Staff augmentation is a form of outsourcing in which companies hire skilled professionals to work on specific projects. Depending on the size and requirements, companies can either hire professionals independently or they can hire agencies that provide staff augmentation services. Before you adopt this solution model, it is important to understand its meaning and use cases, as well as its benefits and how to get great results by working with an augmented team in your industry.  

What is Staff Augmentation? 

Staff augmentation is an outsourcing model built around augmenting talent for short durations. Companies hire skilled professionals that can deliver on tight deadlines and are experienced enough to understand the nuances of joining a project midway and drive it to completion. As an industry, staff augmentation is growing consistently at a CAGR of 4% and will breach the $90b mark by 2023.  Hiring an agency for the augmentation services is usually the smart way to go about this because of the low turnaround time and access to a wide network of vetted professionals.  

How Does Staff Augmentation Differ From Hiring Freelancers or Independent Contractors?

Hiring freelancers or independent contractors means that you still have to go through the processes of recruitment, managing payroll, doing salary/rate reviews. Additionally, you cannot switch the contractor for another one if you believe they cannot fulfill your project's needs. With staff augmentation, you can hire the person/team that best suits you or switch them to a different resource if you need more skills. Additionally, the augmentation company takes care of the rest while you pay the company an hourly, weekly, or monthly rate.  

Staff Augmentation to the Rescue

Not all types of outsourcing are alike. IT staff augmentation is a rapidly growing industry that helps tech companies of all sizes to bridge their talent gap and deliver projects in time. These team members are skilled, available on-demand, and are ready to take on the challenge without you having to commit to a long-term association with them.     

Why is there a need for Staff Augmentation Services?

There are many scenarios where your organization might find itself in a bind and need additional human resources. 

Talent shortages—a global phenomenon

A recent report by Bloomberg says that over 50% of companies worldwide faced talent shortages due to the limited availability of skilled labor in their vicinity. This problem was extremely pronounced in the U.S. at 69%, followed by Mexico at 52%, Italy at 47%, and Spain at 41%. This is why individuals with technical skills are in extremely high demand worldwide. 

How can companies address their workforce shortage?

There are two ways to address workforce shortages. The first is to hire more employees, and the second option is to outsource your talent requirements to an agency. Although both the options seem doable, let us drill deep to find out what is causing staffing shortages if the solution is simple.

Hiring additional employees

Organizations face a lot of challenges while hiring new employees. These include:

• Budgetary constraints with hiring full-time employees
• Time is taken for the recruitment process
• A limited local talent pool
• Specialists in the area know their worth and are more expensive compared to others

 

What are the Use Cases for Staff Augmentation?

Here are some situations where staff augmentation can help you to easily meet your immediate requirements. You need staff augmentation services if:

•  Require additional members for a project that is facing a temporary resource crunch
•  Bridge the gap while you hire new resources for your team
• Hire specialized or more experienced resources for a limited period—for example, if your project needs a Unity or Perl developer for a particular module
•  Feel the need only to hire talent when you need it—giving you the flexibility to scale up or down on-demand

 

What are the Benefits of Staff Augmentation?

    Staff augmentation offers numerous benefits that cannot be matched by permanently hiring new talent or outsourcing your project to other entities. These benefits include:  

• No administrative overheads

You can hire team members on an hourly, daily or monthly basis, with no commitments to keep them long-term. Your service provider takes care of these employees' payroll, insurance, legality, and team-building activities.  

• Reduced training costs

As you hire experienced professionals who are already well-versed in their domain, all you need to do is familiarize them with your development environment and project goals, and you're good to go. These are trained people who get the job done—fast.  

• Reduced project costs

Hiring a temporary team for a quick overhaul or a bug fix is much cheaper than maintaining a full-time development team for your project. Companies save up to 50% of their costs by hiring augmented staff. You can get the resources you need on-demand, pay them according to the number of hours spent, and that's it.  

• Location no bar

Hire talent from around the world. You no longer need to look around your local talent pool for the resources that your project requires.  

• Talent on-demand

Add or reduce your needs on-demand. Get the flexibility to hire resources exactly when you need them.

 

What kind of Talent Requirements can Staff Augmentation fill?

