Blog/Outsourcing
Staff Augmentation vs Dedicated Teams| Outsourcing Models
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Praise Iwuh
June 09, 2023
Outsourcing models are fast becoming a recent trend today. This is because it helps companies to reduce costs while delegating specific tasks to expert third-party providers instead of handling them in-house.
However, do you know that outsourcing is not the only option businesses have when managing their IT needs? They could also decide to hire a dedicated team or augment their staff. Although, this will depend on their business strategy or needs.
For instance, staff augmentation is ideal for short-term projects or specific skill gaps that can be filled by experts who will work alongside your in-house team. In contrast, dedicated teams are ideal for long-term and complex projects.
This article will help you understand both outsourcing models. We will also give scenarios to help you make a more informed decision on which strategy to use for your IT business needs.
What you will learn:
What is staff Augmentation?
Benefits of Staff Augmentation
Limitation of Staff Augmentation
When to use Staff Augmentation
What does a dedicated team mean?
Benefits of Dedicated Teams
Limitations of Dedicated Teams
When to Use Dedicated Teams
Staff Augmentation vs Dedicated Teams. Is there a difference?
What is Staff Augmentation?
Staff augmentation is the use of temporary workers to fill organisational skill gaps. It is a situation where a business hires outside workers to supplement its employees.
Staff augmentation is often done to avoid depending only on the organisation's staff and to swiftly hire workers with specialised knowledge or abilities to finish a particular job.
For example, imagine you have a small IT department in your company, but you have a big project coming up that requires more technical expertise. Instead of hiring new full-time employees, you can bring in skilled professionals from outside to work with your team on that project. They join your team for a limited time, bring their specialised skills, and help you do the job effectively. Once the project is completed, they return to their companies or other assignments.
Staff augmentation is a versatile and effective technique to handle immediate demands and fill skill gaps without making long-term commitments.
Benefits of Staff Augmentation
Staff augmentation offers several benefits to businesses seeking to manage their IT needs. These advantages include:
1. Specialised expertise
Augmented workers often have specific expertise and skills that may not be found within the organisation. As a result, businesses may access individuals with specialised experience in areas such as cybersecurity, data analysis, or digital marketing.
For example, a social media specialist can be added to a marketing agency's staff to strengthen their expertise.
2. Flexibility
Staff augmentation provides flexibility by allowing companies to scale their workforce up or down as needed quickly. For instance, if a retail company experiences a seasonal spike in customer demand, it can augment its customer service team with temporary staff to handle the increased workload.
3. Cost savings
Employing full-time workers entails extra expenses for factors like equipment, benefits, and training. However, by temporarily bringing in outside experts, staff augmentation enables businesses to save expenditures. For example, a software development company can hire freelance developers for a specific project instead of hiring full-time employees.
4. Minimalised risk
Compared to traditional recruiting, there is less risk when using staff augmentation. For instance, you can retain control of the project without making any long-term commitments because you will not be in charge of continuous training or employee retention.
Limitation of Staff Augmentation
1. Not ideal for long-term commitments
Since temporary employees comprise most augmented staff, they might not be as devoted to or invested in the company's long-term objectives. For instance, temporary workers added to a retail store's promotional team over the holiday season might not be as committed or motivated as full-time staff.
2. Dependency on external resources
If staff augmentation is used frequently, it may lead to a reliance on outside resources. Also, operational issues for the organisation could arise if the availability of enhanced workers is restricted or their costs rise dramatically.
For example, if a marketing firm depends mainly on independent authors for its content development, unforeseen challenges with availability or rising fees may interfere with its capacity to provide quality material.
3. Security risks
The security risks of letting strangers access your internal systems and data are a significant drawback of staff augmentation. This is especially true if you are working with a remote team because there might not be any security measures to protect your information physically or technologically.
4. High turnover
High turnover is another major disadvantage of staff augmentation. After completing a project, contractors frequently leave the company, leaving organisations without the continuity of a permanent crew. This means businesses must continually look for new contractors and educate them about cutting-edge procedures and technologies.
5. Potential communication gaps
Due to their temporary status and unfamiliarity with the company's systems and processes, augmented workers may experience communication difficulties. As a result, there may be misunderstandings or a lack of clarity, resulting in inefficiencies and potential mistakes. For instance, poor communication about quality standards could result in inferior goods if a manufacturing company adds temporary workers to their production team.
