Companies that develop software must remain agile to accommodate shifting expectations, assignments, and workloads. The best way to achieve flexibility is with options for adding team members when needed.
Bringing on additional employees is a good way to grow a cohesive team. But the cost of finding and onboarding new hires can be high. Additionally, if the workload decreases after the surge, you might have to let some team members go. Staff augmentation services solve these problems by taking over the hiring process and providing team members only for as long as needed. But this solution may not be robust enough for multifaceted, long-term projects.
A dedicated software team is the perfect solution for ongoing projects with shifting expectations. Such a team may be in-house or remote. Either way, you retain control over all their work. However, managing a dedicated software team takes skill. Wrong moves can cause problems with the work and waste time, money, and other resources. That’s why, in the following sections, we present a guide for managing a dedicated team the right way.
Why It’s Essential to Get It Right
The kinds of assignments that dedicated teams are best for — large projects or those with changing requirements — are also the ones that could cause major problems for your company if not done well. For example, delays in adding an essential new feature to an app could set production and time to market back, leading you to fall behind the competition and lose market share.
Working with an outsourced team provider like BairesDev addresses such issues by delivering a team that’s 100% trained and ready to work exclusively on your project. Team members are carefully vetted to ensure a group of professionals who will live up to your standards and achieve your goals as expected. We also provide solid management to ensure teams know the objectives they’re working toward and how they will contribute.
Managing a Dedicated Team the Right Way
As we will see in the sections below, managing dedicated software teams relies on some fundamental principles. They include seeing the big picture, ensuring team members know how they are contributing to that vision, trusting team members to use their skills to the project’s best advantage, and being available to provide guidance when needed. With the use of these concepts as the foundation for management, outsourced dedicated development teams can do their best work.
Dedicated Development Team Key Considerations
Companies thinking of hiring a dedicated development team should carefully weigh the following considerations.
- Nearshore vs. offshore: Offshore teams are highly cost-effective. However, language, culture, and time zone differences could cancel out the cost savings. Nearshore providers cost a little more but could prevent major headaches over time.
- Time zones: Software development requires that you have close contact with your teams. Those working in distant time zones may not be able to get to urgent requests until many hours or even days later.
- Language: An agency may hire English-speaking developers. But how good are those language skills? You should consider that small misunderstandings due to language issues could grow into major challenges.
- Culture: Culture can have a big impact on how teams work together. If you’re considering hiring an outsourced team, think about how these factors could impact productivity.
- Tools: For projects to be completed quickly and efficiently, ensure that the teams you hire are not only familiar with but proficient in the necessary development tools.
Once you have carefully considered all these factors and have a team in place, the next step is to ensure they are well managed.
Manage a Dedicated Software Development Team: Best Practices
A smooth-functioning software development team doesn’t just happen. It requires strong leadership from managers who follow best practices like those listed here.
#1 – Clearly Communicate Your Vision and Expectations
The most successful teams work well together because all members understand the high-level objectives and their roles in meeting them. But it’s the responsibility of the team leader to set those objectives and roles. For example, a manager might state that the end product should be a fully functioning app to help consumer users track the cost of commonly purchased products and services to see where inflation is taking the biggest bite out of their paycheck. The more specific the vision, the better.
Outsourced development teams, such as those provided by BairesDev, also respond well to knowing manager expectations along the way toward the end goal. For example, a manager might state milestone goals such as when the team should complete various phases of the project, how often to communicate with your company, how often to hold meetings, which development methodology to use, and so on.
Managers should communicate early and often, including at the start of the project and regularly throughout the project. The vision should be spelled out initially via in-person or online team meeting, as milestones approach, as milestones are passed, and any other time the team needs a course correction. Other communication methods include online announcements via email, intranet, Slack, or other communication tools the team uses.
Managers should welcome initial questions and make it easy for team members to contact them with additional inquiries later on. Project management tools should clarify how each person’s role will contribute to the final goal, giving each team member a sense of ownership of the final result.
#2 – Establish Reporting Guidelines
There are many differences between in-house and outsourced teams, including trust. With in-house teams, trust is baked in because the team is already part of company operations. With outsourced teams, trust must be developed and maintained because the team is outside the company and may even be in an entirely different region or country. One of the best ways to increase that trust is with regular reporting.
