What to Consider When Hiring a Remote Web Development Team

That’s why, in this post, we’ll cover how to choose the right remote web development team, as well as the different work models you can choose from, the risks to watch out for, and the benefits you can enjoy. 

What Is a Remote Web Development Team? 

Remote development teams are useful when you obtain an exciting new web development project but don’t have the time, expertise, budget, or enough personnel. You can either hire more programmers, engineers, UI/UX designers, project managers, etc. or you can hire a remote team for the scope of the project.

A remote development team—also known as ITO, an IT service provider, or third-party development team—is a team of software developers who support projects, as-needed. The collaboration between a web development agency and a remote web development team is a mutually beneficial strategic partnership. 

Which Work Model Are You Going to Use? 

Two of the most common ways to work with a web development remote team are the outstaffing model and the per-project model. 

What Is Outstaffing?  

Outstaffing—also known as team extension or staff augmentation—means that you incorporate specific specialists into your team, as an extension of your team, for the duration of a specific project. 

This model is very much like hiring an employee because you choose and manage the candidates. But, as opposed to hiring, there is no in-house hiring process, administrative/HR tasks, or typical employee costs like benefits packages. 

When Should You Use Outstaffing? 

Imagine your team acquires a project for a web application that will require a QA engineer. But your in-house QA staff are all swamped with ongoing projects. 

Typically, you opt to hire the necessary personnel, but there are situations in which hiring a full-time employee is not feasible. 

For example, 

• When the new project will only require part-time hours
• When HR is struggling to find qualified candidates among limited applicants 
• When you’re not sure you will have the proper workload to provide that person with full-time hours once the short-term project wraps.

This remote work model is a flexible and cost-efficient way to take on smaller projects when you’re short on in-house staff. And it’s easily adopted because it is so similar to hiring a new staff member.

What Is Per Project?

Per project, also commonly known as outsourcing or subcontracting, is when you hire a third-party team to carry out a project end to end. You’re trusting the remote team and their staff to handle the development life cycle independent of your internal activities or in-house programming. What you’re investing in is the end product. 

When you find a remote web development team that you work well with, they provide quality work, and their prices are cost-beneficial—this model offers you the flexibility to confidently say ‘yes’ to more projects and grow your web development business. 

When Should You Use Per Project?  

For a fast-growing web development company, there are many situations in which the per-project model makes strategic sense. 

• When the remote team’s costs are lower than completing the project in-house 
• When you find yourself turning down projects because you don’t have the time, personnel, or niche, technical expertise to accept a web development project 
• When, because of growth, you need more secure and complex IT infrastructure 
• When you find yourself with a high turnover rate
• When you need to free up your developers’ time to handle core business tasks 

How Does a Remote Team Accelerate Growth?

Although there are many reasons that companies may choose to take advantage of remote web development partnerships, the four main reasons are:

1. To face talent shortages
2. To cope with high turnover
3. To increase productivity
4. To reduce costs

Talent Acquisition and Retention   

Remote teams help businesses grow by filling in talent gaps and expanding the size of teams, therefore, increasing the quantity of work your business can accomplish. 

Talent acquisition and talent retention for small to midsize companies can be time-consuming and resource-intensive. In 2019, companies, on average, needed 66 days to fill an IT position. During those 66 days, companies pay for job postings, background checks, and lost days of productivity.  

LinkedIn has found that tech has the highest turnover average of any industry at 13% per year. Smaller web development companies are especially susceptible because they have a hard time competing with benefits packages that larger web development companies can offer. 

Collaborating with remote teams is an interesting solution because you can get support when you need it. When demand is high, the remote team you collaborate with acts as your backup. But when demand is low, you don’t have to stress about extra personnel weighing on the payroll because your remote team keeps a full-time staff of up-to-date tech professionals so you don’t have to.

Other challenges include: 

• Sense of loss of control 
• Privacy concerns 
• Business continuity
• Varying time zones and business culture     

For more information about the challenges of working with a remote web development team, read The IT Recruitment Strategy That’s Helping Small to Midsize Business or IT Outsourcing Vs. Staff Augmentation. 

How Do You Choose the Right Remote Web Dev Team? 

Unfortunately, not everyone who has worked with a remote team has had a positive experience. Companies have lost time, money, clients, and a good reputation because of unprofessional remote development teams that overpromise and underdeliver. 

But all the challenges listed above can be managed and avoided with a strict vetting process, and by making transparent and ethical partnerships a priority. 

Choosing your remote web development team is not a decision that you should make overnight. It’s a tedious process, but when you consider that you’re choosing someone to trust with your business reputation, the lengthy process is worthwhile. 

To begin the process: 

• List your priorities and requirements. You can find a list of things to consider before starting the vetting process here.  
• Do your research on several remote development teams 
• Narrow down your options and set up consultation calls 
• Begin a strict vetting process with your top candidates.

A Strict Vetting Process

During the vetting process, don’t shy away from covering the hard questions even for the things that aren’t directly related to web development. 

Four topics that often get overlooked in the vetting process are communication, talent, ethical sourcing, and cultural/geographical obstacles. 

Communication: How do they communicate with their clients and how often do they communicate? 

Talent: How do they find, train, and retain their talent? What’s their onboarding process like? How will they handle poor performance? What’s their turnover rate? 

Ethical sourcing: What are their active policies to promote diversity and equal pay for women?  

Cultural/geographical obstacles: How do they overcome any language barriers? 

For more information on how to ethically source a remote team, read Ethical Sourcing in the IT Industry.