on Airbnb or elsewhere. This is also a great way to really explore a city and its culture.
  • Unlock your phone and get a local pay as you go SIM card:  With 4G, you’ll be able to work from anywhere, even if the local WiFi is poor. You can put in a full day of work from the most exotic locations in the world.
  • Over-communicating with clients is key:  You’re constantly traveling, so that means you need to be communicating with clients at all times. Even just responding to requests with a quick “Hey, I saw this and will get to it ASAP.” goes a long way. Your clients always need to know what you’re working on.

Hundreds of us at Toptal are doing this on a regular basis, and it’s been amazing, especially when you have a support infrastructure in which to do it. At Toptal, we constantly hold events every day in places around the world, and help our community members get in touch with each other when they travel. We’ve found that connecting with local developers and designers who share the same interests just makes traveling that much more fun.

If you’d like to join our community of top designers and developers from around the world, I encourage you to apply!