For software development projects, reporting guidelines must be established to keep you apprised of the team’s progress. Regular status reports give stakeholders insight into what elements of the project are on track, where the team might be stuck, whether deadlines are being met, where help is needed, and other important matters. Demonstrating consistent progress and being transparent about challenges are two methods that build trust with outsourced team members over time.
For everyone to get the most out of the process, reporting guidelines should be established. They may include how often reporting is completed, who will perform it, what sections or elements it should contain, who it is delivered to, and what follow-up actions should be taken.
Sections can include a summary of how the project is going, overviews of each part of the project, accomplishments to date, challenges and what’s being done to address them, timeline and budget updates, and expected next steps. To keep reports consistent, the same sections and formatting should be included each time. Report preparers can create a template to fill in each time they need to update the report.
#3 – Schedule One-on-Ones
Meetings that take place between a manager or team leader and a team member are known as one-on-ones. These meetings are different from group meetings where many team members are present and have the opportunity to be heard. These larger group meetings are beneficial for working through issues that impact the entire team. But one-on-ones are critical for helping each team member contribute their best to the project at hand.
According to Asana, “the 1:1 meeting is a place for coaching, mentorship, giving context, or even venting. The 1:1 goes beyond an open door policy and dedicates time on a regular cadence for teammates and leaders to connect and communicate.” For managers, this type of meeting might seem like just one more thing that will take up their valuable time. However, such meetings don’t need to be long. They can be as brief as 15 minutes, and they save time in the long run by ensuring each team member has what they need to succeed.
Additionally, these meetings can take place during other activities, such as lunch, a coffee break, or an afternoon walk. The agenda should include how the employee is doing on current projects, any challenges they may be experiencing, how what they’re doing now fits into longer-term career goals, and anything else on their mind. The key to success for such meetings is a leader who is open to hearing what the team member has to say. When done well, these one-on-ones can contribute to productivity and employee engagement.
#4 – Be Available for Questions
Providing detailed instructions up front is always helpful to get a team going on a project. But situations may come up where the leader didn’t explain fully or the outcome wasn’t expected. That’s why team leaders must be available to answer questions from team members. Questions could be about the process, the client’s needs, deadlines, technology, or any other aspect of the project.
Leaders can make themselves available in many different ways, including in person if the team is in house. If not, messaging, email, brief meetings, and the use of communication platforms are all possibilities. Having more communication methods enables leaders to connect with team members in ways that are comfortable for them, and leaders should make everyone aware of how to reach them and when they are available.
Team leaders can find ways to make the most of team member questions. For example, they can use the shared communication platform to start a list of common questions and the answers to them so team members can look there if they can’t reach the leader right away. They can also hold meetings about specific topics that come up repeatedly, such as how to handle a specific ongoing problem.
Effective leaders may also want to use questions to formulate training materials for future teams or new team members. Such materials aren’t meant to replace personal involvement of the leader, but to serve as a reference tool and a backup for team leader participation.
#5 – Trust Your Team Members
The adage “if you want something done right, you must do it yourself” may be appropriate in some situations, but not with teamwork. Leaders must be able to trust their employees and team members to contribute to high-level goals in ways that are productive and helpful. But trust is something that is built over time. So, how can teams and leaders create that trust together?
Two of the biggest contributors to building trust are transparency and responsibility. All team members, including leaders, must own up to mistakes and challenges and take responsibility for correcting them. Leaders must be willing to allow team members to test their skills and make those mistakes from time to time.
Further, leaders must be prepared to take action when team members’ actions or inactions are causing repeated or ongoing problems with the project. That’s especially true for situations when the problems are being caused by someone considered a high performer. According to a recent Forbes article, “Leaders that do not address a star employee’s bad behaviors demonstrate to the team that results are more important than their values, relationships, and ethics.”
Other tips for establishing trust are serving as an example and providing mentorship. If leaders want team members to be trustworthy, they should show them how it’s done by following through on commitments, standing up for team members within the company structure, and only promising what they know they can deliver. Mentorship through one-on-ones can help team members learn these critical skills in addition to the technical skills they need to perform their work.
Conclusion
Dedicated software development teams have many advantages. And they can be helpful in a variety of situations for different company types. Given this flexibility and the many resulting benefits, companies that go to the trouble and expense of hiring dedicated teams are smart to take the further step of ensuring they are well managed.
