How can an offshore development team be managed so that its effectiveness and performance are satisfactory for the client?
I’ve been in this field for quite a while, so I can say that it may be very tough at times. As a PM in Qubit Labs, I have been tasked with establishing and managing in-house and offshore software development center/nearshore software development teams for several clients. I have accumulated vast experience in what works and what doesn’t.
Now I successfully manage two remote offshore development teams – one for game development outsourcing service and another for web development.
Here I share some of my best practices and lessons learned from team building and management of remote staff for advanced performance and avoidance of dreadful, but nevertheless too common, underwater stones.
3 Popular Software Development Methodologies
The way you staff your remote department depends, first of all, on the software development methodology your company pursues when you build an offshore software development team.
There are different types, and I can’t think of any ideal one, but the most popular approaches today include >Agile, SCRUM, and KANBAN.
Let’s discuss each of them in a bit more detail.
Agile
The Agile management ideology is very common in software development today; it is the basis of managing offshore software development teams’ best practices in many companies.
The cornerstones of Agile include prioritization of the client’s needs, regular and frequent delivery of product results, frequent release of the working product, close collaboration between business and development, communication, project flexibility, simplicity, self-organizing staff, and systematic review and correction of work.
SCRUM
Another way to manage a remote dedicated team is SCRUM, an Agile methodology.
Companies working with SCRUM have SCRUM masters and product owners on their teams. The development process includes mandatory stages of product planning, daily meetings, and retrospectives, as well as such artefacts as the product backlog, sprint, and increment.
KANBAN
KANBAN is also an Agile methodology; it originated in the 1950s in Japan.
Its name means a “signboard,” the primary point of the methodology’s implementation.
The main signboard of the project always features its backlog filled with tasks for further execution.
Neighboring columns include completed tasks, tasks in progress, those ready for testing, those undergoing testing, and those under the PM’s review.
Each column has a particular coefficient that indicates the maximum number of processes for implementation.
However, it’s vital to remember that KANBAN works well for offshore development teams of up to 5 members; the complexity of process tracking and evaluation grows with larger numbers of people.
Offshore Development Team Structure – Main Project Roles
One of the secrets to managing an offshore software development team is to distribute roles properly. Based on my experience of working with remote staff, I distinguish five key roles:
Product Owner
This role is strategically important in software development projects as it guarantees that the staff understands and adheres to the product vision, all decisions are made on time, and critical feedback from the client arrives on time.
Moreover, this person is responsible for maximizing the project’s ROI and managing the product’s backlog.
Project Manager (PM)
The PM communicates with all stakeholders of the project and manages the work done on it. In most cases, PMs perform a variety of functions on the project ranging from staff recruitment to task assignment; they also report progress to the client or the product owner.
The key spheres of PM’s responsibilities include managing the budget and deadlines; additional areas involve managing risks and addressing problems.
Technical Lead
Development starts when business needs are broken down into technical processes for their achievement; this is what a technical lead does.
Once the work breakdown structure is produced, the technical lead’s task is to oversee the daily development work and report to the PM.
Software Developer
Developers use the instructions of their technical lead to perform the development tasks.
They complete assigned tasks, warn the lead and PM about possible troubles and bottlenecks, and report progress.
Software Tester
As soon as development is over, testers check the technical product’s compliance with the initially formulated business requirements.
They also verify the product’s quality and detect bugs for troubleshooting before its release.
These roles are hierarchical; the product owner guides the entire process, while the PM is accountable for the project’s progress to the product owner.
The PM, in turn, oversees the work of the technical lead, developers, and testers, while developers are directly accountable to their lead.
Testers report detected bugs to developers.
10 Secrets to Successful Managing of Offshore Development Teams
To understand how to manage a development team, you need to implement the following secrets, which I learned while working for Qubit Labs.
They work in all situations and help achieve outstanding work results.
- Select staff thoroughly. Not all people can work remotely. An ability to handle such jobs depends on specific soft skills such as responsibility, advanced and clear written expression, and self-organization. Qubit Labs recruits candidates for their clients’ remote staff based on these soft skills. All teams work from our office, so strictly speaking, it’s not freelance work from one’s home, where one finds it hard to concentrate. Here we have an HR who monitors the staff’s morale. However, even for our remote staff, we select individuals thoroughly by considering multiple layers of their skills and abilities.
