Ultimate Guide to Hire and Manage Dedicated Developers

As a trend, hiring dedicated developers is a fast-growing one, keeping in pace with the rising needs of enterprises from all sectors to develop software applications for growth.

The most probable reason for you reading this guide is that you are exploring various options for getting a software/website/web app/mobile app developed for your enterprise. So, the guide provides detailed information on one of the options, called dedicated development, including who dedicated developers are, what are the needs to hire them and what advantages do they offer and how to hire and manage them. Let’s start with it.

Who Are Dedicated Developers?

Simply put, dedicated developers can be placed between the part-time and full-time employees of an organization. They are hired for developing a particular project, usually for an extended period, during which they work on a full-time basis. Now, depending on the sources you hire them from and their work environments, here are some of the best ways to understand them better:

1. Freelancers

Dedicated developers operating as freelancers are the independent individuals or groups who may work from home or small offices and directly interact with the enterprises that hire them.

2. Dedicated Development Outsourcing Model

One of the three popular models of software development outsourcing is dedicated development in which you outsource the development to a dedicated team hired and managed by an outsourcing company.

3. IT Staff Augmentation

In this scenario, an enterprise hires the specialized developers from an IT staff augmentation service provider to develop the application at the enterprise’s office itself. In most of the cases, the hired developers act as a support to the already existing internal IT staff of the enterprises. In the first two types, the hired developers act as the remote employees of the enterprise, which employs them. A report mentions that the per year cost of maintaining a remote employee is $1,000 (in furnishings) and $500 (in perks) as compared to $10,000 (in furnishings) and $5,000 (in perks) of an in-house employee in New York. So, dedicated developers, when hired for remote working, can bring in some fantastic benefits.

A report mentions that the per year cost of maintaining a remote employee is $1,000 (in furnishings) and $500 (in perks) as compared to $10,000 (in furnishings) and $5,000 (in perks) of an in-house employee in New York. Click To Tweet

Some Comparisons to Guide You Better

1. Dedicated Developers vs. Freelancers in Outsourcing

There are many reasons why you should prefer to hire dedicated developer over freelancers:

• Dedicated developers are expected to have better expertise level through professional work experience
• They would be dedicated to one project at a time in real sense whereas freelancers may work simultaneously on multiple projects
• The outsourcing company providing dedicated developers is more likely to provide a better development environment, resources as well as communication support that might lack quality in case of freelancers
• Security is one concern associated with remote developers, and it can be better addressed if you hire a dedicated team from a reputed software outsourcing company

2. Dedicated Developers vs. In-house Teams

Upwork recently released a report which claims that nearly 73% of all teams globally would have remote workers by 2028. Hiring a permanent team of in-house developers may prove to be extremely expensive. Even the option of staff augmentation by hiring dedicated developers has some issues that dedicated development outsourcing addresses:

• Remote working extracts better efficiency and job satisfaction out of employees. A report by Flexjobs acknowledges a 115% increase in remote employees from 1.8 million in 2005 to 3.9 million in 2017.
• Choosing dedicated developers allows enterprises to save their office spaces as well as resources that are essentially required by the in-house teams. The company behind Wordpress Automatic WordPress Automatic shut down its San Francisco headquarters and has 860 remote employees working across 68 countries.
• The process of hiring an in-house team may be cumbersome and time-consuming, and it also might not prove to be fruitful. When an enterprise decides to hire a dedicated team, it saves the complicated recruitment efforts.
• The size of a dedicated team can be scaled up and down at any point in time and according to the changing needs of the project development. It is not possible with an in-house team as the tasks of hiring, terminating, and re-hiring may prove to be annoying.

Upwork recently released a report which claims that nearly 73% of all teams globally would have remote workers by 2028. Click To Tweet

3. Dedicated Development vs. Other Outsourcing Models

Apart from a dedicated development team, the other two models of software development outsourcing are fixed-price model and time-material model. A dedicated development model is preferred when an enterprise is not able to clearly define the scope of the development project. Flexibility (of changing the project scope at any point in time) is, therefore, the advantage it offers over the fixed-price model in which an enterprise is expected to define the project scope clearly.When compared with time-material mode, the dedicated development model grants the enterprise with more control over the project development process. This is because the dedicated team would work as the remote employees for the enterprise, and there would be better possibilities of scalability. Moreover, a dedicated development outsourcing model is apt for projects that might run for years.