When to use Staff Augmentation
There are a few essential factors to consider when considering staff augmentation. They include:
1. Project timeframe
Staff augmentation is viable if your project is short-term and has an established commencement and completion date. It enables you to hire additional staff for the project's duration rather than committing to a long-term position.
2. Expertise or skill gaps
If your team lacks the particular knowledge or experience you need, you need to consider employee augmentation. It allows you to fill skill gaps quickly and efficiently without investing in extensive training or hiring full-time employees.
3. Cost
Since you do not have to pay for the full-time salary of new employees, staff augmentation services can also help you save money. Also, it can be more cost-effective for firms to choose staff augmentation because the hourly rates are often lower than those for full-time hires.
4. Time constraints
Staff augmentation can help you quickly onboard additional workers to fulfil project deadlines or respond to unexpected market demands. In addition, it saves time compared to the traditional hiring process, which can be lengthy and involve multiple rounds of interviews and evaluations.
5. Scalability
Staff augmentation allows you to scale your personnel up or down as necessary if your workload varies or sees frequent spikes. You can quickly bring in extra hands during busy periods and release them when the workload decreases.
What Does a Dedicated Team Mean?
A dedicated team refers to a group of professionals who work exclusively on a specific project or for a specific client. They are fully dedicated to that project or client and often operate as an extension of the client's company. Another name for a dedicated team is an "extended team" or "dedicated development team."
A dedicated team is often ideal for long-term projects because it provides continuity and consistency throughout the project's duration. With a dedicated team, you have a stable group of professionals who are fully committed to the project from start to finish. They develop an in-depth understanding of the project's intricacies, business requirements, and technical aspects, which leads to improved collaboration, efficient decision-making, and seamless execution. This long-term partnership fosters trust, allows for better knowledge sharing, and enables the team to adapt and evolve, resulting in successful project outcomes.
Benefits of Dedicated Teams
1. Long-term commitment
Dedicated teams comprise fully dedicated employees to the project regardless of duration. They get committed to the project's success and are driven to produce the most remarkable outcomes due to their long-term commitment, which develops a sense of ownership and accountability.
For instance, a construction company undertaking a large-scale infrastructure project may assemble a dedicated team of civil engineers, architects, and project managers. This team remains dedicated throughout the project's duration, ensuring consistent progress, adherence to timelines, and accountability for the project's success.
2. Project customisation
Dedicated teams can modify their procedures and approaches to fit the customer's or project's unique requirements and preferences. This adaptability enables project customisation, ensuring that the team's work is closely in line with the goals and needs of the client.
3. Deep expertise
Professionals with specific knowledge and project-related experience make up dedicated teams. Their specialised knowledge enables better technical competency and problem-solving skills, resulting in outstanding solutions.
4. Knowledge retention
Dedicated teams gather priceless project insights, subject knowledge, and best practices throughout an extended project. This knowledge retention benefits the client as the team can provide ongoing support, address maintenance needs, and offer guidance beyond the project's completion.
5. Scalability
Dedicated teams are well-equipped to deal with adjustments, difficulties, and project expansion. In addition, they offer flexibility to meet the project's demands since they can quickly adjust to changing project requirements, allow scope changes, and scale their resources as necessary.
Limitations of Dedicated Teams
1. Higher cost
Costs may be higher using dedicated teams due to their speciality and exclusivity than other methods. In addition, team members' rates may be greater than non-dedicated personnel because they focus entirely on a single project or client. For instance, a software development company may incur more costs for a client's custom software project due to a dedicated team's specific skills and extended dedication.
2. Limited flexibility and scalability
Dedicated teams are created to concentrate on specific clients or projects, which can limit their ability to transition to other tasks or adjust to shifting priorities. For example, a dedicated design team assigned to a long-term website redesign project may struggle to accommodate urgent design requests for other projects within the organisation.
3. Reduced diversity of expertise
Teams wholly committed to a single project or client may be less exposed to external concepts, business trends, and various viewpoints. This may impede innovative thinking and inventive problem-solving. For example, a dedicated research team within a pharmaceutical company might benefit from occasional collaboration with external researchers or experts from different fields to bring fresh insights to their projects.
