Dedicated Team Model: What It Is, Pros & Cons for Your Project

A recent report from Grandview research states that the market for global software development outsourcing will grow 7.7 %, year on year from 2021 to 2027, taking the industry to $937 billion revenue in just six years. A lot of companies resort to a dedicated team model of engagement. 

In this article, we’ll take a closer look at dedicated project team structure pros and cons, reasons why you might need to hire dedicated developers, and tips to choose the best ones.

Source: Accelerance

What Is A Dedicated Team Model?

A dedicated team model (DTM) is a team that works remotely on a project in order to significantly reduce a product's time to market and improve the client's business processes. Such a team is not an extension of the customer's team but a separate unit with its own framework and management, meaning it is less dependent on the customer than teams in other models.

Other IT outsourcing models include fixed-price and time and material:

• With a fixed-price (or fixed budget) contract, the payment amount does not depend on resources used or time expended. It is used for short-term, small or medium-sized projects with a limited scope, or budget, when there are clear requirements and deadlines or when you need to develop an MVP. 

The model has its own disadvantages as it complicates risk management with little control over the development process, and it requires a long preparation period as all requirements for implementation and deadlines must be documented.

•  The time and material model involves payment for the time and effort spent on development. It is relatively flexible and capable of adapting to any changes. Payment is made monthly on the basis of actual work performed.

However, in spite of budget flexibility, you may not have all the information required to assess the project budget, especially in a startup, so it’s difficult to accurately estimate the amount of required investment. What’s more, the time frames for the development of the final product version are uncertain due to the uncertain scope of the project.

A Dedicated Team Structure in Project Management

 

A dedicated software development team structure usually includes the following key players, who are focused on your project solely and completely:

• Front-end engineers – select, install and test the user interface elements of a website or application. The front-end developer focuses on the look and feel along with its functionality. 
• Back-end engineers – work on the server components of multi-tier applications, focus on web services and the data store, and they are involved with business rule implementation logic.
• QA engineers – assess the quality of specifications and technical design documents to ensure timely, relevant, and meaningful feedback.
• UX/UI designers – create the user interface based on user research insights.
• DevOps engineers – work with other developers to facilitate better coordination among operations, development, and testing functions.
• Business analysts – bridge the gap between IT and the business, assessing processes, determining requirements, and delivering data-driven recommendations and reports to executives and stakeholders.
• Project managers – have overall responsibility for the successful initiation, planning, design, execution, monitoring, controlling, and closure of a project.

Further, we’ll dive into the dedicated project team structure pros and cons and give you key reasons why you might need to hire a dedicated team for your project.

Advantages of Dedicated Team

There are a lot of advantages of a dedicated project teams structure, we will cover the key ones below.

Cost Efficiency

Benefits of a dedicated team model start from cost efficiency, hiring a dedicated team for a project is usually much cheaper than recruiting in-house specialists, especially if the team is located in another country where development costs are much lower than in, say, the US.

A group of experts with a proven track record of successful projects similar to yours won't cost the Earth, especially an outsourced dedicated development team in Eastern Europe. They will do the necessary work without compromising the product’s quality. It's a great chance to reduce HR costs and slash the overheads that would be involved if you were to hire new employees.

Focused Approach

One of the greatest dedicated project team's advantages is a focused approach. All the people involved in the project will concentrate exclusively on it, ignoring potential distractions. And that's not all. The team is flexible—it can be re-configured at any time according to the current requirements and needs of the project, ensuring the project’s faster completion and better results.

Transparent Management

Dedicated teams use time tracking and task management solutions that the customer can access upon request. This helps them to be on the same page and gives the client an opportunity to check on the progress themselves.

Regular communication via messengers like Slack and Telegram and daily reports that you will receive will also contribute to transparent management.

Relevant Experience and Expertise

When you outsource dedicated software development teams, your project acquires professionals who have the necessary skills and professional expertise. Quite often, these people have already completed projects similar to yours. They can give you useful advice and take into account the tiniest details that you could have missed.

