Outsourcing: first of all, is it good or bad for your mobile app development project?
Like anything in this world, the process of outsourcing is also a two-headed coin, with both pros and cons. The fact that the pros far outweigh the cons is the reason we’re writing this blog.
As a startup or an established company, should you outsource your mobile app development to a contractor instead of augmenting your team with the necessary resources, such as a group of app development experts? What are the benefits of outsourcing? And most importantly, when should you outsource tasks? Let us address these questions one at a time and start with the basics.
What is Outsourcing, and How is it Relevant in Today’s World?
One of the main qualities of a manager is effective delegation. In essence, this is what outsourcing is, except you assign tasks to an entity, individual or otherwise, that is outside of your core team.
Wikipedia defines outsourcing as “an agreement in which one company hires another company to be responsible for a planned or existing activity that is or could be done internally, and sometimes involves transferring employees and assets from one firm to another”. Simply put, you are making a financial transaction with an entity outside of your employee payroll in exchange for a product or service.
Your team may or may not be capable of delivering the task you have outsourced. Or maybe your team has the potential to deliver the same with some investment from your side to develop your teams’ capabilities. So, why outsource in the first place instead of just assigning the task to your team?
The answer is simple: time is money.
Your team may be engaged in far more demanding tasks that are more suited to their particular skill sets. So, they’re busy. Or it’s simply not viable to invest in your team’s development for a specific task that is not recurring in the long run. Why buy a palace for a short vacation when you can just rent it?
If you are a company seeking a mobile app developer to outsource to, the second reason is more applicable. The core product or service offered by your company most likely does not revolve around mobile application development, so there’s simply no point in developing a team to build a mobile application for you. Think about it.
Once the application is built, what do you do with the application development team except disperse it? Factor in all the efforts and costs involved in building an app development team for a few short months. You’ll easily understand that most times, it is more practical to just outsource the project to niche experts who can be hired on a contractual basis.
Top 10 reasons you should outsource your mobile app development project
1. It’s Practical
Outsourcing is the most practical way to go when it comes to short-term projects.
Let’s say you want to develop an app that brings your groceries to your consumers’ doorsteps. Your core team is engaged with different aspects of your business processes.
Instead of disrupting your team’s daily tasks to develop a skill that is a one-time requisite for your company or hiring a team of app developers for a short time, you can simply sign a contract with an outsourcing agency.
Now, you’ll have an entire team of expert developers working on your app development project without any business disruption.
What’s more, they won’t be a liability to your company when your mobile application hits the market. Your contract ends, and you won’t have to be accountable for the development team anymore, except for the occasional app maintenance as stipulated in your contract.
2. It Helps You Save a Considerable Amount of Money
You will definitely be on a budget for resources while initiating a mobile app development project. And outsourcing will help you keep a tighter rein on your money, thus ensuring that you stick to your project resource budget without too much difficulty.
Outsourcing is a cost-effective solution for short-term projects. As long as you make your mobile application requirements clear to the team you outsource it to, you will be able to get a clearcut quote from them and avoid any hidden expenses as the project matures.
You can reduce and control your operational costs by outsourcing your project to a team of developers with a good track record. This way, you get to increase your profits and save the extra money to invest in another vertical of your business.
In today’s world, restricted by social distancing, outsourcing plays another critical role. You don’t need to set up the office space required to maintain a team, which means you can also cut down costs associated with the maintenance and running of the working spaces.
Also Read: What is the Average App Development Cost in 2021?
3. It Increases Operational Efficiency
Outsourcing your app development project can help you increase the overall operational efficiency of your business. Your core team is left undisturbed to work on their usual tasks while you streamline your business processes. This will also make the app development task off the minds of your regular employees.
This means that they can spend more time on making your business more adaptable for when your mobile app is finally ready, keeping your entire business flow agile from start to end.
It has also been noted that when you outsource a project, you can conclude it much more quickly. You do not need to make the initial investment of building and developing a team, and you can dive right into kick-starting the project as soon as you finalise a contractor you can outsource to.
This rapid conclusion of the process will give you a final product much more quickly than if you were to start from scratch and make your core team pick up app development skills.
Check out the 11 Productive Mobile App Development Tips for Startups & Small-Scale Businesses.
4. It Gives You Access to a Bigger Talent Pool
The world is your oyster when you plan to outsource your mobile app project to a contractor. If you think your country has great app developers, think of all the talent that can be found globally, just waiting for you to tap into their potential.
