How to Manage an Offshore Software Development Team?

Hiring an offshore software development team can add success to your business by finding new methods and strategies to speed up the work. However, managing an offshore team of technical experts from different parts of the globe is not an easy task.

From keeping a track record of work to getting work done according to a particular work style, culture, and time zone, there are countless numbers of tasks that you have to manage as a team leader. So, to help you out, here we’re going to give a few tips that you can use to handle your offshore software development team.

Tips for handling the offshore development team

Time zones

One of the biggest hurdles that come in the smooth workflow of an offshore software development company is the time. In order to know the progress report and exchange of information regarding project development in real-time is crucial. Since two different countries operate at different timings, it is crucial to identify the overlapping working hours when you and your offshore team can be available at the same time.

The best way to organize the work is by using modern tools such as Google Calendar. It helps you to know the public holidays and PL of the employees. You can also rely on other apps to form a schedule of the work of different branches.

Communicate Regularly

The success of an offshore software team depends on how effectively you communicate with them. Goals, expectations, and the requirements of the project should be thoroughly explained to the team members. In order to avoid any confusion, it is crucial to answering the queries properly. You can engage in video conferences and phone calls to clear the doubts of the projects.

Apart from this, consider the language barrier. It might happen that your members don’t know your language and vice-versa. In this situation, hiring a translator can turn out to be the best option.

Boost productivity of the working staff

Whether it is local or abroad, you hire the best quality work staff to achieve superior results. Being a leader, you can’t afford to have biased behavior; you should give the concrete work to both the teams. High-quality work will increase the interest of the employees. Besides that, they would like to engage and collaborate with each other. It will accelerate the work process in all workplaces and lead to success.

Engage with videos and images

There’s no replacement for face-to-face communication. When your workers are spread across the globe, software like Skype is life-savers. Hence, it is crucial to make video conferencing tools a part of your project tools. It helps your team to understand the project requirements in a better manner. Not only is it beneficial for your employees, but it also makes it easy for you to explain the features of the new software. You can also take the help of social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter. These sites will keep you connected with your team in any part of the world.

Adopt the common source codes

Software development is incomplete without proper coding. While working for offshore software development, you should adopt the common source codes. It will ease the work of all teams in and out of the country to work on several projects. The common control system will reduce the chances of misunderstandings and conflicts among the team members.

Pick the right talent

The budget is generally the issue with the small IT companies due to which they hire inexperienced software developers in the main office. It could be hazardous to the success of the organization. Being the team leader, you should select the person that has several years of experience in handling the software projects. You can hire a project manager for your offshore team who will handle all the tasks in an effective way.

Include everyone in the meetings

Being a member of an in-house team of a company, you cannot exclude your offshore team from any meeting or conversation. So, choose the time at which the members of both teams are available. Use Skype or Google Hangouts to discuss the progress and analyze the problems faced during the project development.

Emergency numbers

Managing the offshore team includes many failures and challenges. At times, you need to urgently call your members abroad to discuss the progress of the project. Hence, it is always better to keep emergency numbers.

Every employee of the company within and outside the country must have access to these emergency numbers so that anyone can call on these numbers at any time if anything goes wrong during the implementation of projects.

Provide Sufficient Time

No one can deny the fact that even the best developer needs some time to understand the requirements and learn the technology. However, it has been found that management doesn’t give sufficient time to understand the project.

As a result, their experience with an offshore organization turns out to be bad & they give up on an offshore team. Hence, it is crucial to give them sufficient time to learn the technology. You can also organize some training for your offshore software development team members.

Conclusion

While these are the tips you can use to manage your offshore organization, it is the responsibility of the unit leader and project manager to lead the team properly. Hence, they should check every detail of the projects and keep them up-to-date. They should be capable of finding solutions to the problem and offering the right resources to their team members.

If you’re seeking the best offshore software development company that can handle all your software development projects, then you should definitely check out the Saigon Technology website to connect with the experts.