Working together for some time, they have established polished workflows and know-how to delegate tasks. You won't have to do this from scratch and deal with conflicts that may arise, and it is highly beneficial too.

Tight Collaboration

The customer and team members work closely together to achieve the common goal and obtain visible results. They not only communicate with each other on a daily basis but also participate in brainstorming to assess strong and weak points of the process, and to improve workflows and long-term planning.

This approach is indispensable for the timely solving of unexpected issues and overcoming project-related challenges.

Faster Development

How quickly would you like to get the work done? Speed is one more advantage of dedicated models. Bringing their experience and expertise and quickly adapting to new requirements, they can speed things up considerably.

Flexibility in Project Requirements

The dedicated model is great when you still don’t have a clear development plan and constantly need to make changes to your project. Agility is one of the main benefits of dedicated teams in comparison to the fixed-price model that applies Waterfall as a standard operation approach. Your dedicated team is always open to iterations in the project scope

Disadvantages of Dedicated Teams

As with any engagement model, it’s not ideal for all cases, there are some snags, as well. The biggest disadvantages of the dedicated team model are detailed below.

Low Efficiency for a Short-Term Project

It’s more effective to hire dedicated development for big projects that constantly evolve, whose requirements are flexible and change frequently. In all other cases, it's better to choose another model.

Not a One-Size-Fits-All Solution

Before selecting such a model, double-check that it is exactly what you need. Your project may be long-term, but if you have clearly defined goals and the set of requirements seems to be final, signing a contract with a dedicated team may be an unwise decision.

Different Time Zones

Different time zones may become a serious problem if an offshore company is involved. But this problem is solved easily if the team applies the principles of agile development.

However, when you hire a dedicated team located in the same country as your customer’s company, this problem will simply never arise.

6 Reasons Why You Need a Dedicated Development Team

We’ve covered the major dedicated project team advantages and disadvantages. If you are still in two minds about whether you need it, consult the checklist we have compiled for you. If you answer ‘yes’ to most of the statements below, the chances are high that a dedicated team model is a viable option for you.

Your Employees Don’t Have the Required Experience and Expertise

Are you sure that your workers have enough experience and expertise to embark on the project? If not, you need help from the outside.

It’s a Large Project

If the project is large with multiple tasks and numerous requirements, it may be difficult for your employees to bring it to a successful conclusion themselves.

It’s a Long-Term Project

Whether you are a startup or a well-established company, you will definitely launch other projects later on. In short, it’s nearly impossible to stay efficient when working on multiple projects simultaneously.

You Need a Great Deal of Flexibility

The project may change in the course of time, leading to completely different goals and, ultimately, new requirements. The dedicated development team structure is built in a way that gives the project the flexibility to constantly evolve.

You Wish to Have Control Over the Resources

With a dedicated model, you gain complete management control over the project and also the team running it.

You Need More Control over the Day-to-Day Process

If you are a control freak or simply wish not to stay in the dark about how the project is going on, you’ll be able to obtain this information from progress-tracking tools used by the team, and from daily reports sent to you.

Where to find the Right Dedicated Team

In this selection, we offer you three popular ways of connecting to your prospective dedicated team: agencies, aggregators, and reaching out personally. 

Agencies

A client company can consider an outsourcing agency (e.g., Odesk, Elance). If you are outsourcing for the first time and your project is large, it makes sense to let the agency take the burden of choice off your shoulders. If you have an in-house team or person who can deal with this task, there’s no need to have anyone in between or to reach out to a particular specialist or company.

Aggregators

You can find a company to collaborate with using aggregators like Clutch, G2, HubSpot, or GoodFirms. These B2B platforms provide ratings and reviews on software development and UX/UI design service providers and allow you to filter them according to services and location. Once you found a candidate company, check out its website for the range of services and business cases.

Reaching out

In the case of content services when you need one or two specialists, LinkedIn is an excellent source to fish for talent. If a candidate’s profile isn’t comprehensive enough, you can ask for a CV.