You get access to a much larger talent pool with a wide variety of skilled professionals. They are ready to render their services to you without tying you down with tedious details like taking care of employee benefits, pension funds, and health care benefits.
These industry experts have honed their skills to a point and will be able to cater to your needs quickly and efficiently. Since an outsourcing firm will have multiple projects going on simultaneously, they will also be continuously exposed to novel ideas and technologies that could add value to your project.
5. It Can Act as a Consulting Service Too
Companies or individuals that take up outsourced work usually work in a niche industry. It gives them the time to understand the workings of that industry right down to the last cog, making them unchallenged experts in the field.
With the concentrated knowledge they possess, they can act as valuable consultants for your business to develop an app that is the right fit for your sales and organisational goals.
Such agencies will be able to guide you on your project journey by providing valuable research data and UX and UI suggestions to build a mobile app that is truly innovative in nature.
They can tell you what to do and how to do it to get optimal results for your project with minimal input. With consulting services from industry experts, you can rest assured knowing your app is in good hands.
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6. It Makes Your Project More Focused
Your core team will be busy with their routine work that is the primary driving force behind your business. Once you outsource an app development project, it is no longer the main concern of your team to concentrate on the development process.
Apart from the checks necessary to keep abreast of the project progress, such as ensuring that deadlines are met, and milestones are achieved, your team can focus more on enhancing your business operations and ultimate outputs.
With a dedicated team working solely on your app’s development, your project becomes more focused and the progress pace will be much quicker. You will also get the needed support to move your project along quickly as the spotlight is solely on your mobile app development.
Also, you should remember that whether it is onshore or offshore, product delivery depends on how well the teams work together. So, to ensure success, you should know how to manage your team effectively.
7. It Mitigates Project Risks to a Certain Extent
Every project comes with its share or risks and responsibilities. From the initial stages to the final project delivery, there are many things that can go wrong. And if history is any indication, everything that can go wrong will go wrong in any project development. Here, you’ll need to be actively involved in countering the challenges encountered and develop solutions to keep the project moving forward.
Now, if you were to outsource your project, you wouldn’t need to worry as much about the roadblocks in your app development project, because most of the accountability lies with the contractors.
The primary accountability of project success ultimately goes to the entity you outsourced it to. You have hired the team for a service, you have outlined your requirements clearly, and you are ready to invest time and money in the project.
It’s the responsibility of the assigned development team to ensure that the project is a resounding success, and it is one responsibility that will never be taken lightly by any outsourced team as their livelihood is closely interlinked with their reputation.
Take a look at the types of IT outsourcing models and how to choose between them.
8. It Equips You to Work Around the Clock
The flexibility that comes with outsourcing your work is every manager’s dream come true. If you find the right team of developers, you can set up working conditions that promote productivity throughout the day.
The different time zones (if you hire a team on the other side of the world) can also be utilised to your advantage. Your team can work in such a way that you wake up to new updates every day, and your team starts off a new workday with your feedback and suggestions.
Check out the reasons why outsourcing product development fails and learn how to avoid them.
9. It Promotes Transparency in the Workplace
An entity that works as an outsourcing agency does is inherently bound by transparency. The organisation is public, and the workings are laid out for everyone to see in order to maintain the transparency that is trusted by diverse clients.
Working with a team that is unwilling to compromise on their integrity can do wonders not just for your project, but for your work environment too, by extension. It can serve as a reminder that there are no cheat codes to building and keeping client loyalty.
Suggested Read: 21 Mobile App Development FAQs Every Startup Founder Must Know – A Detailed Guide.
10. It Gives You More Time to Focus on Your Real ‘Mission’
You will have a clear long-term vision and mission for your business, which sometimes have to take a back seat when your attention is riveted by urgent short-term tasks. But if you’re outsourcing, you can take a step back and take a good long look at the big picture.
You can focus more on the expansion strategies to help your business grow and give more time to the priority tasks that keep your business running smoothly. In a nutshell, outsourcing will give you the time required to indulge in out-of-the-box thinking to up your business game instead of worrying about your app development project’s progress and associated challenges.
Here is a complete Guide To Outsourcing Mobile App Development.
Conclusion
It is always better to outsource your mobile app development whenever you can. You will be able to get a more focused development whose niche industry experience will guide you when it comes to designing your mobile app. Outsourcing your mobile app project will also help you get a bigger talent pool at an affordable cost than if you were to build your own team from the ground up.
This is where you can place your trust in the hands of proven mobile app development companies such as NeoITO, who will be able to steer you the right way and equip you with the tools to create delightful user experiences.
