There are too many outsourcing horror stories around, which make companies reluctant to outsource their development or any other projects to a third-party company. However, what the horror stories do not tell, is that in 95%, the failures in software development projects happen because of a poor management of the outsourcing process. Although management and outsourcing are two different things, you need to be familiar with both of them for a successful beginning and end of the outsourcing project.
Here are several key outsourcing project management concepts that will help you get started:
The basics in managing practices
- Communication management - Communication is key to the successful management of an outsourcing project. In the best-case scenario, your company will have a specific communication structure that will help improve the contact between your in-house and outsourcing teams. Having a good communication structure, your team will be able to face the issues faster and more efficiently. There are a number of communication management methodologies developed for specific types of projects
- Relationship management is also important, as it enables the smooth progress of the project. The client should be able to communicate to the outsourcing development team all the expectation from the project, in order to eliminate any misunderstandings
Clear objectives
Another key to a successful software development project is the availability of clear objectives of your outsourcing project. In many cases, businesses decide to outsource their development project to a 3rd party company, because of the issues they face in-house. Before making a decision to outsource a project, you should understand the reason for doing so. The 3 main reasons to consider outsourcing are:
- Meeting deadlines
- Need in experience and expertise
- Need of more human resources
Moreover, before outsourcing any development project, you must be sure that you have time and resources to manage the outsourcing project.
The first steps
After your company has decided to outsource IT project, there are a series of steps to take to assure a successful end-result:
- Formulate a right strategy - You must identify its organizational goals and define the things that need to be achieved from outsourcing: reducing costs, meeting deadline, getting expertise, etc.
- Create an action plan - If possible, assign the outsourcing project organization to a dedicated person, who will think through the whole process and define a detailed process for any stage of outsourcing
- Define the scope of the work - You should prepare a list of all the activities that will be outsourced. Based on this list, a documentation for the outsourcing team will be created, which will serve them as a guide for the whole duration of the project
- Choose the right partner - the last and most important step in the phase of preparation is choosing the partner to work with. Be specific in the requirements for your project and choose based on both the experience, feedback and company values. Learn more about how to choose the right outsourcing partner here
Each outsourcing project’s success lies on the partnership of your company and the outsourcing company/individual, thus, if you fail your part, the whole project will be failure