Imagine a scenario where you’re bombarded with complex projects, and your in-house team can’t handle everything internally.
Your focus is to expand your team by hiring external professionals on a temporary basis who can augment the existing team. This is where staff augmentation outsourcing comes in to help you achieve your business goals.
In this blog, we will reveal everything about what IT staff augmentation is, its benefits, and things you should know before collaborating with a staff augmentation company.
An Overview of IT Staff Augmentation
IT staff augmentation means outsourcing employees to perform IT-related tasks on a temporary basis.
Suppose your organization wants to develop an entertainment app for your client; however, you need more skilled developers to build robust apps.
Hiring talented developers is not an easy job; it requires a few weeks and even months to find the best match whose expertise aligns with your project requirements.
Failure to find qualified software developers results in project delays. With staff augmentation outsourcing, you can easily find developers with relevant expertise, helping you launch your project quickly with zero hassle.
Usually, organizations demand skilled resources in either of these situations: when you want to meet deadlines for a big project or when you need a human resource who excels in a specific domain and can augment your existing team.
Benefits of Staff Augmentation Outsourcing Model
The popularity of IT staff augmentation is increasing day by day. According to a Business Wire report, the revenue of the software product market is currently valued at $930 billion in 2020 and is projected to increase to $1493.07 billion in 2027.
From these figures, you can now estimate this industry’s massive size and its potential to grow.
Moreover, augmenting software teams is a cost-effective option for software development agencies as they don’t need to go through lengthy processes of screening candidates and make payroll decisions.
Here are a few benefits you will get by investing in staff augmentation outsourcing:
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Get access to talented IT professionals
Partnering with an IT staff augmentation firm provides you access to skilled IT professionals that are not readily available within your organization.
You don’t need to run extensive training programs for augmented staff as they are well-versed in a specific domain.
Hiring in-house staff might give you limited exposure and make it challenging to find available market talent.
On the contrary, staff augmentation connects you with domain-centric talents who can easily adapt to your company culture.
Moreover, they are ready to deliver exceptional results on time for your business.
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Saves your cost
Staff augmented outsourcing is cost-effective for organizations that need personnel for a few weeks or some time.
If you go for hiring a full-time employee, it costs more in terms of recruitment, salaries, and other overheads such as office space, hardware, and other expenses.
As per Glassdoor, the cost of hiring an employee in the US is $4000 and 24 days. A staff augmentation model lets you work on your development projects at a reduced cost.
This engagement model is the best fit for small or medium-sized businesses as they want to supplement their existing team and don’t have an adequate budget for full-time hiring.
This way, you can boost the productivity of your workforce and gain access to world-class talent at a fraction of the cost.
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Gains better control over operations
In the case of project outsourcing, you’re not sure whether your project is going in the right hands or not.
You lose control over the project, and you can’t see what’s happening. With staff augmentation model, you can better manage your projects as you’re allocating a specific project to external vendors.
This way, you would be able to match the quality standards of the organization.
Those technical vendors will work with your existing staff, and the good thing is that you can choose to work with candidates who are the perfect fit for your project. Moreover, you can keep track of how your projects are running.
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Scale your development team
Staff augmentation is a perfect solution for your business when you need to scale up or down the workforce depending on your project requirements. More importantly, you do not have to incur additional costs in hiring full-time employees.
There are circumstances when businesses go through unexpected situations (project cycles, seasons, market trends), and you want to fill the skill gap immediately.
With this engagement model, organizations get complete flexibility to adjust their workforce, so they don’t need to spend hours recruiting and training employees.
Thus, you can save more and spend less as you are not engaged with employees who are not required for months.
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Faster time to market
In this hyper-competitive world where competitors are launching products faster than ever, being stuck in finding suitable candidates for your project can result in delays of weeks or even months.
With staff augmentation, you can quickly find skilled employees who can bring their fresh perspectives and work closely with your in-house team. Such a contribution results in faster delivery of products/services and increases market share/revenue.
Steps you should follow before choosing a staff augmentation partner
Here are the few steps you should follow to choose the best staff augmentation partner:
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Define your software development needs
Before hunting for a staff augmentation partner, be clear about a few things in advance, such as:
- Timeline and goal of your project
- How much funds you can allocate for software team augmentation
- Skills and expertise of developers you need for developing a project
- How many domain experts do you need to complete your project?
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Research about staff augmentation companies
After laying down project goals or objectives, it’s the right time for you to perform thorough research about partners who possess relevant expertise in the software development domain.
- Create a checklist of 15-20 companies who you think would be relevant for your project.
- Check out their website to get a quick overview of what they do and how they help others.
- Head over to their portfolio section to see what clients they served in the past and what results they brought for existing partners.
- Go through some online reviews and testimonials on reputable websites such as Clutch and Glassdoor to ensure whether they can deliver quality projects on time or not.
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Hop on an interview with them
Before signing a contract with a staff augmentation company, it’s better to conduct an interview with them.
This way you can assess how well they can communicate with you and if they are culturally fit for your organization or not.
4.Flexibility and scalability
Make sure to partner with a company that offers flexible engagement models to you, especially during times when there are changes in project fluctuations.
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Decide the pricing and budget
Here, you need to choose the partner that matches your budget. It’s not necessary to go with the cheapest option always. While choosing the staff augmentation company, ensure that they can add value to your business.
Endnotes
A staff augmentation partner is all you need to stay competitive and become successful in your industry.
Outsourcing an augmented software team provides you with various benefits, such as saving costs, giving you better control over operations, and access to qualified IT professionals.
IT staff augmentation holds a bright future in the coming years.
A data report from Grandview Research states that the market size of global IT augmentation is expected to be $142.7 billion USD in 2028.
Thus, Staff augmented outsourcing makes it easier for businesses to get support from certified IT professionals and achieve their business goals effectively.