4. Risk of knowledge concentration
There could be a risk of dependency and a lack of knowledge transfer within the organisation if a committed team is the only one with crucial project information and experience. Due to this, it may not be easy to sustain the project over time or transfer it to other teams.
5. Limited exposure to market dynamics
Teams with a solid commitment to a single project or client could be less exposed to the more significant market dynamics and changing business trends. This can result in a mismatch between the project's outcomes and the market's shifting demands.
When to Use Dedicated Teams
Here are a few considerations that can help guide you on when to use dedicated teams:
1. Long-term projects
Dedicated teams are well-suited for long-term projects that require consistent effort and ongoing collaboration. If you have a project with an extended timeline, where continuity, in-depth knowledge, and commitment are crucial, a dedicated team can provide stability and focus.
2. High collaboration and coordination needs
A dedicated staff can guarantee smooth communication and collaboration if your project calls for close teamwork, coordination, and collaboration.
3. Complex and specialised projects
A committed team with the necessary knowledge and experience could prove helpful when a project calls for complex specifications or requires specialist knowledge. This is because the specialised skills and domain knowledge committed teams to bring to projects benefit those requiring a thorough understanding of particular technologies, industries, or domains.
4. Resource availability and allocation
Dedicated teams ensure that resources that are entirely focused on your project are always available. This can be helpful when resources are limited or require a dependable staff dedicated to your project's success.
Additionally, dedicated teams provide stability by reducing resource disputes and maximising resource allocation.
5. Customised solutions and tailored needs
Dedicated teams are advantageous for projects that call for customisation and customised solutions. These groups can carefully match their methods, procedures, and resources to the particular demands of your project. Furthermore, they collaborate directly with you to learn about your objectives and create solutions tailored to your requirements.
Staff Augmentation vs Dedicated Teams. Is there a difference?
Staff augmentation is not the same as dedicated teams. The significant difference between staff augmentation and dedicated teams is that staff augmentation entails primarily adding external resources to complement an existing team. In contrast, team dedication refers to forming a specialised team exclusively focused on a specific project or client for a more prolonged duration.
The difference is in the degree of integration and commitment: team dedication offers a more substantial and long-term relationship than staff augmentation, which is more adaptable and transient.
IT Project Outsourcing
IT Project Outsourcing is the act of assigning particular IT projects or activities to third-party service providers. Most times, organisations hire external expertise or firms to perform projects on their behalf rather than managing them internally due to the number of benefits of IT Outsourcing.
These benefits include increased flexibility, lower costs, and access to specialist talents.
For example, a business can contract with an outside IT services provider to design a custom software application. In this case, the external provider would handle requirements gathering, software design, coding, testing, and deployment tasks.
The company can also benefit from the outsourced team's expertise and experience while reducing the need to hire and maintain an in-house development team.
Why Choose Wazobia Technologies as your Software Development Partner?
Wazobia Technologies is a Software Development Agency specialising in custom software products and operations. We provide engineering solutions to help solve business needs for our clients, ranging from small and medium-sized enterprises to multinationals.
Our creative hub boasts a strong presence across the UK, Kenya, and Nigeria, as a reliable partner for end-to-end product development, software consultancy, business analysis, quality assurance, and maintenance projects of all sizes, scales, and complexities.
Wazobia Technology also provides intelligent solutions in most modern software technologies, such as DevOps, Cloud, and resource augmentation. In addition, all our operations are scalable and sustainable, so you can continuously add features and upgrade as required because we tailor them to fit the specific needs of each business and meet any budget.
Wazobia technologies stands out because we are customer-centric and we are proficient at mitigating problems of outsourcing software development. This means your satisfaction is our top priority. We also take great pride in effective communication, efficiency, and transparency. In addition, we use an agile methodology, so you are always in the loop at every stage of the development process.
Find out more about how Wazobia Tech can be of service to you.
Conclusion
Exploring various outsourcing methods, such as staff augmentation and dedicated teams, gives businesses helpful choices to improve resource management and project execution.
With staff augmentation, you can solve team skill shortages, add temporary external resources to boost capacity on a project-by-project basis and complement existing teams. On the other hand, dedicated teams offer a focused and undivided devotion to a particular project or customer, encouraging long-term collaboration, in-depth subject-matter expertise, and seamless integration into the company.
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