Another important model is the extended team model. The difference between team extension vs dedicated development team is that the prior comes with more responsibility as you have to hire and manage the team on your dedicated. Dedicated developers, on the other hand, are self-servicing experts who take care of end-to-end tasks and operations.

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Need to Hire Dedicated Developers (When to Hire Them)

There has been a steady growth in the demand of dedicated developers, and there are many needs that encourage enterprises to look for them. Here are some of them:

1. Managing Long-term Projects

When an enterprise anticipates that a software development project would run for a long period of time (maybe more than a year), it is apt to go for the dedicated software development outsourcing model. One reason for this is that there is no way to decide the total development cost that would be required for the project. By paying a fixed salary every month to the dedicated developers, it would be easier for the enterprise to keep a check on the costs.

2. Projects with Unclear Scope

How can an enterprise think of the fixed-price model when it is unable to define the scope of the project? By hiring dedicated developers, the enterprise would gain the freedom to take the project further without any fear of schedule or cost deviations. Moreover, it would be able to easily handle the project requirements that may keep on changing throughout the development course.

3. Long-run Relationship Maintenance

An enterprise may need the support of the development team for an indefinite time period during which it may need to add more experts to the team or reduce the number. Moreover, it may need experts for software maintenance, modification, upgrading, and other requirements in the future. By opting for dedicated developers, the enterprise can indulge in a strategic relationship with the outsourcing company and get its requirements fulfilled without any hassles.

4. Shortage of Skills

According to a Future Workforce Report, nearly 52% of the hiring managers acknowledge the shortage of talent and skills as one of the main reasons to opt for a ‘flexible’ workforce, and dedicated developers are a part of it. The enterprises globally are unable to find and employ skilled developers locally and, thus, they need to opt for remote developers with adequate skills and experience in different technologies. Numerous enterprises from the USA and Europe prefer to hire dedicated developer to fill the gap.

5. Agile Development Methodology

Agile software development methodology is continuously gaining prominence over waterfall methodology. It follows an iterative development approach in which coding and testing are conducted concurrently to ensure that the software is being developed as per the requirements of the enterprise. Dedicated developers are the best fit for this approach as they offer uninterrupted support, time, and resources required extensively for the process.

A report by Flexjobs acknowledges a 115% increase in remote employees from 1.8 million in 2005 to 3.9 million in 2017. Click To Tweet

What Advantages Do Dedicated Developers Offer?

The dedicated developers offer many benefits with regard to the success and anticipated outcomes of the project development process. Let’s understand all of them:

1. Dedication and Full Focus

As their name suggests, dedicated developers are fully dedicated to one client at a time which encourages them to devote complete focus on one particular project. Needless to say, every enterprise would love to hire people who give priority to its project with uninterrupted attention and dedicated developers are the best choice in this respect.

2. Specialized Skills:

The Future Workforce Report further analyzes the viewpoints of hiring managers, 59% of whom agree that skills have become more specialized in the past 3-5 years. Nearly 61% of them feel that the skills would become even more specialized in the next 10 years. With the growing software development trends like virtual reality, internet of things, robotics, artificial intelligence and mobile-first development, the need for specialized developers is also. Dedicated development allows the enterprises to explore the global pool of developers specialized in these skills and invest in popular development trends.

3. Professionalism

Usually, the dedicated developer teams consist of professionals who are not only experienced but also familiar with the global development work standards and etiquettes. There are east chances of them showing any unprofessional attitude or non-compliance with the work culture you expect from them.

4. Resources

An enterprise doesn’t need to arrange for the required hardware, network bandwidths, and software development kits (with expensive licenses) for software development if they choose dedicated developers. The outsourcing companies that hire and manage these development teams are responsible to provide them not just with space but each of these resources which helps the enterprises to enjoy reduced development costs.

5. Flexibility

One of the top advantages of software development outsourcing to dedicated developers is the flexibility with which you can add, subtract or modify the project requirements. All you would need to do is to convey and discuss the requirements with them for implementation. The approach is also flexible in terms of team size. At any point of time, if you feel that more number of UI/UX designers or testers or any other development experts must be added to the project, you just need to inform the outsourcing company. Also, you can flexibly get one or more average-performing members of the team replaced with others.

6. Management

Starting from recruiting to managing the developers’ team, the entire responsibility lies with the outsourcing company. It means that the enterprise would be free to focus on its core business activities better. As far as project management is concerned, you can easily rely on a number of tools for purposes like sharing, communicating, and monitoring. The dedicated team would be responsible for keeping the entire development process fully transparent.

