5 Tips on How to Manage Offshore Software Development Projects
In this era of technology, information technology and software development are growing. Many businesses are hiring a dedicated development center to assist with tasks to streamline processes and to save costs.
However, it’s a much harder process to turn your ideas into reality, albeit, you already have a great idea. For that, you need to have an offshore development team and that’s a really tough job. Managing a custom retail software development company is complicated and has its own challenges. However, with the right coordination and management, you can leverage many benefits thereof.
Once you decide to own an offshore development team, it’s important to have an organized structure right from the beginning to avoid complications in the software development process. You should know that the success of various software projects including web and mobile app development depends on project management.
Hence, if you approach the right dedicated offshore development center and follow the right steps, managing offshore development teams should be easy and highly beneficial.
The Role of Project Manager
Every time, many businesses invest their time and cost in projects to develop new applications and software to stay ahead of the competition. But hiring an offshore development team will turn out to be the most effective and affordable way to develop new apps. But sometimes, these development teams fail to deliver on certain goals and results. Therefore, it’s important to have certain management procedures in place before hiring an offshore development team.
So, if you are hiring an offshore team, the first thing you should consider is to hire a project manager. However, once you have them on board, it’s their responsibility to ensure that strategic processes and plans are executed as per the strategy.
A project manager should have capabilities and skills like excellent planning, problem-solving, coordination and team management. Hiring an expert project manager will have you reap the benefits of your project in no time.
The below-mentioned things a project manager should have:
- A clear vision and mission
- Provide a detailed roadmap of the project
- Set milestones and create a timeline to complete the project
- A clear communication plan and coordination at every stage of the process
- Ensure that the steps are recorded
- Identify potential pitfalls and risks
- Ensure that the project is completed within the time and budget
- Evaluate the project once it’s finished
So, you might have understood that the project manager plays a vital role and this position should not be overlooked.
In nutshell, you should consider a dedicated project manager who plays the role of mediator and acts as a virtual bridge between your business and the offshore team.
In this article, we will give you some simple tips to manage offshore software development projects quite successfully.
1. Define Your Goal
Well, you should know that your offshore development team is not a team that works for you for a day or two. But, they are a value-adding extension of your existing team and are in it for the long haul. Therefore, your work doesn’t end by just assigning them tasks. You have to show them a bigger picture.
It’s important to exchange some words with your offshore team. Talk to them regarding your business, vision, and mission. Let them know and understand where you see your business in the coming years. Brainstorm with them about how you intend to accomplish them.
This allows them to think beyond the object of your project, and in turn, provide creative and innovative solutions for your business.
Therefore, it’s important to define and discuss the goal of your project with your offshore team.
2. Clear Communication Methodology
Communication is a vital key to effective development management. Having vast experience in this software industry, we have found that clear and frequent communication between the business and development team often yields the best results.
Daily updates are ideal for both large and small projects. Therefore, you have to organize a meeting with the developers or project managers so that the offshore team should get a clear idea about the context of the project. You have to make sure that your offshore team hears you carefully whatever you have to say. Likewise, you need to listen to what they have to say. You should have a timely conversation with transparency so there is no room for misunderstanding.
3. Don’t Micromanage
As per the survey, around 60% of the respondents considered switching jobs because of micromanagement. But as a matter of fact, 36% actually did end up changing jobs. Moreover, 71% of the respondents believed that micromanaging negatively affects their performance.
Therefore, nobody wants to be micromanaged, especially not experienced developers. You may feel like you want to manage smaller parts of the process, but this will lead to frustration. When handling a largely offshore team, it’s better to hire a project manager or senior developer who can manage tasks and lead the project.
A strong leader and his skills will keep the team motivated and on the right track throughout the development.
4. Manage The Time Difference
Time difference is the major factor if you are planning to hire an offshore development team or outsourcing your project requirements. This can have its perks and disadvantages depending on how it’s managed. It’s quite challenging when working with offshore teams.
However, with mutual agreement for a common time zone, you can overcome this problem. For instance, if you get in touch with a software outsourcing company in India, the mid-day mark of the shift in India may overlap with the start of the shift in the UK. Therefore, it’s essential to plan for the difference in working hours. By managing the time difference, you can build a more efficient schedule for your local and offshore teams. Ensure that communication between your team is not affected because of the time difference.
5. Use Project Management Platforms
If you are dealing with an offshore team, there are many project management tools available in the market which may help you to have a seamless project development process. You should be aware of some online management tool that helps you to report bugs, tasks, perform follow-ups, and questions to the team members.
These management tools help you to make a clear conversation between you and the project manager. As a business owner, you could ask for changes anytime you find something that needs modification.
Conclusion
By following these tips, there will be higher chances of selecting the dedicated development center. On the other hand, you will increase your chance of seeing your project come to life as you imagined it.
If you are looking to hire offshore software developers, you can reach out to us by sharing your requirements. Hiring an offshore team from us will be a productive and constructive way to ensure quality software development. I hope that this has been helpful to you. Please let us know if you have a project you need help with as we are here to help.
If you find this blog useful and are curious to know more about software outsourcing, please go through the below-mentioned blogs.
