There is a lot of debate about what is staff augmentation, its types, and how it differs from outsourcing. One thing is definite in this entire discussion. You need staff augmentation, and yes, there is no other way around it. You have to extend your team, add more resources, and augment IT talent for the benefit of your company and there is no denying it. Staff augmentation is augmenting or increasing the in-house resources by adding new (contractual) team members. The exercise requires evaluation and assessment of the existing team strength, capability, skills, in-house resources, and talent pool available. It gives a complete idea of where the company stands in its capabilities and strengths and where it needs to go from this point. Staff or resource fulfillment strategy works wonders for every company and allows them to hire more employees.
There is undoubtedly a shortage of skilled labor when it comes to IT specifically. Skilled employees are tough to find because:
- Very rarely do you find a good combination of skill, talent, experience, and credibility
- They are too expensive for the company to afford on a full-term basis
Staff augmentation makes things easier by accelerating the hiring process and bringing the best resources on a contractual basis. The temporary hiring cuts down the cost and ensures the availability of ideal resources whenever needed. When should you go for resource or staff augmentation to extend your team?
Many companies want to expand their IT resources and talent but are not sure if the model or strategy would work for them. We have outlined a few situations and checklists which will explain when you should augment your resources:
- When you want to extend the strength and capabilities of your in-house development team and resources under a fixed budget and constraints
- If permanent hiring is not the solution any longer because of talent, experience, and money shortage
- When you want to hire overseas people or offshore talent to cut-down costs
- If you are looking to build a remote team and promote remote culture
- When you want an experienced developer with disruptive technology knowledge and expertise under limited finances.
Reasons and conditions to opt for staff augmenting strategy
Under the following conditions and reasons, a company should go for fulfillment of resources on temporary basis.
Reason #1. Meet Deadlines
Often companies increase their resources and in-house strength when a project deadline is nearing, the required talent is missing. To compensate for the lack of developers and experts, augmentation techniques work ideally.
Reason #2. Acquire skill flexibility
Often a tech company is dealing with multiple projects simultaneously. These projects require different specializations and expertise. A company requires skill flexibility in this situation to facilitate the demand for skills. It has to address the need dynamically and strategically.
Reason #3. Free-up resources for other core functionalities
You could be faced with a chaotic condition where you require new resources to add innovation to your project. But at the same time, you lack developers to look after coding and programming.
