Agile Offshore Software Development: How to Make it Work for Your Business?

In the tech community, the word "Agile" has become synonymous with the concepts of innovation and efficiency. Now that the market speeds are insane, the only way for business managers to keep up with growing user needs is by constantly delivering new features and builds.

Naturally, for the companies that have in-house teams, it might be either to set up processes that go in line with Agile methodologies. But, can agile development work with offshore resources?

In this post, we will elaborate on the benefits of Agile offshore web development and describe the practices that promote flexibility and interdependence within a remote team.

Choosing a team of professionals who are willing to comply with Agile principles is a way to take the control issue off the manager's place — it promotes continuous feedback and encourages programmers to communicate with project stakeholders.

Let's take a closer look at the benefits of Agile offshore development.

Although Agile is one of the most goal-driven and transparent methodologies out there, business owners eventually discover that implementing its principles isn't a straightforward task.

Here's the rundown of main issues managers and business owners face during Agile implementation for custom software development outsourcing.

Connecting offshore development with agile means offering a new technology to a team who used to work differently for years. The main problem is that you will not be building your team from the ground up. Instead, you will attempt to introduce a set of new practices to a team who may have worked differently for years.

While project managers might agree to implementing Agile fairly easily, the full weight of change falls on developers' shoulders — not all are happy to carry it. Some programmers might be against the practice of continuous delivery, show up to meetings reluctantly, and slack off on documentation.

Solution: show benefits and facilitate training. When introducing Agile to outsourcing vendors, other than discussing the process with project managers, schedule a meeting with the development team and explain the benefits of Agile to them.

A business owner should remember that Agile can't be expected to set up quickly.

Getting used to such an impactful methodology takes some time — managers need to be ready to provide the time and resources necessary to get the development team up to speed.

Agile projects are built on the backbone of constant interactions and collaboration. Naturally, these practices are not easy to implement when the teams involved in the project are miles and time zones apart.

In such a predicament, both business owners and outsourcing companies eventually grow tired of meetings, start deviating from a previously discussed schedule until the implementation of Agile stalls.

Solution: regular visits to the vendor's location help build a strong relationship between the own offshore development team and in-house departments. There are several ways for business owners to set this up — they can either fly back and forth personally to keep tabs on the project or appoint a partner from the local team to work directly with the outsourcing team.

There are several benefits both of these practices offer:

• Build a strong connection between the main team and the outsourcer.
  
• Provide the vendor with business context and facilitate reaching business objectives.
  
• Give business owners a clear view of the development process and make crises on the vendor's behalf easier to mitigate.
  
• Encourage the outsourcing team to be proactive and prioritize the project.
  

Another reason why agile offshore software development struggles to succeed is the lack of a well-defined, efficient communication strategy. In some cases, business owners are completely cut off from software developers and only communicate with project managers.

Thus, it's next to impossible to understand how the project is progressing and whether the team is passionate about it.

Solution: reassess communication channels. Chances are, your communication with the outsourcer stalls because of ineffective ways chosen to handle it. Here are some tips to proactively reassess the communication strategy between two teams:

• Use one communication tool for all discussions to make sure important information isn't dispersed between several platforms.
  
• Use project management software to track the completion timeline. Asana, Trello, or Jira are a few popular tools top-notch teams use to keep tabs on their projects.
  

Invest in soft skills training. It's no secret that a tech professional is rarely skilled communicators. Learning how to translate tech concepts to business language will take time and training — make sure you offer both to improve communication efficiency.

When praising the productivity of offshore outsourcing, most business owners discuss short-term projects. However, when it comes to long-term offshore software development with agile, both researchers and managers agree on the fact that offshore teams tend to lose their starting efficiency and, in some cases, lag behind the in-house team.

Solution: gear the team up with the right digital resources. The plateau in your team's productivity might have a lot to do with the fact that developers don't understand how their work fits into the bigger picture of your company's success. Here's how you can keep the team motivated:

• Use project management tools for task tracking.
  
• Suggest a reward system to the project manager that would track and offer bonuses to productive employees.
  
• Invest in digital resources — make sure that the team working on the project doesn't
  

Working in a fast-paced environment is one of Agile's poster characteristics. While they help build projects efficiently, the practices of continuous delivery are taxing on tech talent. After months of fast-paced work, teams eventually come to experience agile burnout — a dramatic reduction in productivity and workplace motivation.

Solution: hire a scrum-master. As a business owner, you have a lot of tasks to handle and departments to manage — there's no time to watch out for burnout red flags within the virtual dedicated team. That's why it's better to onboard a professional scrum manager who will make sure that the workload and the stress levels of the tech team are manageable.

Agile is one of the most popular and efficient project management methodologies. As business owners introduce it to outsourcing, challenges might show up along the way but the fundamentals stay constant — through constant collaboration, continuous delivery, and readiness to change your vendor will be able to create top-tier products. Do you want to increase your business revenues with outsource recommender system development services? Contact us now! We have an extensive experience in various projects: offshore mobile app development, monitoring systems development, web development etc.

If you are considering hiring an Agile outsourcing team, it's better to find vendors who have already established the Agile infrastructure. At Fayrix, we have all the needed resources and expertise to handle software development in an agile manner.

To make sure that our tech team and a client share a strong bond, we oversee communication, run regular code reviews, and regularly update stakeholders on development progress. To bring your project to life with a skilled team of Agile tech professionals, leave us a message!