Quick Recap: IT staff augmentation Vs. Managed services Vs. Project outsourcing! Staff augmentation offers hiring flexibility and is cost-effective but needs close monitoring. Project outsourcing provides access to specialized experts and involves fixed costs but may lack control. Managed services offer comprehensive support but may not fit in everyone’s budget.
Whether it is healthcare, finance, travel, logistics, or e-commerce, almost every business relies heavily on robust and efficient IT systems to run its operations and offer products/services to customers. The traditional approach for this requires setting up a full-fledged IT team. However, it can be quite expensive, especially when you need some professionals to perform complex tasks for a short period.
This is where the IT staff augmentation business model comes into play. It enables businesses or organizations to quickly and efficiently scale their existing teams with external talent. For instance, if you have a software development team and wish to equip your software with AI, you can augment staff with expertise in artificial intelligence.
While it is essential to know the inside-out of staff augmentation, one should also get an idea of other IT service models, such as managed services and project outsourcing. This blog is all about that. Here, we have provided an in-depth comparison of IT staff augmentation with other IT service models.
Let’s begin!
What is IT Staff Augmentation
This is the basic you should know before moving to the differences between IT staff augmentation and other IT service models. Staff augmentation is about temporarily outsourcing specialized IT professionals and augmenting them to your existing IT team to fulfill your project requirements.
How Does Staff Augmentation Work?
Staff augmentation requires a company or an individual to simply connect with a recognized and reliable IT staff augmentation services provider or one of the IT staff augmentation companies and hire the required IT professionals for a certain period. After completing the formalities, the company can begin the onboarding and training process to make the IT professionals know the project, work ethics, and everything else associated with it. IT staff augmentation eliminates the hassle a company has to go through to recruit new staff for a temporary position.
IT Staff Augmentation Vs. Other IT Service Models
Without wasting your time, let’s quickly check IT staff augmentation versus managed services versus project outsourcing. We have also provided a brief about IT staff augmentation versus an in-house hiring model.
IT Staff Augmentation Vs. Managed Services Vs. Project Outsourcing
Before you choose any IT staffing model, it is important to understand the difference between IT Staff augmentation, project outsourcing, and managed services model. Let’s check it out through this table:
IT Staff Augmentation Vs. In-House Hiring Model
Now that you thoroughly understand the difference between IT staff augmentation, project outsourcing, and managed services, let’s explore the differences between IT staff augmentation and in-house hiring.
| Feature | IT Staff Augmentation | In-House Hiring |
| Cost | It is pay-as-you-go; you have to pay only for the hours worked. | IT experts are hired on a permanent basis regardless of need. Involves fixed salaries and benefits to be given to the staff. |
| Speed | Quick onboarding with readily available IT experts. | Considerable time is required for recruitment and onboarding. |
| Expertise | Direct access to specialized experts. | Requires searching, interviewing, and recruiting particular skills |
| Flexibility | Highly flexible. IT staff team can be scaled up or down as per the project needs. | Quite difficult and expensive to scale team size quickly. |
| Control | Lesser control than the in-house hiring model. | Direct control over the hired experts, their work, and performance. |
| Commitment | Short-term based on the project’s requirements. | Long-term employment commitment. |
| Training | Augmented IT staff is expert and well-trained | Requires training hired employees. |
| Admin Burden | Less admin burden as the IT staff augmentation services provider takes care of everything. | Requires taking care of payroll, benefits, and HR management. |
| Focus | Focus is on completing specific tasks or projects. | Takes into account long-term organizational goals and requirements. |
In simple words, IT staff augmentation is suitable for targeted and short-term requirements where speed and specialized skills are the highest priority. On the other hand, in-house hiring is better for long-term and performing core functions; it offers great control and in-depth involvement. In-house hiring also requires investing in recruitment and hiring process.
Whether you choose IT staff augmentation, project outsourcing, or managed services model, it is crucial to choose the right company that offers you these services or to whom you outsource your IT project.
Final Thoughts
IT staff augmentation offers the flexibility to hire specialized experts to extend your existing IT team, managed services means outsourcing any particular function or task of your project/company to a third-party service provider, and project outsourcing means outsourcing the entire project to a technology company. Each of these IT staffing models has its own pros and cons, all you have to do is determine your needs and choose one of these models for your project.
FAQs
Some advantages of IT staff augmentation include:
– Flexibility to scale up or down quickly
– Access to specialized skills on demand
– Cost-effective compared to hiring full-time employees
– Faster time-to-market
– Seamless augmentation with existing teams
Key advantages of the project outsourcing model are:
– Clear project scope and deliverables
– Fixed cost and timeline
– Access to external expertise
– Minimized management overhead
– Focus on core business functions
Below are some major advantages of the managed services model:
– Proactive IT support and maintenance
– Predictable costs
– Improved service levels and uptime
– Access to the latest technologies
– Focus on strategic initiatives
The cost of each model varies depending on the project’s complexity and duration. In the case of the managed services model, the cost is predictable, whereas in the case of the project outsourcing model, the cost is fixed. IT staff augmentation cost depends totally on the type and duration of the skillset/experts you need.
– The IT staff augmentation model is suitable for short-term needs and filling specific skill gaps while ensuring flexible scaling.
– The Managed Services model is suitable when you need to outsource your specific business function.
– The Project Outsourcing model is suitable when you have to develop the entire project without worrying about investing in infrastructure or resources.
Flexibility, access to specialized skills, and cost-effectiveness are a few reasons why companies choose the IT staff augmentation model over other IT staffing services models.
