The Benefits of Having an Extended Development Team and Resource Augmentation
27 January 2026
The Benefits of Having an Extended Development Team and Resource Augmentation
What if you had another set of developers that would carry on your work after you’ve finished for the day?
You’re probably thinking I already have a great in-house team of engineers, so why should you care about the benefits of having an extended development team?
Investing in a remote software team is one of the the easiest ways to fill any skill gaps in your core staff, build lasting partnerships with brilliant developers, and get long-term projects done quickly, effectively and cost efficiently.
Resource augmentation and an extended development team will come cheaper than hiring full-time employees.
What is an extended development team model?
The extended team model, also known as staff/resource augmentation, brings together in-house and remote or “extended” engineers and has them work on the same projects. This long-term cooperation model cuts costs while benefiting from the skills of additional top-calibre developers. Through our partnership with INIVOS we can provide some of the best developers in the world.
What’s the difference between Extended Development Teams and Traditional Outsourcing?
The extended team model does share some benefits with traditional outsourcing. For instance, both models allow you to tap into a larger talent pool and offer quick and efficient team scalability. However, there’s one key difference, in traditional outsourcing, you hand over the entire development process to an outside team. As budget-friendly as that may be, it often goes hand in hand with a certain lack of transparency and limited managerial oversight over the code you’re getting.
In contrast, one benefit of a the extended team model is that your in-house and remote engineers work closely together. Because they have common goals and responsibilities, they build an ongoing partnership and learn from one another — and you always know exactly what’s going on.
Don’t get us wrong, though: Outsourcing can work great for short-term or one-off assignments, it still definitely has its place in the world of developing. It’s just not the best solution when you are looking to establish lasting cooperation or to work on more complex or longer term projects.
The Benefits of Having an Extended Development Team
1. You save time on hiring while staying in control
Does the thought of going through the whole of recruitment, training, and onboarding process full-time engineers fill you up with joy? I can imagine it doesn’t.
An extended development team offers a quicker and more streamlined alternative. You get to assemble your dedicated development team and have it up and running in no time. This means all the project management takes place in-house, you are always on top of the product development.
2. Cost-effectiveness
One of the key advantages of extended software teams is that they are budget-friendly.
What’s even better is that the lower cost does not come at the expense of quality. You can have your pick from an international pool of top-level engineers who have been thoroughly vetted and come with a proven track record of delivering excellent results.
3. Increased transparency, trust, and collaboration
Direct communication, transparency, and trust are integral parts of any successful long-term collaboration and that’s exactly what you get with staff augmentation throughout the project.
The extended development team works closely with your core staff, you can benefit from:
Ongoing and effective communication
Total transparency around the work being done
Shared responsibility for the deliverables
Increased productivity
Furthermore, the two teams that you build can complement each other’s skills and exchange knowledge, ideas, and problem-solving techniques. Tis means at the end of the project you are getting the best possible solution.
4. No setup or operational hassle
Compared to standard recruitment, the extended development team model requires little to no operational hassle. Which will save you time and money.
With most of the work being done remotely, you don’t have to worry about:
Payroll and employee benefits
Buying equipment
Setting up physical workstations
Renting and maintaining an office space
Enabling a home-office setup
Looking after tech support
Everything is already ready to go!
The only thing you need to do is assemble the remote team and ensure they have access to the software and information systems they will need to do their work.
5. Faster time to market
In addition to saving a substantial amount of time on recruitment and setup, you also get to speed things up by having additional resources work on the same project simultaneously. By sharing and distributing tasks among themselves, your engineers will get more work done in less time.
One of the major benefits of having an extended development team is that your remote engineers will not be juggling a handful of different projects, which is often the case with outsourcing. As a result, the team will be dedicated to and fully invested in your project — and they will get things done quickly and efficiently.
Get in touch today with any of your questions- give us a shout on 02920 713 855 or email mail@cardiffappdevelopers.com!