- Onboard remote employees: I firmly believe proper offshore software development team management can’t be done without the staff’s effective onboarding. A perfect solution is to familiarize the in-house and remote staff on day one of their collaboration on the project so that all of them know their responsibilities and tasks. They should all understand to whom to turn in case they need a vacation or a sick leave, as well as obtain access to all required systems and get their corporate emails for internal communication. Creating a water cooler chat for communication between the two teams is also a great idea.
- Communicate effectively The most challenging part of working with a remote offshore software development team is communication. To be more precise, for most projects, this is the only problem that is uncommon for collocated teams. You are not always in personal contact, and this may get even worse if you are in different time zones. Project management requires lots of communication regarding the details of tasks, and it is very important to get back to any previously described details. Here is some advice on how to make your communication more efficient:
- Avoid working via email and transfer all feature-related conversations directly to your team’s task-tracking software (for example, TFS, JIRA, Redmine, etc.).
- Avoid undocumented management, especially via phone or video chat with someone from the team. Here’s a list of technologies that allow real-time communication. Chats and apps register every single word written, so you won’t waste time on meeting notes.
- Use voice or video calls for meetings with your offshore software development team’s management and heads. Always hold these meetings at the exact time so that everyone is fully prepared and all the questions for the day or week can be managed at one time, again, to save time and funds.
- Don’t oversupervise. If you overmanage them, they will become slower and more focused on satisfying you than providing better software. Your team should know their KPIs and benchmarks, and you should go more in-depth only if there are any real problems with them.
- Arrange working visits
If possible, welcome the remote staff to your office and let them work with the in-house staff for a few days. This will achieve greater collaboration and better team building.
- Create offshore software development team rituals
Work is not only about work; people need socialization and small rituals to feel appreciated and live a full working life. So, I strongly believe in the need for rituals that work well for remote staff. For instance, it may be a Monday standup with all in-house and remote developers, meeting online and discussing the project’s progress in an informal, “lean coffee” atmosphere. I also try to foster one-on-one events to avoid overloading the staff with redundant meetings but ensure closer personal contact between remote engineers and the client’s in-house developers. - Set clear requirements
One of my best practices for managing an offshore software development team is to set clear tasks without ambiguity. Voice all your expectations, preferably in writing, so that the team and the project’s execution are controlled without excessive interference. Set up a task manager or organize e-mail communication properly, and you will avoid much trouble. It also helps you to self-manage by reviewing what you are doing and whether you made yourself clear to all subordinates. - Give and receive feedback
Everyone needs feedback. It may take the form of weekly meetings where you discuss the project’s progress or one-on-one meetings (held once a month or even rarer). Remember that when it comes to feedback, it’s critical to give it and ask the team for their feedback. That’s the golden rule for building trustful relations. - Automate routine
Automate and simplify everything you can. When you select the task manager or any other piece of software, pay attention to its user-friendliness and how long it may take to master it. Don’t urge staff to waste too much time on non-core tasks. - Plan your schedule
If your hiring model is nearshore outsourcing – no problem, your schedules will coincide. But if the teams are separated by far distances, your time zones will differ greatly. Plan the work schedule in such a way that teams overlap for at least a couple of hours. The more time they have to collaborate, the better. Another best practice for managing an offshore development team is not to appoint meetings for overtime; it’s ideal if the meetups are convenient for all staff. I also recommend informing all employees in advance so that they have enough time to get ready. - Avoid the offshore software development team syndrome
A company or a PM should never divide teams into insiders and outsiders to build a strong culture in a team of offshore developers. Your remote staff are full-fledged members of your company, so distribute resources evenly among them: invite them to meetings, give them a raise, issue bonuses.Never pin dull tasks on remote developers while reserving the fun stuff for the in-house programmers. If you do so, you risk losing staff (turnover drains financial resources) and reputation.
Don’t Go Too Far with the Management of the Offshore Software Development Team!