With staff augmentation, the possibilities are infinite. The very flexibility of this approach gives organizations the capability to fill various roles with diverse talent sets without compromise. Some roles that staff augmentation can easily fill include:   This is just the tip of the iceberg. Staff augmentation can fulfill the roles listed above and many others—ensuring that your organization can scale up or down on-demand.

 

How does an Ideal Staff Augmentation Process work?

Staff augmentation is very similar to a traditional recruitment process, except that you choose from a pool of pre-filtered talent. Here's how this works:  

• Step 1: Gathering requirements

We understand your project requirements, work methodologies, and business goals to ensure that we have the right talent for you.  

• Step 2: Interview the talent you need

We provide you with managed professionals who have the skills you need. You interview the finalized candidates to pick those best suited for the job.  

• Step 3: Start winning with your new A-team

You bring the newly hired resources onboard with a Q&A session to provide clarity and ensure that everyone is on the same page. We ensure that all the cultural, operational, and other policies of your workplace are understood and followed by the new hires. This includes knowing how to log hours, understanding reportage frequency, chain of command, and project, network, and data access.  

• Step 4:Get consistent support

Our client relationship manager will stay in touch with you to ensure that you build a highly productive team with your augmented staff. Your data and systems are kept safe through our access control systems. Additionally, we keep your team members engaged with regular team-building activities.  

What do staff augmentation contracts include?

A staff augmentation contract lists all the terms and conditions that the hiring company and the staff augmentation agency agree to. Here's what these contracts commonly include but may have fewer or more components:  

Note: Please consult your legal team before signing a contract. If you do not have a legal team, speak to a lawyer before signing one.

 

What are the problems associated with staff augmentation?

Although the number of problems faced with staff augmentation is few, you may occasionally run into road bumps due to one of the following reasons:

• Communication

This is a common problem whenever you hire global talent. Whether you're hiring full-time employees or for a temporary gig, communication issues can often create problems at the workplace. 

• Security

Security breaches and data and intellectual property thefts happen more often than you may realize. With incidents of cybercrime and IP theft on the rise, it is necessary for every company to ensure data, network and IP security, especially when dealing with external vendors. At Volumetree, we follow industry-standard best practices to ensure total confidentiality, security and intellectual property protection. We sign an NDA with all our clients to ensure that their information and intellectual property is 100% safe and secure. 

• Efficiency

Your remote workers might not be as efficient as your staff. Building rapport and ensuring that you get the same levels of efficiency from your augmented team can be hit-or-miss if you do not partner with the right agency.  

When should you go in for staff augmentation?

Staff augmentation is a great idea for companies of all sizes if you are planning to add staff for:

• Short-term requirements

Temporary staff requirements or is a cash crunch delaying hiring? Staff augmentation is the way to go for you! If you're hiring team members for the long haul, it is better to hire full-time employees.  

• Projects that are not classified or restricted

If you’re working on a project that has classified info, hire your own team. For everything else, there’s staff augmentation.  

• Immediate, one-time job requirements

Do you need a specific resource or a small team to get a one-time job done quickly? Staff augmentation is the best choice for you! If you wish to permanently hire an entire team, it is better to outsource your project to a third party or hire your own staff.

 

A checklist before you finalize a staff augmentation services vendor

Similar to outsourcing, staff augmentation requires due diligence from your end before you hire the agency. Ensure that you take care of the following:

• Protecting your intellectual property

Keeping your data and IP safe is your responsibility. Sign an NDA with the service provider to safeguard your intellectual property. The resources you shortlist will become a part of your team and will have access to all your data just like your regular employees.

• Ensuring clear payment terms

All payment terms must be clear before you sign a contract with the service provider. This will ensure that there is no confusion and everyone is on the same page.

• Employment benefits and terms

Even though the employees you hire work for you full-time, you must discuss and agree on areas of responsibility, working terms, vacations, and off days with your provider.

• Get the talent you need

Ensure that your provider has a wide selection of talent to ensure that you can get the experience level and expertise you need.

• Switch resources on-demand

Things may not always work out with the team members you hire. You must have the ability to switch developers on-demand if you believe that the individual you shortlisted cannot keep up or is not comfortable with your team.

