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IT team extension or IT team augmentation, means a strategy of incorporating and engaging highly skilled software specialists into the in-house software development team to add more value to specific software projects. External expertise within an extended IT team model helps reinforce the internal staff when it lacks particular skills in software development to accomplish complex and intensive roadmaps.
IT Team Augmentation Model in Software Development: Key Benefits
- Flexibility and scalability: Team extension allows for flexibility in scaling the software development team based on project requirements and roadmap. It enables rapid expansion of the team size, depending on the project’s needs, without the long-term process of recruitment.
- Expertise: The primary purpose of the team extension model is to bring in additional expertise or skills that may be lacking within the core team. This could include specialized technical knowledge, domain expertise, or experience with specific tools or frameworks.
- Cost-effectiveness: Hiring external software team members through the IT team augmentation model can be a cost-effective solution. It avoids the expenses associated with hiring, onboarding, and maintaining full-time employees. Additionally, the extended team members can be engaged for specific tasks or phases of a project, reducing costs further.
- Time savings: Building a team from scratch can be time-consuming. By leveraging an outsourcing partner’s pre-existing talent pool, the client can accelerate the team formation process and start development faster.
- Knowledge transfer and retention: While the IT team augmentation model brings external expertise, it’s essential to foster knowledge transfer to the core team. Documentation, code reviews, mentoring, and regular communication facilitate the transfer of knowledge and prevent silos between the extended and core teams.
- Mitigation of risks: The outsourcing partner shares responsibility for project success. They bring their experience, best practices, and quality assurance processes, reducing the risks associated with developing software solely in-house.
Team Extension Model or IT Team Augmentation Works in Software Outsourcing
- Identification of resource requirements: The client identifies the specific skill sets and expertise needed to augment their in-house team. This could include software developers, QA automation engineers, DevOps engineers, software architects, project owners, or any other roles required for the project.
- Selection of an outsourcing partner: The client selects an outsourcing partner based on their technical capabilities, experience, reputation, and cultural fit. The outsourcing provider should have a pool of qualified professionals who can seamlessly integrate with the client’s team.
- Integration and collaboration: The outsourcing partner’s team members join the client’s team and start working on the project. They become an extension of the client’s team, participating in regular meetings, using collaboration tools, and following the client’s development processes and methodologies, at the same time proactively proposing improvements.
- Communication and coordination: Effective communication channels are established to ensure smooth collaboration between the client’s team and the extended team. This includes regular meetings, video conferences, instant messaging platforms, and project management tools to facilitate coordination, progress tracking, and issue resolution.
- Management and supervision: The client’s team retains control and oversight over the project. The client sets the project goals, priorities, and milestones, ensuring that the extended team aligns with their objectives.
Cases When Companies Opt For IT Team Augmentation Services in Software Development
- The team lacks the expertise or skills for specific software development projects.
- The rates of local software developers seem to be too high.
- In-house specialists are currently working on some crucial tasks, and delegating specific development issues to external experts may help to deal with a non-typical-for-you project.
- Your project turned more complex, and you need extra software developers to speed up the product development process.
- Your team is small to meet the project deadlines.
- Best professionals within the set budget and time.
Overall, IT team augmentation services in software development is an effective approach to address resource gaps, enhance project capabilities, and manage workload fluctuations in software development. It offers the flexibility to adapt quickly to changing project needs while controlling costs and maintaining core team stability.