Management is cool, and with business processes becoming increasingly complex daily, you can’t do without it.
But it is effective if exercised in moderation; surprisingly, it doesn’t work once you cut too fat.
Developers are people who love to have a certain degree of freedom.
If they have it, they feel your trust and perform much better.
So, what can you do not to piss your developers off and preserve a loyal, well-functioning team?
First, I want to learn to understand the mindset of remote coders better.
They hate when:
- Requirements and tasks change too often
We all hate uncertainty at work, and programmers are no different. They wish to plan tasks and workloads in advance to manage them effectively while changing tasks and tossing requirements, which may distract anyone. - They are provided with crucial data not on time
Imagine a situation: you go to a shop to buy a vacuum cleaner. Your wife asked you to and explained some key features it should possess. You spend two hours in the shop and finally select the best one. Once you leave the shop, your wife calls you and tells you she remembered the model she wanted. Will you be mad? Sure you will! The same happens with programmers who rack their brains on solving some project-related tasks, and then the client provides them with details that mean redoing all that stuff. - They are distracted from work by too frequent meetups
Agile management is effective and progressive; it makes a difference in managing offshore software development teams. Meetups are the cornerstone of effective in-house and outsourced staff management, but be reasonable when scheduling them! If your staff spends the lion’s share of their working day at the meetings, they will simply have no time to move the project further! - They are not trusted
Again, the issue of personal freedom is what I touched upon above. People who work under the close gaze of their manager perform worse because they feel nervous and don’t want to take responsibility. Once you let go of some control and let people take the initiative, they will reward you with outstanding performance. - They are micromanaged
Engineers and programmers are specific people who need the freedom to be creative and resourceful. Don’t breathe down their necks, and they will work much better. - Their opinion is ignored
Participatory management is king; once you include your staff in the decision-making process, your gains will be enormous. People appreciate respect for their opinions, and once they assume ownership of the project, they start going the extra mile for its success. - They lack technical resources
Once you hire a team for completion of a specific project, make sure that they possess all resources needed for it. Discovering the lack of software or hardware in the middle of the project is a problem since purchasing it may take time.
Tools for Managing Offshore Development Teams
Your development team’s successful and smooth performance greatly depends on how you manage it.
Choosing the right tools for communication and tracking will help you run your team efficiently.
Communication Tools to Manage Offshore Software Development Team
- Emails are good for official requests and important information when you don’t need an instant reply.
Chats:
- Google Hangouts (send messages, videos, pics, or use voice mail for communication);
- Slack (shared space for communication with a searchable archive of conversations);
- Workplace (connect whole organization, create group chats and live videos).
Video chats:
- Skype (the most reliable video chatting tool for any platform);
- FaceTime (simple and free app for Mac users).
2) Workflow Tools
Screen capture tools:
- Snagit (captures a full screen or a part of it);
- Skitch (capture screen and add notes, commentaries, and sketches).
Collaboration documents:
- Google Docs (allows real-time collaboration for creating documents, spreadsheets and presentations);
- EtherPad (tool for working with plain text documents that saves and restores revisions);
- Zoho (create spreadsheets, documents, and databases for a single person or a group of people).
Tracking Tools:
- nTask (free Agile project management software to track projects, tasks, meetings, timesheets, bugs/issues and project risks);
- TrackingTime (user-friendly app for all platforms);
- Harvest (compatible with the majority of project management tools);
- Scoro (time tracking and time billing).
So, let’s sum up: managing an outsourced software development team is quite easy, especially if you have experience managing your own business teams.
The most problematic aspects of such collaboration are distance, lack of personal contact, and possible cultural or social differences, although these are easy to overcome. If your company is a startup, check out more tips here.
However, any problem like this will be overcome by the privileges of working with an experienced offshore software development team: if managed correctly, you will end up with lots of funds saved and a much better final product in much less time.
Instead of the constant usual problems of having your own team, you just need to get people to know your goals and support them in their work to achieve trouble-free success.
If you don’t want to learn how to avoid problems with outsourced web, software, and mobile development, choose Qubit Labs. Feel free to contact us and ask questions about dedicated developers and how to hire a remote developers.
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