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How to build an outsource team and succeed?

The Tech industry is among the early adopters of outsourcing. Despite the perks of gaining access to the global pool of talents, you might feel a little nervous when you start working with a remote development team. In this article, we will share tips on how to build a well-functioning remote development team and give you tips on how to ensure that the team remains successful.

How to build an outsourced team?

Step 1: Analyze

Building a successful team starts by defining your goals and the requirements to reach these. Analyze your business and ask yourself what you want to develop and how.

  • Do you have an early-stage startup?
  • Do you have short- or long-term projects?
  • Are you open to changes in the workflow?
  • What kind of workflow will you choose?
  • What kind of technical stack is relevant for you?

Step 2: Search

When you clearly understand your needs, you can start googling. When searching for remote development teams, ensure that your search query is concise. This might lead you to some handy marketplaces or remote IT vendors that can meet your needs. What’s more, don’t forget about the power of ‘word of mouth’. Often this is the most reliable way to get a good recommendation. So ask around in your network.

Step 3: Clarify

Once you find your remote development team, you can start to outline the project requirements. Make sure you are as detailed as possible so that everyone on the team understands the specification of your project. Only then can they deliver the best possible results. 

How to manage an outsourced team?

Establish a partnership

Outsourced developers are, first and foremost, people. Feeling empathy towards your outsourced developers and team will create a productive environment. This will form the solid foundation for the project’s success. 

If you treat your remote development team as if they are a part of something great and talk to them as team members, their dedication to work will increase. 

Find time to get to know your outsourcing partner, show your outsourced team members that you appreciate their work, and visit your remote IT vendor to build better connections.

Ensure regular communication

You must identify how close you want to be with your team and ensure you are kept in the loop.

Chats like Slack or Skype are great tools for quick and easy communication. They allow you to ask and answer questions on the go and achieve a ‘remote, but not distant’ cooperation. 

Chat is asynchronous, making it highly convenient if you are dealing with different time zones. Chats might also save your remote developers extra stress if their English level is not the best. The asynchronous nature of chat gives them some time to look up a word or check their grammar before sending a message. This helps to avoid misunderstanding. 

Tools like Asana, Jira and Trello can help to arrange tasks and keep an eye on how the project’s going. Hand in hand with daily catch-up calls and sprint reviews, video conferencing tools create the feeling of belonging, keep everyone informed, and ensure every member is contributing to the project while being heard. 

Share valuable feedback

A friendly working environment where developers feel they are a valuable part of the project is beneficial for a client and a developer. 

Recognize your team’s accomplishments, give them positive feedback when they do good work and point out their mistakes if something is wrong. However, you need to remember that people want constructive criticism, not insulting. 

This strategy makes your team feel valued, fosters loyalty, and motivates them to work harder for you and your business. 

Conclusion

So, if you want to have a successful outsourced team, there are two cornerstones:

  • clear understanding of your goals and the requirements to reach these;
  • even though your developers are outsourced and located far away, they are still members of your team and contribute to the project’s success as much as your in-house team.


In short, how you treat your people and your project is KEY to your success. Any distance, borders, different time zones or languages shouldn’t deprive you of bringing your thriving business solutions to life. 

Curious about the way that we manage to do this every day at SharpMinds, contact us directly.

Wil jij je team uitbreiden met onze developers? Ik kom graag in contact!

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Lennaert Groen

🇳🇱 Co-Owner SharpMinds

+316 27621780

“Verhoog je developmentcapaciteit sneller door een dedicated remote team in te huren!”