Remote Teams: A help to achieve seamless project delivery

Introduction

The ever-changing landscape of business has seen increased instances of the adoption of remote development work. Giant Software Development and IT companies are hiring remote developers to meet the critical scarcity of manpower. Remote teams offer unparalleled flexibility & access to a diverse pool of talent from across the globe. 

This blog will explore how businesses have achieved effortless project execution by embracing the power of remote teams. The blog will also focus on business case studies & best practices in hiring remote developers.

Let’s begin with how the rise of remote work came into the picture & why remote work is here to stay as well as how it’s impact on businesses.

The Rise of Remote Work

Remote work has become popular in the last decade. It has come a long way from being a rare privilege to being a mainstream business practice. Technological advancements have made hiring remote developers easy.

IT staff augmentation is a powerful strategy, to scale the workforce quickly and efficiently to meet the project needs.

Now let’s understand the advantages of Remote Teams and why should an organization hire remote developers.

What are the advantages of Remote Teams?

There are several advantages an organization would get by hiring remote developers, let's understand each of them.

Access to Global Pool: IT staff augmentation and remote team building allow, organizations to hire remote developers from across the globe.

Cost Effective and flexibility: IT staff augmentation offers cost savings and flexibility, as companies can scale their teams up or down as needed. 

Boost in productivity: A remote team of developers ensures a boost in productivity. The tech talent works remotely covering different time zones to streamline development processes easily.

The above-mentioned benefits denote why hiring remote developers is a beneficial idea.

Now, let’s uncover some of the challenges organizations face while hiring remote developers.

What are the Challenges of hiring remote developers?

Despite the advantages that remote teams present, there are a few challenges, that every organization needs to overcome.

Let’s understand a few of them

Communication barriers: This is one of the most impactful challenges any organization faces while managing a remote team. Communication flaws can highly impact the project's deliverability.

Using proper communication tools and building a communication flow can help in tackling the challenge.

Difference in time zones: Remote employees work from different locations and follow different time zones. The difference in time zones can impact the coordination between IT professionals and hence it can ruin productivity.

Cultural Diversity: As remote worker works from different locations, they would surely have different cultures. Any organization hiring needs to understand the cultural compatibility of the developer before integrating and hiring them.

The company can overcome all three challenges by setting up meetings. The organization should also provide flexible work shifts & encourage a friendly work environment. Maintaining team coordination and motivation is also crucial, especially in long-term projects.

Now, let’s understand the key strategies for managing remote teams.

Remote Teams: Key Strategies for Seamless Project Management

Effective management of remote teams involves several key strategies. 

• Firstly, using the right communication tools is essential for keeping everyone on the same page.

• Secondly, the organization needs to define clear expectations for a smoother management of remote projects.

• Lastly, the organizations used leverage effective collaboration tools to attain seamless project management.

Now, let’s understand some project management & communication tools that any organization can use to manage remote developers smoothly.

5 Project Management tools for successful remote project management

Project Management Tool #1 - Trello

It is a simple and effective project management tool. Trello enables a company to organize its projects using Kanban boards. The user has access to a free plan that allows them to use 10 boars per workspace, it is an easy-to-use tool. 

Trello is beneficial for freelancers, as they can use this board to plan their assignments. Companies can also use Trello to build a complete project workflow allowing visibility at every stage.

Project Management Tool #2 - Asana

Your to-do lists are good to go but need to be a little organized, using Asana can help you in this. Asana is a project management tool that allows you to break down projects into sections and sub-lists. One of the features of Asana is, that it offers dashboards to keep track of work.

Asana enables you to add, rearrange, and complete tasks, the same like your regular to-do list. The tool has some additional features of collaboration that are necessary for you to work as a team.

Project Management Tool #3 - ClickUp

Unlike, other tools, Clickup offers you 11 different views that include the Gannt view and Mindmaps. Additionally, it also offers four different page views Chat page, Embed page, and a Doc page. The dashboard of ClickUp allows you to choose from 20 different widgets to highlight important project details. ClickUp has a few more features for its users.

