Three qualities make up a competent and dedicated project team: The right skills, experience, and passion to achieve the desired goals. However, finding a team with all these qualities is not an easy task. It is very challenging for employers to find people with their desired skillset in their respective domains.
To overcome this challenge, businesses have started moving towards IT staff augmentation. This is an outsourcing model where companies can hire qualified IT professionals with their desired skills and expertise. The augmented teams work remotely and integrate with the client’s in-house teams for better results. This way, employers can access advanced skills and fill their short-term or long-term IT staffing needs without stretching their budgets.
The article below discusses the key benefits and challenges of IT staff augmentation. Read this blog to make an informed choice about hiring skilled IT resources from a third party.
Let’s dive in!
What is IT Staff Augmentation?
IT staff augmentation is an outsourcing model that enables businesses across diverse sectors to expand their workforce quickly and efficiently. The technique facilitates companies in achieving their desired goals like reduced hiring costs and faster time to market. Besides, companies also hire employees from IT staff augmentation agencies to diminish the hassles of recruitment and gain industry-specific technical expertise.
Let’s understand this model with an example. Suppose you are the owner of a tech startup with a small team of talented IT professionals. Your marketing team has recently approached a high-value client who agrees to assign you a project that demands advanced skills and expertise.
However, your in-house team lacks these skills and cannot meet your client’s requirements. Since it is a short-term project, you cannot afford to hire full-time staff to fill this skills gap. At the same time, you want your business to grow and work with that client at any cost. So, how would you tackle this challenge?
The solution is IT staff augmentation because this strategy can fill your short-term IT staffing needs and help you gain your desired expertise. You can hire remote IT professionals with the right skillsets for a limited period and complete your project without any hassle. Once the project has been delivered, resume working with your in-house team. This way, you can expand your portfolio and increase your profitability without bearing the liabilities of full-time employees.
Key Benefits of IT Staff Augmentation
1. Faster Time-to-Market
The success of a business is determined by its ability to adapt to market changes and accelerate launches. In today’s highly competitive digital landscape, the requirements of IT projects keep changing with time. Hence, companies need to hire IT resources with diverse skill sets to achieve faster time-to-market and meet tight project deadlines.
IT staff augmentation eliminates the hassle to shortlist, interview, and selecting suitable candidates. Instead, employers can hire IT staff with their desired skills and expertise from a third-party recruitment agency on short notice. This way, businesses can access advanced competencies and release products or services quickly without compromising on project requirements.
2. Industry-specific Technical Experience
The skills and expertise of the workforce play a key role in corporate growth and development. IT companies require qualified IT resources with industry-specific technical experience to stay ahead of their competitors.
Hence, IT staff augmentation services facilitate businesses in hiring qualified IT staff with comprehensive experience in their domain. IT staffing agencies have a wide pool of talented resources with diverse skillsets ad expertise. Employers can hire remote IT teams to access advanced competencies and achieve their desired objectives.
3. Cost-efficiency
The third benefit of IT staff augmentation is that this model considerably reduces the costs related to staff hiring, training, and skills development. Instead of spending time and resources to find people with the right talent, companies can hire qualified resources from IT staff augmentation agencies.
Augmented teams don’t need advanced technical training from employers. Instead, companies can readily integrate them with their in-house teams and start working on projects right away. Moreover, employers can hire remote IT staff both on a short or long-term basis depending on their IT staffing needs.
As a result, businesses can cut down their hiring and operational costs and use that investment to explore further growth opportunities.
Challenges with IT Staff Augmentation
1. Vague Expectations
Integrating a remote team with in-house employees is very difficult. You have to maintain seamless communication to promote teamwork and collaboration. Besides, make sure you choose the right IT staff augmentation agency with all resources you need to achieve your desired goals.
However, most augmented IT teams have vague expectations with unclear goals. A lack of communication can result in negative long-term consequences on organizational growth. Moreover, the reputation and expertise of your outsourcing partner also play a key role. Working with an incompetent IT staff augmentation agency can result in poor quality and unnecessary project details.
2. Security Issues
In IT staff augmentation, companies allow third-party workers to access their database and system infrastructure. Augmented IT teams coordinate with in-house teams and use organizational systems to complete their assigned tasks.
While this cooperation is inevitable, it is very risky too. Remote workers can steal confidential information from a company’s database and misuse it without the employer’s consent. Similarly, the risk of cybersecurity breaches is also high while working with augmented resources.
Therefore, you have to be extremely careful while choosing your IT staff augmentation partner.
Final Words
IT staff augmentation is a proven technique that facilitates businesses in boosting their corporate growth and accessing advanced skills and expertise. Companies can hire talented IT resources from reliable IT staffing agencies and fill their short-term or long-term IT staffing needs.
Similarly, IT staff augmentation agencies have a wide pool of qualified IT professionals. You can hire remote IT professionals with your desired skills and achieve your business goals without stretching your budgets.
If you are looking for a reliable outsourcing partner, contact Khired Networks. As a leading IT staff augmentation agency, we provide companies with dedicated IT resources with industry-specific technical expertise. Our IT teams help businesses stay ahead of their competitors and achieve their desired goals while keeping their budgets in control