Tips for Choosing an Outsourcing Software Development Team

So, you’ve decided to employ a team to work with you. But how do you select a winning team? Follow the simple steps listed below and you will find the best of the breed.

Do Detailed Research

First of all, check B2B ranking platforms like Clutch.co, which allows you to look at many companies' profiles, customer reviews through filters, over a range of industries. You can also find specialized providers at GoodFirms, SoftwareWorld, The Manifest, and many more.

Review the Portfolio

You’ll find examples of previous projects there and will be able to judge whether you want to move further with them.

Agente has an extensive case portfolio in a range of fields, including e-learning, fintech, traveling, entertainment, and e-commerce. Check it out.

Request References

Reach current and previous clients of the company to find out if they were satisfied with the choice of specialists, communication, and delivery management and also with product development. This feedback is always the best indication of quality.

Discuss the Approach to Work

We consider the best approach when working with a dedicated team on complex and long-term software projects is agile development methodology. It allows us to develop the project gradually by defining top priority requirements first. Agile is flexible and relatively simple, at the same time providing high visibility of the project’s status.

Find Out the Rates and Discuss the Billing Process

Companies have varying rates, which may either fit your budget perfectly or burn a hole in your pocket. This will help you plan your budget and make adjustments if needed. Remember not to compromise on quality and overall reliability for a lower-cost solution!

Identify the Documentation that is Provided

We document every step to reduce any misunderstandings and strive to improve team collaboration in every possible way. To do this, we identify the right tools for this purpose:

• Team and project management
• Bug and issue tracking
• Code review system
• Source code and repository management
• Release management.

Dedicated Teams FAQ

How can you be sure a dedicated development team model is right for the project?

You can start by defining the type of project you are working on right now. If it’s a long-term and large project with a variety of tasks and an unchanging need for high-quality deliverables, then a dedicated team model is the right choice for you. 

Who needs a dedicated team?

Sometimes companies face problems such as not having the required skill set or lack of capacity which restricts them to fulfill their business needs. DTM provides a ready-made team of talents that fill the skill gap.

What is the difference between staff augmentation and DTM?

Staff augmentation involves the identification of a very niche talent gap in your company and filling it with a highly skilled expert for a short period of time. Outsourcing a dedicated team means a partnership with a remote software house and handing over the project to its staff.

What is the process of hiring a dedicated team?

• Contact the provider and inform them of your project scope, the resources you require (the number of specialists and technologies).
• The contractor brings together specialists with specific skill sets and experiences who match your expectations.

How can I verify the experience of a dedicated team?

 You should ask your dedicated team the following questions:

• How many stable cross-border teams have they already created?
• How quickly can they hire the people you want?
• What HR processes do they have to ensure that your future team is highly motivated?
• What is their general period of work with clients?
• What kind of customer service do they offer, and what is their approach to business?
• What are their approaches to keeping client data safe and delivering smoothly?

Dedicated Teams at Agente

Agente specialists have vast experience in setting up and maintaining successful dedicated teams for businesses of any scale — from corporations to startups. Team success largely depends on how well the service provider takes care of the talent resource and how good the infrastructure and environment are. Here’s why Agente is your choice:

• We have worked out a set up for gathering the exact requirements from the client and setting up a dedicated team based on these requirements. 
• We keep the development process transparent and problem free with a project management team and BA in constant touch with the client.
• We can easily scale up our dedicated team upon the client’s request.

On a Final Note

For 10+ years, Agente has been a remote-friendly company serving the customers across eight time zones. We have saved tons of business money by outsourcing ourselves, and companies across the world collaborate with us remotely. 

We are fully prepared to work online and get things going regardless of the epidemiological situation. All human resource management is done remotely keeping excellent communication with our clients and delivering artifacts on time.

If you are not sure whether your project will benefit from a dedicated team model, fixed-price or T&M, contact AGENTE to discuss all the nitty-gritty.