Staff augmentation for software development: driving business success

Felipe Farias

May 3, 2023

How can businesses keep up with the fast-paced transformations in technology? Even more, how can they do it without compromising quality? Is it still feasible to rely on an in-house IT team to research, adopt, and develop software?

Unfortunately, it’s not. According to Wellingtone’s annual report on the state of project management, 52% of CTOs are somewhat or very dissatisfied with the current level of Project Management maturity within their companies.

In this competitive landscape, staff augmentation for software development has emerged as a strategic solution. By integrating dedicated development talent into your existing structure, you can scale your engineering team on demand, maintain control over your projects, and keep pace with emerging technologies without overwhelming your internal resources.

In this comprehensive guide, we'll explore how engineering team augmentation enables scaling development teams efficiently and helps you deliver high-quality software faster.

Staff augmentation explained: understanding the dedicated development team model

Essentially, a dedicated development team is a form of IT outsourcing, also called IT staffing. In this model, an external product squad works with your in-house team, helping them get things done and overcome any roadblocks in the development process.

The word "dedicated" means that the outsourcing company will assemble a team of skilled professionals that will be dedicated exclusively to your business. This means its members will work only for your company and on the project they were assigned for.

The flexibility and scope for customization enhance the appeal of working with dedicated development teams. This is because it can be adapted to suit your unique needs and business structure.

In other words, the team is customized to fit your project’s requirements so it can adapt should unexpected setbacks arise or should the demands shift within the project.

Outsourcing vs. Staff Augmentation: Understanding the Difference

While traditional outsourcing and staff augmentation might seem similar, they operate on fundamentally different principles.

With outsourcing, you delegate entire projects to an external team that works independently. You receive the final product but have limited visibility into the day-to-day development process.

With staff augmentation, you integrate external talent into your existing workflow. These professionals work under your direction, following your methodologies and collaborating directly with your in-house team. This approach gives you greater control over quality standards, development practices, and project timelines.

Understanding this key distinction in the outsourcing vs. staff augmentation debate helps CTOs make more informed decisions about their development strategy.

Scaling development teams: the optimal structure of dedicated engineering teams

As we mentioned, each dedicated development team is built according to the unique needs of a project. Yet, there are some common functions you can have access to when hiring an outsourcing company, such as:

Software engineers;
Business analysts;
UX/UI designers;
Project managers;
QA engineers.

It’s important to note that the professionals chosen will match your project’s needs. This means that the dedicated development team will have professionals who are experienced in the specific skills necessary to fix your team's quality gaps.

But don’t worry! We’ll explain to you how the team is put together later in the article. Now you’ll discover which role each of these professionals plays in the team.

Software engineers - They are the ones who take the lead in building, updating, or restructuring the software or the web development project. There are many kinds of software developers, so it’s important to find the ones whose expertise matches the tasks at hand;
UX/UI designers - They are responsible for designing the user experience and the user interface of the website or mobile app. In order to achieve excellence, they do market research and run tests with users;
Business analysts - They are responsible for making sure that the project is aligned with your company or startup’s goals and that it’s financially viable. In order to do this, one of their usual tasks is creating detailed specifications guiding the solution’s development process.
Project managers - They oversee the project as a whole. In order to do that, they’re responsible for monitoring and communicating its progress and ensuring it is completed on time;
QA engineers - Their main priority is ensuring the quality of the project. In order to achieve excellence, they create and execute test scenarios, identify and report bugs, and make sure that the product complies with industry standards and regulations.

Before starting: critical considerations for engineering team augmentation

Engineering team augmentation can help you complete your development process and bring your product to market faster by strategically adding valuable technical talent to your existing team.

But to do that, the dedicated team should have an accurate view of your project's current state. So, before hiring a partner, there are some questions you should answer, such as:

What resources will be necessary? And what resources are available for this project?
Which skills do I need on the team? How many professionals are necessary? Is it possible that I might need to add more people to the team during the course of the project?
What do I need in order to make sure that I have all the resources and the people I need to successfully complete this project?
What is the scope of the project? What will be its workload? What is its main goal? For example, in a web development project, it would be to build a website or a web application.
What’s the final deadline for this project? What are its stages and what’s the deadline for each stage?
What is the budget for this project? Is it flexible? And, if so, what’s its limit?
What is your preferred development methodology?
Now that you know what a dedicated development team is and what its ideal structure is, you’ll discover how to hire the best outsourcing partner.

High-performance software teams: how the staff augmentation process works

Engineering team augmentation begins with finding the right partner who understands your technical requirements and company culture. The relationship between your company and the augmentation provider must be collaborative, with both parties aligned on expectations and outcomes.

When implementing engineering team augmentation, you'll first need to communicate your specific technical requirements, project scope, and team dynamics to your provider. Based on this information, they'll assemble candidates with the specialized skills your project demands. The success of the project depends on you being on the same page.

