When you assemble your IT team, you do so based on knowledge about current and likely future company needs. However, those parameters can change at any time. For example, say your company gets a large new client, resulting in much more work than your present team can handle. Or, say an existing client suddenly needs much more output. In these cases, hiring enough new IT staffers in time to meet your deadlines can be challenging – if not impossible.
In these cases, you might want to consider IT staff augmentation from an IT staffing company like BairesDev. IT staffing companies have on-demand IT specialists who are highly trained with the technical and soft skills required to make all your projects successful. Rather than performing an extensive search for just the right people, you can submit your request and quickly have the expertise you need.
But you may ask, how will these professionals fit in with my current team? How much money will I end up spending? Will I still have control over my projects? How can I be sure this approach is right for my situation? Here we explain a bit more about what IT staff augmentation actually is, how to know when you might need it, and how it can benefit your company and your projects.
What Is IT Staff Augmentation?
IT staff augmentation is the process of adding external help to your existing IT team. Typically you work with a staff augmentation agency, which hires and trains IT professionals, then sends them out for various assignments. This strategy is useful when you need specific skills that your current team members don’t have, when your project load suddenly increases, or when you want to work with potential team members before you hire them permanently.
Your Company May Need IT Staff Augmentation If…
Not sure if IT staff augmentation is right for your team? If the following descriptions align with your situation, this approach is something to look into.
#1 You’re Looking for Cost-Effective IT Services
You may think hiring external IT support to join your team would be more expensive than hiring professionals directly. But that’s not always the case. Consider the time and money you save by avoiding the traditional hiring process. You also save once the new team members are on board because you’re not paying for full-time salaries, benefits, or training. Plus, you only pay for these services when you need them.
Additionally, IT staff augmentation is often provided at a consistent cost, so you can manage your budget more effectively than when you have many employees coming and going.
#2 You Need to Quickly Expand Your Team
If your company is looking to grow quickly, you might get more than you bargained for if a great client with many demands comes along. In such cases, you may not have enough time to find new staffers to add to your existing IT team, as talent searches involve creating job postings, interviewing candidates, and onboarding new employees, all of which can be highly time-consuming.
IT staff augmentation is the perfect solution here, as it allows you to quickly expand your team and get expert assistance that will contribute to the success of your new partnership. You may even find that you’d like some of the new team members to stay on as permanent staff. Many IT staff augmentation services enable you to hire their team members after they’ve been a part of the augmented team.
This strategy is also helpful for when you have one or more IT team members out of the office for an extended period. You can hire one or more temporary team members to step in just for that time, without the hassle of traditional hiring and firing.
#3 You Need to Quickly Contract Your Team
The opposite is true if you have a situation in which your workload decreases, meaning you get a high degree of flexibility, which can help you respond to the inevitable unknowns of your business environment. The augmentation agency will take care of the offboarding process, and there will be no hard feelings among staffers who know their position could be eliminated at any time.
#4 You Need High Project Visibility
IT staff working for augmentation services are trained not only in technical skills but also in project management and communication. That means they’re fully able to keep you informed of every aspect of the project that they’re responsible for. They understand the latest communication tools and methods as well as the importance of using them.
#5 You Need a Specific Skill Set
Perhaps your company has taken on a project that requires skills your in-house IT team doesn’t have. Finding the right person may be like searching for a needle in a haystack, and you might not have the time to perform an extensive search. But an IT staff augmentation service could have just the talent you need, even if that specific skill is rare in your region. In fact, many companies use foreign outsourcing agencies specifically for this reason.
You Want to Maintain Control Over Your Project
When you hire an entire external IT team to take over a project, you may lose control over certain aspects of it. It might even be required to send the entire project to a different country, where legal challenges could prove difficult should something go wrong. When you augment your existing team, you keep the project in-house and onsite, and maintain 100% control.
This benefit is particularly useful when you’re developing a new product or service. You want to make sure every detail is within your influence to create the best possible outcome.
You Want to Minimize Risk
Say your company gains a large new client on a trial basis requiring an immediate increase in the amount of work needed from your IT team. If you hire enough new people to supplement your team to perform this work, you’re taking a risk that this client will stick around. If they don’t, you need to lay off all those new workers. When you use IT staff augmentation, you minimize such risks because, when the unexpected happens, you can simply let the augmented staff go.
