What should I choose, IT Staff Augmentation or Managed Services?

Software outsourcing services today more than ever are very useful for companies in all industries, because they allow them to reinforce their teams with qualified and experienced personnel to speed up the development of their digital projects. IT Staff Augmentation and Managed Service are solutions that have gained popularity in different companies and we are going to take a look at what they mean by each one.

It is clear that the pandemic accelerated this entire digital adoption process for companies: with the quarantine and confinement seasons, in which it was best to stay at home, companies sought to recruit more staff via outsourcing to support workflows online and remote. Proof of this are the statistics shared by the ArganoUV portal: investment in outsourcing recruitment in 2019 stood at 15 billion dollars and grew to 18 billion in 2020, the first year of the pandemic.

The demand for software engineers and developers is on the rise all the time, so services such as IT Staff Augmentation or Managed Services are the fastest way to get experienced professionals faster. But how to choose between one service and another? How do you know which one is best for your company or project?

Which should you choose, IT Staff Augmentation or Managed services?

Let's start by defining each of these services. When we talk about IT Staff Augmentation, we refer to the hiring of staff on a temporary basis, to increase the capacity of the company for a certain period or to support the team in a certain project, for example. The key here is that it is a temporary contract, with specific skills and proven experience that is of value to the company.

In the case of the Managed Services service, it is focused more than anything else on the management of certain routine and standardized processes of a company, to free up the team's time so that they can dedicate themselves to more strategic tasks.

Read more: Dedicated Software Development Team: what is it and what are its advantages

“Managed services are typically offered to cover critical services, functions that are at the heart of your business. These critical services range from computer support to data center management. It is clear that the latter should not fail, but even the smallest or seemingly insignificant services should not be interrupted from a business perspective”, explains the Kio Networks portal in this regard.

With this data that we have just given you, it is already a little easier to differentiate one service from another. While with IT Staff Augmentation you temporarily add professionals to your team, with Managed Services you hire a team to be in charge of managing certain areas of your company.

So which service to choose?

When to implement IT Staff Augmentation

• If you need additional staff in your team.
• If you need specific or special skills for your project.
• You need to cover a short-term need in your project.

When to hire Managed Services

• “He doesn't have a skilled technical manager and even the thought of routine management drives him crazy; all you have to do is find a talented and experienced provider who will take responsibility ”, they detailed in the Procoders portal.
• You have to be willing to delegate responsibility for your systems to a third party, aware of the benefits but also the risks.

About this, Chelsea Sherwood, an engineer graduated from the New York City College of Technology, commented in a Quora forum several aspects about when to hire IT Staff Augmentation and Managed Services.

“If you run a small or medium business, IT Staff Augmentation works best for your requirements. This is because you do not have to invest in operating expenses. In addition, you could save on your infrastructure expenses since most of the professionals hired under this modality work remotely or from their reduced workspaces”, she pointed out.

On Managed Services, she said: “Managed services are ideal if you only have the idea of ​​starting a business in mind. If you don't have domain experience, aren't sure how your particular industry works, have no idea about delivery models or staffing, and more, managed services can run your entire business operations."

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