That’s why Vinta has assembled a team of elite software developers that act as consultants for your projects. We’re specialists, but at the same time, we’re not afraid to push ourselves and try new things. This way, we can help you do the same for your company.

Once you have matched with your provider, you’ll need to inform them of everything that you need from the dedicated engineering team. Then, they will assemble candidates who fulfill your requirements. After they’ve all been interviewed and the parties have reached an agreement on management-related issues such as the schedule, the team is ready to start.

This process takes much less time than the usual hiring processes, and more people can be added or removed if necessary promptly. In addition, since your company will pay for the provider’s service only, the expenses for hiring or firing a member of the staff are the provider's responsibility.

However, you’ll still maintain complete control over the dedicated development team. You’ll be able to assign tasks and deadlines and evaluate the team’s work in meetings. No change or variation will be applied to the project without your knowledge.

In addition, since you’ll be kept in the loop, it’ll be much easier to know exactly what you're paying for. So the project’s cost becomes clearer and the budget becomes more trackable.

Outsourcing vs. staff augmentation: 5 key benefits of dedicated development teams

Here are five ways staff augmentation for software development can enhance and accelerate your delivery process:

Assertive hiring

By hiring a dedicated engineering team, you unload yourself of operational tasks. This allows you to focus on project management and on developing the administrative and financial aspects of your business.

And it doesn't stop there. The providers of dedicated development teams are responsible for all the processes related to recruiting, hiring, onboarding, and retaining talent, and managing their salaries and benefits.

Not only is the entire selection process faster than the traditional hiring of in-house employees because the providers are responsible for the training, but it also costs less. Their commitment only lasts as long as the project, so there's no need to restructure your company to accommodate new hires.

Better communication

Most of the dedicated development teams follow Agile methodology. This method demands transparent and ongoing communication between you and the team.

That means, should there be a need for a change, it'll be communicated quickly and not after one of the stages of the project or the entire project is completed. This avoids rework and misunderstandings that can cause a delay in the project.

Access to specialized skills

Instead of hiring a regular software vendor with fixed prices, hiring a dedicated engineering team means you'll hire a team that was customized to fit your project's scope and needs. That means their work will be much more assertive because the team will have a much deeper understanding of the project.

In addition, since the team will work full-time on your company or startup, you'll avoid the disadvantages of having a team that works on multiple projects at the same time, such as:

Knowledge gaps;
Misunderstandings;
Missed deadlines;
Quality gaps;
Missed innovation opportunities.

This customized approach creates high-performance software teams that can tackle complex challenges more effectively than generalist teams.

Flexibility

Staff augmentation for software development favors changes in deadlines or project scope without jeopardizing overall success.

Remember what we said about the constant communication between you and the team? That means any changes necessary won't be radical and will be incorporated into the project as it goes on.

The fact that the team has different kinds of experts available means that you have a small talent pool to use as needed, which makes changes be applied more smoothly. This flexibility is particularly valuable when scaling development teams to meet changing market demands or project requirements.

Faster time to market

Remember the question we asked at the beginning of the article? How can startups keep up with the fast-paced transformations in the technology world without compromising the quality of their technologies?

By implementing staff augmentation for software development to handle some or all of the work, months can be cut out of your development cycle. This way, you’ll be able to get your product out in the market in time for it to stand out among its competitors.

When to consider staff augmentation for software development

If you’re a leader at a rapidly growing startup or a well-established company, you know that only being an expert at the technical aspects of your business isn’t enough to ensure the company’s success.

And, if you’re too busy micromanaging your team or accumulating tasks, you might lose sight of what should be your focus: the core of your business and the strategic aspect of it. That’s why in the dedicated development team model, you’re still the project’s leader but you can focus on the big picture and delegate the more operational aspects of project management to your project managers.

But engineering team augmentation isn't limited to just filling staffing gaps. You should also consider it in the following situations:

When your budget is low - Engineering team augmentation is more cost-effective than maintaining a large in-house team or even hiring freelance specialists;
When you have a large or ongoing project with shifting requirements - Especially if it’s a long-term project that demands frequent updating but needs the quality to stay consistent;
When you need people with a specific set of skills - Is it possible to hire the professionals you need independently from one another? Yes. But there’s no guarantee that they’ll be effective as a team. The match between the members of the team also plays a big role in their selection, in order to make sure their collaboration brings excellent results;
When you need to improve and modernize old projects - You might not have the internal expertise necessary to make the changes so instead of hiring new people or training your in-house team, hiring a dedicated engineering team can bring about these changes faster and without demanding the restructuring of your company.

Conclusion

Considering the outsourcing vs. staff augmentation comparison we've discussed, it's clear that staff augmentation offers the best balance of control and flexibility for most development projects.

It may be the innovative and cost-effective solution you were looking for to keep up with the rapid changes in the technology world, improve your results, and run your projects in a more assertive way.