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25 February 2021

Case Study: Supporting UX/UI Agency with an Extended Team

it-outsourcing

IT Outsourcing is a viable business model that can significantly reduce the cost of software development. There’s no need to build your in-house team; your tech partner got you covered. But what if you already have your trusted team, but you lack a specific role?

This is a challenge that one UX/UI agency, ExtraHut, had to face. Offering a wide range of design services, ExtraHut needed to have access to web and mobile app developers, experienced in many programming languages and frameworks.

If you want to neaten your product, develop a new feature, scale your operations, or take your services to the next level, you might need some extra help, just like ExtraHut did. That’s why they approached us at SoftwareHut about cooperating in an extended team model.

As an alternative to IT outsourcing, the extended team model requires finding a software house with a team of professionals ready to jump right in. This time, however, there’s no need to hire the entire team – only the missing roles.

And it turned out to be a perfect solution for ExtraHut!

Working in an Extended Team Model

The concept of working in an extended team model has just recently gained popularity; why would you risk choosing it? Let me explain the reasoning behind ExtraHut’s decision to join forces with SoftwareHut!

ExtraHut provides services to a wide variety of clients such as proptech companies, e-commerce brands, and mixed reality solutions. Having such a diversified clientele, they wanted to make sure that they can find support whenever they need a missing skill.

It wouldn’t make any sense to go for IT outsourcing and hire the entire team; they already have their specialists. However, for projects that exceeded their capacity, they needed the support of a small team or sometimes a single developer.

By choosing ETM, they only hire the roles they need from us, maintaining control over the project delivery in-house. Our software developers, hired externally as an augmentation of their team, work within ExtraHut’s structures and processes, following their chosen project management methodology.

We complement ExtraHut’s in-house team but do not substitute it. We fill in the skill gaps of their main team and augment its overall potential, maintaining communication that suits their preferences.

Recommended reading:Software Project Cost Estimation: What Impacts the Cost of Your Project?

Our Extended Dream Team

ExtraHut is a UX/UI agency located in Poland, and our colleague from the TenderHut group. They specialise in delivering stunning IT solutions for their clients. As a team of experienced specialists, they provide high-level services in UX research, analysis, and prototyping areas. They also offer product and web design and development, as well as the design of innovative solutions, including VR/AR interfaces.

Moreover, they are also a part of UX Fellows, a global network of experienced user research companies. Working with ExtraHut for their global clients is a great honour and challenge.

How has been our cooperation going? Couldn’t be better!

So far, we have supported them with software developers, and QA testers. For the majority of the projects, we also include a project manager responsible for maintaining ongoing communication between ExtraHut, and our software developers and software testers. Our cooperation is multidimensional and enlightening.

Do ExtraHut share our enthusiasm? Fortunately, they do. As Dariusz Sawicki, the COO of ExtraHut said, “Working with SoftwareHut, we continue to complete the projects that are meeting our clients’ business goals. SoftwareHut team delivers their assigned tasks on time, and the code is always of good quality. (…) They have been open to feedback and easily share their own ideas for improvements.”

It’s music to our ears!

What’s Next

Our cooperation with ExtraHut has been going strong since 2016. However, we’re not going to rest on our laurels; we want to keep on delivering the highest quality software development services to support their cutting-edge UX/UI solutions.

During our cooperation, we’ve had a chance to watch ExtraHut grow and develop. I’m sure a bright future awaits them!

ExtraHut is living proof of the effectiveness of working in the extended team model. If you need some support, we can join your project at any time, working hand-in-hand with your in-house team. You don’t have a team? No worries, we take on entire projects, too.

Reinforce your in-house team with professionals you lack!


Author
Karol Średziński
Outsourcing Specialist