Resource and Staff Augmentation for Digital Health Software Development

Resource and staff augmentation is an effective way to drive your digital health projects forward when faced with staffing issues. An outsourced company can supplement your existing teams, where you have shortages. 

In the current job market, IT staff augmentation is a necessity for many digital health companies. The combination of the great resignation and the current developer shortage has left many companies understaffed. The tech industry is one of the hardest-hit sectors. Staff augmentation can be both a temporary and long-term solution to tech staffing problems.

However, this outsourcing method can present challenges. As with any outsourcing, communication needs to be a priority. Clear communication and effective problem solving are key to the progression of a project. Similarly, it’s important to find a partner that works with you, rather than a primarily transactional relationship. 

IT staff augmentation also offers scalability. This outsourcing method provides the freedom to upscale your teams, and scale down, as needed. Consider which outsourcing method might be right for your digital healthcare development projects. 

Communication

Effective communication is critical for any business, including within in-house teams. This is especially true in digital health developments, due to the demanding deadlines and compliance risks involved. Introducing outsourced staff to your existing teams can create further difficulties. 

Depending on the location of your outsourced partner, time zones can cause delays in communication. Working with offshore teams means waiting for engineers to begin their workday before problems can be fixed. 

There may also be a language barrier, depending on their location. Needless to say, this can stop effective communication in its tracks, without clear translation. 

Consider the best location for your development partner. Offshore resource and staff augmentation may offer lower labour costs. However, in exchange for a cheaper budget, you lose quality communication. The right partner should value communication across teams, as much as you do.

Communication of in-house best practices is key to the smooth running of IT projects. IT staff augmentation encourages outsourced staff to integrate into existing teams. Your partner should understand the importance of your company-wide best practices. This is especially important in the digital healthcare space, as regulatory compliance is critical.  

If all engineers are operating to the same standards, then the project is more likely to be successful. The key to good communication, is confirming that all engineers are on the same page.

Ensure that your company-wide communication methods are effective. Implement modern communication methods, to encourage a constant stream of information surrounding a project. These might include task management tools, video conferencing tools and more. You might also want to schedule regular updates and meetings for reports on the project from all teams. 

Quality Control and Project Management

Keeping control over a project can be challenging as teams grow. New team members need time to integrate and understand your expectations. However, this becomes even more challenging during outsourcing, as new team members are not always nearby.

For instance, offshore outsourcing involves partnering with teams that are in distant countries. It is difficult to maintain management control with physical distance between the two organizations. Therefore, it’s important that your partnership has similar priorities, and are working towards the same goal. Also, consider onshore or nearshore staff augmentation, to reduce the distance.

IT staff augmentation is the integration of outsourced teams into your existing teams. With the right partnership, new team members should understand the importance of your project objectives and expected control measures. Resource and staff augmentation in digital health requires a mutually beneficial partnership, rather than a contractual relationship.

Experience and Expertise

There are plenty of outsourcing agencies out there. They might even offer IT staff augmentation services, instead of purely outsourced development. However, digital health development projects need more than just extra tech developers. 

The healthcare and technology space is challenging to navigate. Not only is the industry becoming more demanding as it continues to evolve, there are also large regulatory risks. 

For this reason, it’s critical that software development partners are experienced in the health tech space. This kind of expertise is more challenging to find.

Development companies that are new to the health tech space will benefit from shared expertise with an experienced partner, too. Whether a health tech novice, or experienced, consider resource and staff augmentation from a digital health-specific development company. 

Your partner should have experience in building healthcare solutions, and understand the market well. This ensures maximum success for your software solution. However, it’s just as critical to ensure your local teams are staffed with compliance experts. Ultimately, a compliance breach could topple any tech development. This should be a key resource in your development partners’ teams. 

Investment

A digital health software development project can be costly, depending on the resources needed for the build and the relevant deadlines. Fast development isn’t cheap, as more resources are required. The difficulty is balancing speed, quality and budget. 

This same challenge is faced in resource and staff augmentation. Ultimately, IT staff augmentation is likely to be more cost-effective than recruitment in the long run. Staff augmentation might address the problem of staff shortage, while still maintaining a reasonable budget. 

However, it’s not easy to calculate the right budget for digital health development. Start by clarifying your priorities. In health tech, compliance and security are critically important. It’s worth investing in skilled engineers to ensure your project is compliant from the start. The initial investment in skilled augmented teams is nothing compared to the expense of privacy violations and breaches. 

Ideally, quality and compliance should take precedence. Hire a digital health development team with experience in the industry. They should complement your existing staff, and work with you for the improvement of your health tech innovation. A cohesive partnership is the solution to the majority of challenges in the digital health software and IT staff augmentation space.

At Vertrical, we work with you to drive your digital health developments forward. Our in-house team can integrate into your existing talent, and provide compliance and development expertise. We understand the challenges within the digital health software industry, experienced project managers, business analysts and more. Get in touch today to discuss staff augmentation with Vertrical.