• Flexibility and multiple pricing tiers

Your service provider must be flexible enough to accommodate your requirements and have multiple pricing tiers that work with your budget.  

Why augment your team with Volumetree

In today's fast-paced world, organizations such as yours require the flexibility to scale up or down according to need. In such cases, staff augmentation becomes a highly beneficial component and strategy for you. Get access to world-class talent at a fraction of the cost involved in hiring your own team, with little to no long-term commitment requirements.  We are an experienced staff augmentation company. With over 5 years of experience dealing with clients worldwide, we know what it takes to provide a world-class staff augmentation experience. If you have a project that needs an A-team to get the job done, let us know. Our large pool of engineers, UI and UX designers, and project managers can help you get the job done, fast! Schedule a quick call with one of our experts to see how we can help you succeed!    

Dubai, UAE: On 20th January 2022, Dubai Startup Hub named Tech Startup EduPloyment the winner of the Dubai Smartpreneur Competition 6.0 for prizes worth a total of AED150,000. The annual award recognizes talented founders from around the globe and promotes entrepreneurship in the Emirate. Diwama– an AI-based image recognition software that automates waste analysis won the second prize. Soul Artists–a commission-free dedicated space for performing artists to manage their bookings and tap into a new pool of growing clients bagged the third prize in the competition. Previous winners include UAE-based startups ProvenMed and Callix and Swedish startup PlasticFri.   https://twitter.com/DubaiStartupHub/status/1486945806599045120   The judges chose 10 finalist startups from a list of 30, shortlisted from 280 smart business solutions operating in trade, opportunity and sustainability. These 10 finalists made their pitch to an expert panel of judges, including Tomaso Rodriguez, CEO of Talabat; Mona Ataya, CEO of Mumzworld; Talal Bayaa, CEO of Bayzat; and Raja Al Mazrouei, Executive VP of FinTech Hive at DIFC. Started in 2016, the competition is a key pillar of Dubai’s entrepreneurship strategy. It aims to encourage innovation and entrepreneurship as the primary driver of Dubai and the UAE's economy. Smartpreneur has seen over 2,000 startups worldwide apply in its last six iterations. H.E. Faisal Belhoul—the board member of Dubai Chambers, noted that 71% of submissions were from the UAE, 10% from South Asia, 7% from the Middle East and 4% from Africa.  

Meet the Founders

At the helm of EduPloyment are its two founders, Mazen Omair and Rana A. Batterjee. They're challenging the conventional model of building a business by working for a positive impact. EduPloyment's mission is to uplift blue-collar workers from poverty by training and educating them for employment. And on the business side, providing companies with better-trained employees. Mazen Omair is the co-founder and CEO of EduPloyment. He is a successful entrepreneur, a visionary leader, and a top executive with 30+ years of experience in leading $billions in operations. Mazen is well known for his integrity, initiative, and ability to transform teams. Rana A. Batterjee is the co-founder and Chief Purpose Officer of EduPloyment. Rana is an expert strategist with 17+years of experience shaping the growth and management of companies. On top of her entrepreneurial feats, Rana is also an accomplished Audiologist. EduPloyment uses technology to provide better livelihoods for workers and connect employers with trained talent. All this while creating a profitable business model. The two founders got this idea while at a conference where they learned the concept of a purpose-driven business that solves a world problem while generating profits.

 

EduPloyment's Vision

EduPloyment is inspired by the idea of using web and mobile apps to uplift blue-collar workers and help them find meaningful employment while also providing employers a new avenue for hiring. Using an intelligent global online training and recruitment program, EduPloyment's mission is to upskill these workers with soft skills that provide them access to better jobs locally and abroad— creating social impact by uplifting their families out of poverty and providing better livelihoods.  

