Through five essential questions learn what you must know about your future IT outstaffing partner in order to understand if it is, in fact, the best option for your project.
IT outsourcing is the practice of hiring services outside of a company to handle IT-related parts of the business. If we’re talking about outsourcing IT professionals to work directly with you, we can also call it IT outstaffing.
So far so good?
… or would you like to read more about IT-specific terms? We wrote a Professional IT Services Glossary which could be useful to take a look at before reading on.
Why do you need an IT outstaffing partner?
Most companies in the twenty-first century rely on some sort of technology to operate smoothly and efficiently.
So even if you run a small business or a startup, you might find useful some of the advantages IT outstaffing offers:
Access to experienced professionals
Because you’re outsourcing just for a limited period of time, and just for a specific project, your budget will allow you to access more experienced professionals that otherwise, you wouldn’t be able to hire.
Moreover, consultants change projects from time to time, which means, not only do they have several previous experiences with different clients, they might as well have it with projects similar to yours. Which can definitely make things go faster!
Improve your knowledge pool
When you hire a developer, you get the knowledge and experience of a single person, but when you outsource, you gain access to a whole network!
So if your consultant is not sure about some technical detail of the code, instead of asking Reddit, they can ask the other consultants of your outsourcing partner.
That’s because consultants of the same outsourcing firm support and help each other – but they do it without revealing any confidential information about your project, of course!
Payment terms are easier to meet
When you hire someone for your team, the expectation is that you pay them the salary at the end of the month. In outsourcing, developers get paid by the outsourcing firm. Meaning that you’ll have extra time to pay (most likely a few weeks!) because you’re doing it to the outsourcing firm instead of the developer directly. And so, the payment deadline will depend on your agreement with the outsourcing company.
If you run a business, then you know that having some extra time to pay salaries is a big deal, especially if you run a cash flow intensive business!
Contractual flexibility
If you no longer need a developer placed on your project – regardless of the reasons – you simply need to communicate it to your outstaffing partner. You should do it a few weeks in advance, but the exact amount of time depends on what you previously agreed with the outsourcing company.
You won’t need to pay the developers any compensation and you don’t need to feel guilty, as they’re not going to be unemployed – your oustaffing partner will find them another project.
Therefore, if you’re outsourcing, dismissing someone becomes much easier – which can be a very welcomed advantage in times of economic or health crisis, in which boards are sometimes obliged to unexpectedly cut costs.
Outstaffing allows you to spend more time on the tasks that matter
Because of all these mentioned advantages, you’ll have more time to actually focus on the business goals of your company.
Does it sound like just what you need? ????
But here’s the difficult part: there are so many firms providing this service, how can you understand which one is better for your business?
We give you a little help: pre-select a few companies and try to find the answer to these 5 questions.
How to choose an outstaffing partner?
Make sure you know the answer to these 5 questions before signing anything.
1 – Which technologies does the outstaffing partner work with?
Make sure the outsourcing partner you choose actually works with the technology you need.
Remember that not always the best partner for one project is the best for another: just because provider A got you the best front-enders, doesn’t mean they’re the ones that will get you top Data Analysts.
2 – How good is your outstaffing partner in caring about their people?
An outsaffing firm that provides regular and specialized coaching moments to their consultants can realize when something is going on with a consultant before it actually becomes a problem. And so avoid it, or at least, be prepared with solutions if something happens.
Not all outstaffing firms have the same level of involvement so it’s important that you ask how regular the assistance is and who will be coaching your consultant: is it the same account manager who talks to you or is it a specialized professional whose occupation is exclusively to support the consultants?
Remember, where focus goes, energy flows, so it’s key that your partner has people doing ONLY that!
3 – What if a developer needs to be replaced?
Consider that the earliest your oustaffing firm knows about the consultant’s intentions to leave, the earliest they can start looking for a replacement.
So that’s why the assistance to the consultants is so important: if well done, it assures there won’t be any surprises. If your developer wants to leave, your oustaffing partner should be able to know ahead of time and inform you ASAP.
Moreover, do you know the expression “no news good news”? Well, in this case, if you don’t get updates on what’s going on with your consultant regularly, then maybe your provider is trying to hide something from you. Or maybe they don’t even know what’s going on with your consultant. ????♀️
4 – What’s the outstaffing partner speciality?
Some oustaffing firms are specialized in one area. Others operate in more than one.
Consider that it’s hard to be an expert in dozens of areas/ technologies. So if an outstaffing firm claims to be an expert in lots of things, think twice… perhaps they are “jacks of all trades, masters of none”.
5 – What’s the outstaffing partner’s location?
The location of the outstaffing firm is of great importance because it’s probably where your future developers will be working from.
If you’re considering outsourcing for your tech team you’re most likely already considering your staff to be working from different time zones (if not, check our article 7 Reasons to Keep your Development Team in Remote Work After the Pandemic because it might change your mind!).
But maybe a time difference of just 1 or 2 hours, so you can still keep some real-time communication.
Choosing to work with an outstaffing company in Portugal is especially attractive because the country has the same timezone as the UK, and just one hour less than central Europe countries. Plus, Portugal has very good relationships with South American countries, such as Brazil, whose developers will happily move to Portugal to work for you. And because you are outsourcing, the outstaffing company should be able to take care of the VISA for you.
But just in case, ask about that too!
5 questions to help you choose an IT outstaffing partner: final thoughts
After understanding why working with an IT outstaffing partner can be just what your company needs, the five questions we just presented may help you assess which outstaffing company suits your business best.
If KWAN is one of your pre-selected outstaffing companies, we’re happy to give you our answers (and to any other question you might have!).
Fill in the form and let’s schedule a call. ☎