Time-to-market: The dedicated development outsourcing model is often considered as the best approach to enjoy a faster time-to-market. One of the top reasons behind it is the quick and seamless transition from one phase to another, which these teams are experts in. Also, you can expect them to be available round-the-clock and even during the emergency needs. With the completion of development at a faster pace, you can expect an accelerated business growth as well.Only a passionate and technologically-driven team can help you scale up rapidly. What are you waiting for. Call Now!

How to Hire Dedicated Developer Team?

Dedicated developers can be searched and hired from a number of sources. However, you should be ready to follow the right steps to make the hiring process productive. Here are some tips.

Where to Look for? Some of the top ways to find dedicated developers include:

1. Outsourcing Companies Offshore companies offering software development outsourcing are undoubtedly the best mediums to hire dedicated expert teams. The advantage of approaching one such company is that the organizations they offer already have good experience in software development. Secondly, you would be saved from the time-consuming tasks of screening each and every developer as these companies hire the best experts through rigorous screening.

2. Search Engines You may search using Google and other popular search engines, the dedicated development teams. Refer to the reviews and ratings of the options that you find. You may also come across a number of job boards and bidding websites where you may post your requirements. However, you can expect a response from a number of freelancers as well.

3. References There must be enterprises around that might have recently hired dedicated development teams. It would be great if you take recommendations from them and also ask about their experiences. However, you must take into account the type of projects they hired the teams to work on and evaluate whether they meet your own needs or not.

What to Look For? After you shortlist some of the top options, the next step would be to compare and evaluate each one on the basis of certain aspects like:

1. Portfolios Have a look at the clients the company has worked for and also the type of products they have developed in the past. You may also find the contact information of the company’s previous clients, and you may reach out to them to know about their experiences.

2. Expertise Find out what platforms and technologies and tools that the company’s dedicated developers have knowledge in. A good IT outsourcing company would have developers for the top technologies, languages, databases, and tools used currently for software development.

3. Compatibility You are likely to find dedicated developers from offshore outsourcing destinations located in different time zones. So, you must find out their approach to deal with work hour differences, language barriers as well as the cultural differences.

4. Communication Working with remotely located dedicated developers might make you worry about how you would communicate with them. Take care to ask the team how they would address the issue.

How to Interview? You must interview the dedicated developers thoroughly to know about their mindsets and work approach. Here’s how to do it.

1. Make It a Team Effort Your in-house employees (especially from the IT department and those who would be acting as project managers from your side) should be involved in interviewing the developers you plan to hire.

2. Mode of Interview Phone interviews, as well as video interviews, are the mediums to interview the developers. Ask them the questions about their skills, previous projects, experience, and more.

3. Questions to Ask Depending on whether you have the technical knowledge or not, you may ask questions related to hard skills (technical issues related to programming and other phases of software development) or soft skills (to evaluate their qualities, strengths, weaknesses, communication expertise and more) or both.

4. What to Evaluate? From their abilities, track records, and soft skills, you need to evaluate things like how efficient they are in meeting deadlines, communicating with team members, solving problems, responsiveness and reporting, and so on.

5. Discuss Your Needs To adjudge whether the developers are right for your specific project, share your needs, and ask their views. Figure out how well they understood your brand and needs and what approach they suggest for developing the right product.

Getting Started and Managing Dedicated Developers

Once you select the right dedicated software team from a reputed software development outsourcing company, you must contribute effectively towards the development process by:

• Agreeing mutually on the working hours and schedules
• Creating a well-defined development plan and setting the deadlines for each phase/task
• Setting up priority schedules and assigning day-to-day tasks
• Promoting transparency on both sides
• Ensuring security standards by preferring a non-disclosure agreement
• Maintaining the advanced authentication systems to prevent any security breach
• Trying to create a sync between the work cultures through online socialization

One of the biggest challenges of working with remote employees is project management. Though the outsourcing company would perform the task of managing the dedicated developers, you must ensure that there are no hiccups in the project development. Find out how?

• Using modern technology-based tools to collaborate and communicate with the dedicated developers.
• Schedule management tools can also be used to create synchronizations between your in-house teams and dedicated developers.
• Also, there are several tools for project planning, as well as project tracking web applications that can add value to the process.

Take time to adapt to the process of hiring dedicated developers entirely. A number of enterprises begin with software development outsourcing companies by hiring a small team of dedicated developers. Following the same, you can evaluate the performance of the team and then scale up its size to begin the full-fledged software development.

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