The Problem

Team EduPloyment found that blue-collar workers were often exploited due to the following reasons:

1. The candidates could not access well-paying jobs
2. They lacked English language skills that are essential for most well-paying jobs
3. They did not have the funds to pay employment agencies for these jobs. This fee typically ranges between $900-$3,000

Additionally, EduPloyment noticed that employers looking for blue-collar employees were unable to get suitable candidates for the job. The reasons for this problem include:

1. Tedious, time-consuming processes for sourcing, interviewing and hiring blue-collar workers
2. Agencies provided scores of low-quality or unqualified personnel that further increased hiring time
3. High costs of hiring agencies that source these candidates

The Solution

EduPloyment leveraged the penetration of smartphones in underprivileged populations to deliver their solution and ensure that the right candidate applies for the right job.

To do this, they :

1. Use mobile apps to disrupt the nexus of recruitment agencies in the hiring process
2. Engage candidates in their native language to improve communication with them
3. Use simple techniques such as introductory videos and photos to speed up the CV creation process
4. Add English proficiency tests and personality assessments to create benchmarks
5. Use an advanced learning management system that interactively trained candidates in English, improving their chances of getting a well-paying job

Their solutions ensures:

1.       Candidates save up to 80% in hiring costs by eliminating intermediaries and agencies from the process
2.       Companies gain access to qualified candidates that fit their job roles perfectly
3.       Eliminate travel time and costs by using video interviews

 

Creating a purpose-driven technology platform with Volumetree

EduPloyment partnered with Volumetree for their startup idea and our co-founders immediately connected with it. The concept was a challenge—as it was a new take on how organizations traditionally approached CSR (corporate social responsibility). They wanted to use tech to create a purpose-driven business that solves a world problem while generating profit. Our MVP Development experts worked with EduPloyment to brainstorm and create a research framework to build their Android app and website. Both the app and the website helps blue-collar workers to quickly and easily perform the following tasks:

• Learn about EduPloyment
• Sign up with EduPloyment
• Acquire language proficiency through modules available in the app
• Create a CV and a self-introductory video
• Get certified through EduPloyment
• Perform a self-assessment personality test
• Apply for jobs and take interviews online

We performed extensive research to ensure that the app was intuitive and straightforward to best suit the needs of its target audience. Our designer and development teams worked together to create an intuitive user experience that helped over 6,600 individuals successfully sign up for EduPloyment in just six weeks.   

Build Winning Tech Products with Volumetree

At Volumetree, we’re thrilled to see our customers win. It showcases our commitment to quality, reliability, and building tech ideas for entrepreneurs worldwide. Millions of people use our apps and digital platforms every day to lead healthier lives, be more efficient at work, and create a positive impact on society. Our teams tackle challenging aspects of building a digital product—and we never settle until we’ve transformed an idea into something truly spectacular. Want to build winning tech products? Tell us your requirements - let's build together.      

Who doesn't want to get fit? I know that my couch-hugging, binge-watching, serial-coding, startup-enabling self definitely does. For most of us in the IT world, fitness was a resolution that had been pushed to the nice-to-have bucket—permanently. But when the COVID-19 pandemic hit, going out and hitting the pub each weekend—or every night became impossible. This is also somewhere around when we had a good look at our bodies and decided to devote this sudden bout of free time to fitness. Around this time, search volumes for how much it costs to make a fitness app increased dramatically—signalling an entrepreneurial beeline to create the next disruptor in the fitness space. Nearly everyone attributes fitness to spending hours in the gym. With this free time on our hands and gyms being out of reach, many of us started to download fitness apps to understand how we could fix our bodies after years of abuse and neglect.

What are fitness apps? Are they still popular today?

Fitness apps are mobile (or wearable) applications that help you to stay fit by setting fitness goals, helping you monitor and log what you eat, and starting targeted fitness regimens. These apps have seen a sudden spurt in their adoption rates, with the number of fitness downloads rising by 46% worldwide. Developing countries like India saw fitness app adoption rates increase by 156% in 2020 alone, adding over 58 million users to the fitness bandwagon.  A survey by OnePoll found that at least 74% of Americans used at least one fitness app during the quarantine. Over 60% of these users enjoyed using these apps so much that they cancelled their gym membership permanently. With extended work from home timelines, the number of those choosing virtual fitness classes and home gyms has doubled, making it an extremely lucrative industry to be in. The online fitness and fitness app industry is growing at a healthy CAGR of 23.5% and may breach the $14b mark by 2027—or earlier! 

Why should you build a fitness app?

