| Staff augmentation is straightforward. Your project team may be fully staffed except for a specific position or set of positions. For whatever reason, your company cannot staff the position or prefers not to. The solution is to seek out a firm that provides qualified individuals to augment your staff. You identify the requirements and skills needed for the position, negotiate a rate, and conduct interviews. The best candidate then joins the project. Usually, staff augmentation is used to fill full-time positions. The person (or persons) joins the project team and functions just as the other team members, except her paycheck comes from a different company. Her daily tasks are determined and reviewed by the same managers as those for the rest of the team. She works in the same location as the rest of the team and is considered a peer by the other team members. The management of the company providing the resource stays on the periphery of the engagement. The consultant may provide periodic status reports to her company's management. The staff augmentation firm touches base with the project manager (in other words, the client) to verify that the consultant is providing satisfactory results. Using staff augmentation in this manner provides the following benefits: The client can seek consultants who already have the skills needed for the position, rather than expending time and resources training existing staff. If the consultant does not perform well, it is much easier to try another consultant than to fire an employee of the company. For specialized skills, hiring a new employee may not make sense. The specific skills may not be applicable to other projects at the company, so after the project is completed, no other projects are available for the employee to leverage her talents. Using a consultant solves this problem. A consultant can transfer knowledge to other members of the team, thus helping employees of the company acquire new skills. Introducing new talent on a project team (particularly if the consultant is enthusiastic and energetic and has special skills) can motivate the rest of the project team.
There are certain cautions to consider when using other firms to augment your staff: Staff augmentation is not contractually the same as a subcontracting arrangement. The original project team is still completely responsible for performance of the project contract. In other words, if the consultant fails to perform and causes the team to miss deliveries, the company owning the project team is responsible. In addition to technical qualifications, make sure that the consultant subscribes to similar philosophies and opinions regarding the methodologies and environment in use on the project. In other words, if the project development environment is run on a Windows platform, make sure the consultant is happy with this arrangement, in addition to being technically qualified. For example, you do not want a UNIX aficionado working on a team of Windows enthusiasts, even if the consultant can use Windows effectively, because this can result in tension on the team. However, this does not apply to expert consultants (as opposed to staff augmentation consultants). Expert consultants are used when it may be desirable to push a team outside its comfort zone. For staff augmentation, you want the consultant to blend in with the rest of the team. Monitor a new consultant closely. Although it's rare, consultants sometimes push their own agenda within the project team, attempting to sell products and more services to the point of disrupting the project team. Certainly, the consultant should promote her own company's services if a need is clearly identified, but the focus should always be on the tasks assigned. In rare cases, I have seen a consultant recruit members of the project team to work for the consultant's company! Such consultants should be promptly escorted to the exit. Monitor the members of your project team who work closely with the consultant, and watch the quality of their interaction. If team members are actively interacting with the consultant, this is a good sign. If there are indications that the team members are not getting along, you should investigate. In the event of personality conflicts, you need to decide whether the situation can be peacefully resolved. If not, the team could be restructured to separate the conflicting personalities, but in general, situations that cannot be resolved mean that the consultant needs to leave. Try another consultant. Give consultants in staff augmentation mode (meaning that they are working full-time on your project) the same amenities as the rest of the project team. In other words, if each team member has his own cubicle, provide one for the consultant. The same goes for supplies and equipment. The purpose is to create an environment that encourages team building. In other words, each member of the team should be treated the same, regardless of who signs his paycheck. Be careful not to use too many consultants on the same project team. When there are more consultants than actual employees, the team dynamics may suffer. Consultants have their own agenda. They may not share the same sense of urgency in making the project successful. When circumstances force you to use a large number of consultants, the project manager should be particularly vigilant for signs of lack of urgency on the team. Provide very clear goals, and establish a sense of mission for the team. Another option is to set up a subcontracting arrangement and allow the subcontractors to choose and control their own team.
Staff augmentation is not always the best solution to supplement your team's talents. Perhaps, you have a specific problem to solve that requires highly specialized skills to come up with a specific solution. After the problem is solved, the team can apply the solution to accomplish the project's goals. An expert consultant (sometimes called a subject matter expert) may be appropriate to solve this problem. |
