IT Staff Augmentation vs Outsourcing A Dedicated Team

Market dynamics changed today at an unprecedented level than have ever seen. Every organization now wants the best IT talents to upgrade their products. Meanwhile, expert IT skills become scarce while demand snowballed for them. In the growing uncertainty, outsourcing and staff augmentation emerge as viable solutions.

Both methods help organizations to respond quickly to the changing IT market. They don’t have to employ another full-time talent to incorporate new-tech tools into their products. But both models aren’t suitable for all situations. So, how do you find the perfect recipe for your company? Emphasoft staff augmentation service explains it in detail.

But before going into details, let’s understand the basics

What Is IT Staff Augmentation?

IT staff augmentation is when companies hire temporary developers to help in-house staff. Companies hire them for some time to fill certain skill gaps, experience, or workload missing in the company.

If a company wants a new solution, they’d need more hands on the deck to create such a project faster. Outside developers can complement their team. They help create the project, get paid hourly, and disperse after project completion.

With IT team augmentation, it’s easier to increase or reduce your staff based on needs. It also saves money on interviewing and hiring for a full-time role. Plus, you control your project, take the risk, and track milestone progress.

What Does Dedicated Team Outsourcing Mean?

When you partner with a remote software development company to build solutions, then you’re outsourcing. You sign a contract, pay them and they will help you build the product

Outsourcing gives you a a wide pool of professionals that’d get the job done for you. They may include UI/UX designers, QA testers, project managers, software developers, and lots more.

Meanwhile, signing a contract means you’ve ceded the whole development process to them. They assign top professionals for your project. They set milestones, complete them and give you updates. They take the risks too. By the deadline, you get your final product.

IT Team Augmentation vs Outsourcing To A Dedicated Team?

Neither is the go-to development recipe for your business. Only what your company wants would determine whether you employ temporary staff or outsource to a development team. Regardless, let’s analyze their use cases and which one to use when.

Project Kick-Off And Time To Market

Project launch date gets more important when competitors are also creating a similar solution. To attract the first set of customers, which method affords you a shorter time to market?

Software development team augmentation allows you to kick off project development faster. You set the project pace and have a special team dedicated to the task. Thus, making the project progress considerably faster. In no time, you launch your solution and build customers.

Outsourcing could drag on. Because software vendors would be working on other projects. They’d have to share time and attention between various projects. Thus crippling the probability of an earlier launch date.

Meanwhile, a company may not know the profile of augmented technical skills it wants. In such cases, hiring drags on as team augmentation services try to find the right profile in the market. Making the project kick-off late. But outsourcing can’t face such problems. Right away, experienced outsourcing vendor would determine the right skills needed for each task. Then, they delegate their workers accordingly.

Costs

Both outsourcing and staff augmentation are less costly than hiring new in-house teams. Among the two, there isn’t a ground rule on which is more cost-effective.

In the staff augmentation model, you could employ staff on-site or remotely. When you hire physically, you have to bear costs for office spaces, gadgets and equipment, training, and lots more. Meanwhile, hiring remote workers doesn’t come with these expenses. You only have to pay hourly rates for work done.

Outsourced vendors also take care of expenses for developers. Whether they have developers onsite or remote also affects what they spend when building your software. Which in turn influences the price quote mentioned in the contract.

What your project entails would determine what is more cost-effective. Overall, it is easier to save resources with staff augmentation by creating low-end solutions.

Project Responsibilities And Risk

When you hire temporary developers outside, your in-house CTO or project manager still coordinates the project. They set sprints and completion deadlines and report project progress to you. As such, you bear the risk and liabilities that accompanies the project.

But outsourcing gives you other options. The model ensures that you relinquish your power over project management. As a client, you’re only interested in getting the final product, not how it’s done. Thus, you carry no risk or liabilities.  The vendor shoulders any cost of project failure.

While IT team augmentation offers you more control, outsourcing is less risky.

After-Development Maintenance and Support

When you outsource to a software vendor, you have access to lots of after services. You’d have a trust relationship that makes them your go-to software partner for maintenance.

Such a vendor also knows the specifics, strengths, and weaknesses of your solution. Thus, they’re better placed to provide constant support and maintenance for your software. They can also attend to needed product upgrades better. You build a nice working relationship over the long term.

Software team augmentation falls short in this aspect. A team augmentation company gives you the workers you need. Most times, your working relationship ends once they’ve developed your product. All you get from them is knowledge transfer. You’d have to rely on another source of maintenance, whether from existing IT personnel or software development companies.

What Do I Choose; IT Team Augmentation Or Outsourcing To A Dedicated Team

It’s pretty easy to get torn between using outsourcing or software team augmentation. Both have their pros and cons. You’d not want to use the wrong model for your project. Would you?

When To Use Staff augmentation

• You already have a project underway. But you need a missing skillset to fill in some gaps
• There is a sudden increase of needed developers in an underway project.
• You want to build a small or low-end solution on a limited budget
• You want to complete a project as fast as possible
• You already have an existing team for such a project (Which lacks only a few skill sets)
• You want to retain absolute control over the project.

When To Outsource To a Dedicated team

• You lack critical in-house IT experts or resources to develop the project
• The project is complex and has a very wide scope. It consists of many sub-projects.
• You aren’t fussed about taking absolute control over the project
• You’re ready to delegate support and maintenance to an IT vendor.

Emphasoft makes sure you don’t run out of developers at your service. The company can take up your software projects or get you, top professionals, to augment your staff, near and offshore. Start your software journey now with Emphasoft.