According to the WHO, nearly 39% of individuals over 18 are overweight—and over 15% are obese. The report also stated that 39 million children under the age of 5 are obese in 2020. This makes fitness a primary concern for the world—and fitness apps are a perfect way to address this concern. A report from Reports and Data expects the fitness app market to grow from $4b to $18 billion by 2028.  The revenue from fitness apps will cross $14 billion by 2021—with an ARPU of $22.21 per user, making it an extremely viable option for any entrepreneur. Apps such as MyFitnessPal, Strava, Step Counter, Six Pack in 30 Days, and We Do Pulse are extremely popular today, with downloads breaching the 3 million mark in April 2021 for Step Counter alone. So if you're thinking of developing a fitness app, this is the perfect time to do so!

What problems do fitness apps solve?

We have always strived to long a long, healthy life, and fitness apps help us to do just that from the comfort of our home. With no trainers to meet in person, fitness apps are perfect for those who wish to stay fit and stay at home at the same time. Social features in these apps have given rise to fitness events, virtual treadmill marathons, virtual cyclothons and fitness challenges that are immensely popular. 

What are the various types of fitness apps?

Entrepreneurs build fitness apps to suit specific requirements. Many individuals use just one app to stay fit, and some use a combination of apps to suit their various needs. Types of fitness apps include:

• Fitness Coaching apps: These fitness apps provide their users with a workout plan, a controlled exercise technique and a meal plan—somewhat like a personal coach. Popular apps include FiiT, Daily Burn, Seven, and FitBod.
• Workout management apps: Workout apps help users to choose and track workouts from a list. The app also provides activity related data and can even connect to smart wearables. Top workout management apps include MyFitnessPal, JEFIT workout planner, BodySpace, Cody and Nike+.
• Nutrition apps: These apps focus on our dietary behaviour and help users to log their food consumption data. Some even provide diet plans for targeted weight loss, muscle building, and calorie data. Notable examples include Fooducate, HealthifyMe, Calorie Counter and Diet Tracker, and SuperFood.
• Activity trackers: These apps track activities such as walking, running, steps, cycling, rowing and can offer data such as routes, calories burned, distance, time and more. Popular activity trackers include Google Fit, Apple Health, Strava, and MyFitnessPal.

What are the top features of a fitness app?

Fitness apps offer many unique features, which help them to become the top choice for their users. These features include:

1. Wearable connectivity - As the adoption of wearables has skyrocketed, your app must connect to popular wearables such as the Apple Watch, Fitbit, Garmin, Samsung Watch, Huawei Watch and more.
2. Goals - A fitness goal is essential to ensure that you're on the right path. Your app must help users to set goals, reward accomplishments and stay in shape.
3. Workout lists - A wide range of workout types is essential to ensure that users like your app. If your app is restrictive in the type of workouts, it will become challenging to increase adoption rates.
4. Calorie counter - Calorie counters are essential for fitness and nutrition-focused apps as they allow users to see how much they are eating and how much they burn. This feature takes 100 hours to develop.
5. Push Notifications - Push notifications such as "Get up and move for 5 minutes" or "It is time to go to bed" are popular amongst fitness app and wearable users. These features make your app engaging and take about 120 hours to develop.
6. Social media integration - Joining a vibrant community and sharing achievements is essential for any app user. Adding this feature will take nearly 200 hours.
7. Gamification - For a fitness app, gamification means adding features such as badges, high scores, levels, challenges and other motivational means to keep your audience engaged. This feature can take up to 200 hours to develop.
8. Logins and SSO - Creating user accounts, profiles, and social media login is a basic necessity for any app. These features help users log in using social media accounts or email accounts and create their user profiles. The app also uses this information to create workout regimens and recommendations. Login systems take 150 hours to develop.
9. Educational content and video lessons - Fitness apps also feature instructor-led content and training videos that help users to follow instructions and exercises better. This feature will take nearly 200 hours to develop.
10. Geolocation and maps - Most outdoor workout apps require geolocation data and map integration for route planning and analysis. Adding this feature will take around 200 hours.

How much does it cost to create a mobile fitness app?

