Software Development Outsourcing Guidance

In my experience, more than half the time, it is possible to fix existing relationships by improving processes, communications, and augmenting your current team with missing skill sets. This is the lowest risk, and often the best option if the situation will allow it.

Before you do anything else, make sure you have control of your software source code and documentation. You need to own and control the repository in which your intellectual property lives (often on services like GitHub, Bitbucket, GitLab, or on-premises systems.) I can help you navigate the waters to accomplish this. Then, we need to look at why a team change is necessary and work carefully to migrate work to a new, better-aligned team. Please contact me to discuss this situation. I will keep all details of our conversation private.

If you are already working with an outsourcing company that you are happy with, I can work with them. I can also help you vet and benchmark new companies to see how well they align with your needs and how they stack up relative to other companies that I know well. The only thing I will not do is work with a company where I have had a bad experience in the past. (I also don’t go back to restaurants where I have had food poisoning in the past!)

In the US market, it can take months to hire a small but highly skilled software team, and you are competing against thousands of companies who also want to hire (or hire away) comparable developers. Outsourced software development companies can build and scale overseas teams much more quickly and keep the team staffed over time. Overseas software engineers are generally less expensive than US-based, but the game today is about time-to-scale and time-to-market and less about cost arbitrage.

In the short term, hiring an experienced, independent, US-based advisor like me costs considerably more than depending solely on the resources provided by an outsourcing company. In the long run, my clients typically save many multiples of my consulting fees. In many cases, my clients can ship software that they would never have completed without my help. I encourage you to learn more about my background and see what my clients say about working with me.

Since 1999 I have spent about half of my time overseas on various software development projects. I’m an American and a US citizen, but I have lived and worked in six Indian cities and the Himalayan country of Bhutan. Over the last fifteen years, there has been an accelerating shift in the global software outsourcing industry away from India and toward Eastern and Central Europe and Latin America. My career has followed this trend. In addition to extensive work in India, I have provided oversight for teams in Hungary, Moldova, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, and Ukraine, as well as Argentina, Brazil, Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico, and recently South Africa. I continue to develop relationships with Indian companies and companies in the broader Asia-Pacific region, including Vietnam, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and Australia. I have the most experience in India, followed by Ukraine, Hungary, and Poland.

I improve software development outcomes by concentrating on a few interrelated services and specialties. The four skill sets illustrated above describe my four areas of expertise and how they connect. A deep grounding in software engineering and development practices are needed to manage software outsourcing successfully. Validation of security and code quality are needed to deliver robust products, provide feedback to developers, and provide objective controls for investors and founders. None of these things matter if you build the wrong product for the market, which is why an understanding of Product Development/Product Management is essential.

Said another way, you can’t select the right technology without understanding the product requirements. You can’t choose the right outsourced development team without knowing the technology stack. You can’t know if your team is implementing your product well without review. You need deep technology skills and experience to understand technical reviews and improve the entire process. The skill set I bring to the table includes these four interlocking elements used to improve software development outcomes. Over the years, as one area has become stronger, the others have also strengthened and matured since they are interconnected.

I use these four skill sets to deliver three services on a consulting basis: Outsourcing Guidance for medium to large-sized software businesses (described above), Consulting CTO for software startups, and Software Investor Services, including code reviews and due diligence.

Learn more about me and my background and check out my testimonials to see what my clients think about working with me.

Yes. Outsourcing engagement models can be complicated, and there are multiple ways to balance risk and value. I can work with your team to evaluate the impact of these models. Typical software outsourcing pricing models include time and materials, fixed cost, cost-plus, performance-based, shared risk-reward, and various hybrids. It is also critical to know cost benchmarks for the different markets in Asia, Eastern Europe, and Latin America, where most software outsourcing now occurs.

I provide services as an independent consultant. My clients engage me either on a project basis or on a retainer basis. Most companies hire me to work on a project-basis initially and then switch to an ongoing retainer model once we have worked together successfully through multiple projects. Projects have fixed fees based on achieving objectives that we agree on in advance. A retainer allows unlimited access to me for advice or consultation by designated people at your organization.

I encourage (and assist) my clients in engaging and paying their outsourced software development firms directly. I do not act as a financial pass-through to outsourcing companies. Companies pay me directly either for specific projects or on retainer.

After many years of consulting, I have stopped accepting work on a time-and-materials basis. Here’s why: I don’t want my clients to feel like they are making an investment decision every time they may need my help, and I don’t want to be seen as self-aggrandizing when I realize that I need to put in more time to get the best outcome. My clients are always best served by a fast improvement or resolution, not a slow one. After completing dozens of time-and-materials-based projects, I have come to realize that pricing by time unit is a fundamental misalignment. So I’ve stopped doing it.

Here is how the process now works: You reach out to me via my contact page. We have a video conference and possibly follow-up calls to determine if we are a good fit for each other. When I have enough information, I’ll make a project proposal that typically has multiple options, each with a fixed fee based on the value delivered. Want to learn more? Give me a shout!