Surviving in a highly competitive market is challenging, but what seems more difficult is getting your work done! Being a start-up, you don’t have ample capital, and whatever you have, you have to be highly strategic and careful about spending that. But, with the rise of the hiring and training cost and later on, liabilities of in-house employees could be very expensive. And, as any team is the strength of a company, the attrition and turnover rate also highly depends on the employee satisfaction factor. So, yes, a responsibility could turn into a liability really quick, which will affect the overall growth of the company. So, what do you do? What to do to get a win-win situation that resolves your employee liability problem and positively impacts your rising development? On the other hand, it pays the employees well as well too. The answer is Team Augmentation or Staff Augmentation.
This method is implemented fiercely in today’s corporate world, not only by start-ups but by software giants as big as Google.
What is Team Augmentation/Staff Augmentation
In simple terms, Team Augmentation means increasing your team from outside. That is hiring outside professionals on a temporary basis to increase the capacity of your team. This method comes out to be extremely handy when you want to extend your group for some particular work in a specific timeline, but you don’t want to hire permanent employees. So you outsource and expand your team.
Types of Staff Augmentation/Team Augmentation
Before implementing Team Augmentation in any company, it’s essential to understand the different staff augmentation models. It helps implement a suitable model for the proper purpose. So, Team Augmentation can broadly be divided into three categories:
● Commodity
This model best suits when work needs to be done under a specific timeline, but no particular skill set is required. For example, retails, essential factory works, or manual labor.
● Skill-based
When a particular skill set is required for jobs like clerical work, data processing etc. The level of skills is not mandatory.
● Highly Skilled
Jobs like software engineering, graphic designing, brand or logo designing, content strategy etc. need high-profile qualified personnel with a certain level of experience and background. So, for all those jobs, highly skilled candidates are required.
Need of Staff Augmentation In Business
Staff augmentation services make sure your business is ready for the next level of growth. It is an ideal solution for businesses that want to reduce personnel and tax expenses, optimize their internal processes, and easily get qualified specialists to work on their projects without hiring them full-time. If you want to scale up your company quickly or reduce staff in the process of optimizing costs — this is the way to go.
Let’s look how staff augmentation impacts your business
Increase Capacity
Augmented staff are a great way to improve your business's capability. With augmented staff, you can keep your team focused on the work that is most important to them, while also getting more done in less time.
Access to vast talent
Staff augmentation is the process of getting the right talent on board, at the right price. If you've got a particular project that you need help with, or if you're looking to expand your business and aren't sure where to start, Staff Augmentation can help you get effective workers in place quickly and affordably.
Great Expertise
It ensure right expertise and experience to help you find the right people for your business, whether it's for a one-off project or for ongoing support.
Improved Quality
We know that when you're looking for help, you want to find the right person. You want to make sure they're qualified and able to do their job, and that they are a good fit for your company culture.Augmented staffing allows you to engage a professional without compromising the quality.
Increase Efficiency
It increases your efficiency by providing you the benefits of an in-house team, but you also have access to a professional who can help you out when you need it.
Is Team Augmentation Right for You
This question is absolutely vital before going for Team Augmentation. There are majorly three considerations before augmenting a team.
● Project Length and Complicacy
Outsourcing won't be the best possible solution if it’s a long-term and complicated project with multiple branches and verticals. In this case, if more team members are required, hiring employees with particular skills would be more beneficial. But if a project is short-term, or some part of the project needs to be completed in a tight timeline with a specific skill that the internal team lags, then it’s better to outsource a temporary small group to get the work done.
● Data Secrecy
Outsourcing the team is absolutely out of the question if your project deals with critical company or client data. Internal employees or hiring permanent employees is the only solution here because only in that case can you come to legal terms if something goes out of the way and thus can lower the risk.
● Emphasize on Remote Working
If your job doesn’t require an office inside a building and regular in-person meetings or any such infrastructure then bearing an establishment cost is unnecessary. In that case, need-based hiring of temporary people to finish assignments would be more efficient and cost-effective. So, in this case, Team Augmentation is the best answer.
Benefits of Staff Augmentation or Team Augmentation
So, if implemented properly, the benefits of augmenting a team is huge. Here are some core benefits.
● It integrates the in-house team to the outsourced one resulting in a better and dynamic output
● Lowers the in-house employee liabilities and thus is cost-effective at times
● Easier to meet project deadlines for short-term engagements.
● Reduce operational cost by having remote teams
● Save time and focus on core business operations
● Hire qualified professionals with project-specific skills for desired period
● Moreover, maintain growth and transform the conventional business approach
While we discussed the benefits of staff augmenting, let's take a look at some staff augmentation challenges that come with it:
Smooth Integration
It is essential to have a more seamless integration. This will be required for the improvement and development process, as it will make it easier to integrate them into the company's workflow.
Cost
If your project ends up taking longer than expected, then the higher-than-average hourly rate of your augmented staff could end up costing you money. To avoid this problem, it’s worth making sure that your initial project scope is realistic and reasonable in the first place.
Lack of control
Adding new employees to an existing company might increase the risk of conflict and loss of control. Your augmented team may have a different method of functioning than your in-house team, which may or may not work in your situation.
Conclusion
In the end, it can be said that Team Augmentation can serve as an excellent benefit for any business to sustain in a highly competitive and dynamic market, but misusing this could be proved as fatal. TECHVED helps you with relevant staffing support without overpaying for redundant recruitment stages.We understand your scenario first and then implement the suitable model through a trustworthy staffing agency. And, collaboration with the internal team in a positive manner is also an essential factor. With all these, team augmentation can be beneficial for your organization.
FAQs
What is meant by resource augmentation?
Resource Augmentation is a flexible, cost-effective solution for managing your company's outsourcing needs. It can provide the most appropriate resources at the right moment for immediate working with start-ups, mid-tier, and large enterprises and meeting all your project objectives.
Is staff augmentation important?
Staff augmentation allows you to find the right person for the job, without committing to long-term hiring. This staffing philosophy puts the best people in a room (virtual or otherwise) so that they can solve problems and deliver creative solutions on time and on budget.
What does prior staff augmentation mean?
Companies used to hire freelancers or hire a full-time resource that might cost them alot. They needed to find someone who could do the job, but they were unsure if they would be able to find the right person. The solution was to hire an agency that could help them with finding great employees. Now, with staff augmentation, you can have a team of people with the same skillset. This will make your company more efficient and productive.