Creating a fitness app needs more than just a list of features. Here's what impacts the cost of your fitness app:

• Requirement analysis and project management

Considered one of the most important parts of the mobile app development process, our consultants and project managers will help you create a long-term vision for your app. We will then finalize a list of components and understand what your application's must-haves are. This takes nearly 100-200 hours. 

• User experience design

Designing an effective user experience for your mobile app is essential to ensure that users stay engaged from the get-go. User experience design involves multiple iterations to develop a UX that works best for your target audience. This can take nearly 100-250 hours.

• User interface design

Your app's user interface involves designing the various elements that make the app, including graphics, buttons, and other design elements. An attractive user interface or UI design ensures that your app looks appealing.

• Development

The time taken in the development of your app will depend on the number of features it includes. This will include back-end development, front-end development and readying the app for deployment to the app stores. Time taken to develop the app will vary. Add the number of hours indicated against the feature list. 

• Testing

Quality is an essential aspect of any mobile app. Our QA teams will ensure that your app is high-quality and bug-free so that your users enjoy using it. Testing can take up to 100 hours to complete.

• Deployment and integration

Deploying the app to the App store includes readying the app and ensuring that it adheres to all guidelines laid down by Apple and Android. Additionally, setting up the subsystems (DevOps) can take up to 100 hours. To get a ballpark figure of your app's cost, simply add the features and the time taken along with the fixed project costs (listed above) and multiply it with the going hourly rate of your development provider. The hourly rates of development providers can vary according to their geographical location. Note that these rates are for a single platform. If you wish to have an app developed for iOS and Android, your costs will increase. However, the fixed project costs will remain the same.

How to create a mobile fitness app?

Here's what you need to do to create an engaging fitness app:

1. Perform market research and finalize features

Performing diligence and market research is essential to develop a fitness app. Market research will help you to answer questions such as:

• Who is your target audience?
• What are their underserved needs?
• What needs does your app serve?
• How can you monetize your app?

And more. Once your market research is complete, you will find yourself with a list of must-have features for your app.

2. Get a good development team on board

There are many ways to get a development team for your app. These include:

• Hiring your personal team - This is the most expensive option as you need to hire project managers, developers, testers and support staff for your app.
• Finding freelancers in your area - Freelancers can offer a good rate, but often are a one-person army that promises a lot and cannot deliver at par with an entire group of individuals. Best for small projects, but not for complex apps like a fitness tracker.
• Outsourcing your project to a third-party development agency

This is the most cost-effective option to help you find the right person for the right job without breaking the bank. World-class outsourcing companies such as Volumetree can help you get the talent you need to succeed.

3. Analyze and discover requirements

The discovery phase builds upon your market research to perform an in-depth analysis of your project. Here’s what it includes:

• Analyzing requirements

Project consultants and business analysts perform a detailed analysis to determine what your app needs. They analyze features, business goals, and the monetization strategy in place for your target audience.

• Creating wireframes

Wireframing is essential to see how one element of the interface interacts with the other and how the app “flows”. 

• Performing pre-development QA

Pre-dev QA analyses your requirements and wireframes to ensure that no logical or flow issues exist in the wireframe and nothing is amiss in the requirements.

• Final quote

Your development partner will create a final quote for you based on the discovery phase. If you choose to hire your own team, you will get a cost analysis to check if it meets your budget.

4. Develop the app

This is the easy bit. Once all the bits and bobs are in place, developers, testers, designers and DevOps engineers work in tandem to create a world-class fitness app for your users. That’s it. Once you develop, test and deploy the app, you can roll it out to your users. Additional tasks that follow or work concurrently with development include marketing activities, audience outreach, building hype for your app and creating a community of early adopters. 

Why choose Volumetree to create your mobile app?

Choosing Volumetree as your development partner has several advantages. Being a truly global company with offices across three continents, we can offer you a price-quality advantage that few can match. With our vast industry experience of creating apps used by millions of people every day, along with a vast talent pool to choose from, we know what it takes to create an awesome app. What’s better is that we have the workforce to make it happen for you!  Contact us for a free consultation today to know more about how much it costs to make a fitness app. Our project managers and consultants will help you to create an app that fitness enthusiasts will love!