Project Management Tool #4 - Wrike

The next one on the list is Wrike. Would you manage projects in a spreadsheet? If yes, then Wrike is for you. Wrike offers you the flexible feature of a spreadsheet with proper columns for mentioning every little detail.

Some of the additional features of Wrike are:

Updating tasks at different intervals (like in-progress, on hold, canceled, or completed). It allows you to indicate them as green, yellow, red, on hold, or canceled.

Project Management Tool #5 - Jira

This is the favorite tool of every software developer. Though this project management tool offers a Kandban view, it is built for Scrum & agile workflows. 

After you sign up, the software will ask you to answer a few questions about your project. It also recommends a methodology and project template for you.

By using Jira, remote developers can get more advantages. The tool can easily integrate with GitHub, GitLab, and Sentry to get the tracking of backlogs easily.

Based on the above information, you can select the project management tool that meets your requirements.

Next, let’s move on and explore five communication tools you can use to streamline your project management.

5 Communication Tools for a Successful Remote Project Management

For any team to execute project management successfully, their developer team needs to have the right communication skills. The five communication tools mentioned below will help remote teams communicate successfully with an in-house team.

Communication Tool #1 - Zoom

• It is the most used communication tool. Zoom has made communication easier for remote developers. A wide set of features makes it an ideal choice for communication in various industries.

• Its exceptional video quality and toll-based voting options make it a unique communication tool for developers.

Communication Tool #2 - Microsoft Teams

• It is considered the Picasso of remote communication. If we talk about internal communication tools, Microsoft Teams holds a prominent place for sure.

• Microsoft Teams allows you to add or remove people without actually compromising the structure of the main remote team.

• It also has some additional features like breakout rooms, call queues, 7*7 video, & contextual search functions.

Communication Tool #3 - Google Chat

• Being a part of a giant suite of Google, this tool enables video calls, chat, or phone call dialogue.

• Google Chat is a simple & user-friendly remote communication tool that allows integration & accessibility as the core features.

• It is one of the most compatible communication tools, as it works smoothly on different devices.

Communication Tool #4 - Slack

• Slack is a cloud-based remote communication tool, one of the biggest names in the remote communication industry. 

• Slack offers a range of features like a robust chat system, easy document sharing and downloading, whiteboard, & search function.

•  It is a comprehensive yet user-friendly tool that makes it a number tool used by both small and large teams.

Communication Tool #5 - Skype

• Skype is the most well-known and longstanding video conferencing tool used by organizations across the globe. It comes with a VoIP feature which is a world-famous feature, some other features make Skype one of the best tools to leverage.

• Skype has features like easy installation& access to multiple platforms. Skype has positioned itself as the most reliable communication tool at various levels.

Based on the above information, you can select the communication tool that meets your requirements.

Now let’s understand how to build a Remote Team by hiring remote developers.

Key Practices: Building a remote team using IT Staff Augmentation

Every organization needs to go through a series of steps when they are building a remote team, let's understand all of them.

There are ten steps every organization needs to consider before hiring remote developers.

• Define role & responsibilities

• Sourcing candidates

• Accessing Candidates

• Interview Process

• Reference & Background check

• Onboarding & Integration

• Communication & collaboration tools

• Setting clear expectations & providing support

• Building a remote-friendly culture

• Providing feedback and Improvement

To learn more about each of the step read our previous blog on IT Staff Augmentation: A Solution to bridge skill gaps

Now, let’s understand how we at Acquaint Softtech can help you build software that meets your requirements.

How Acquaint Softtech can help in IT Staff Augmentation?

Acquaint Softtech is a software development outsourcing company specializing in IT Staff Augmentation Services and custom software development. We are a team of experts having 15+ years of industry experience in helping our clients build custom software. We can help your organization hire remote developers that meet your requirements.

The Elite Alliance - An E-commerce Marketplace Solution

The Project:

Elite Alliance is an e-commerce marketplace similar to Amazon. This custom marketplace enables multiple vendors to set up a shop to take advantage of both B2B and B2C sales. Elite Alliance is a robust solution that supplies the data using an API. The administrator can access a feature-rich dashboard to manage products, users, and individual stores.

• The administrator can log in & access a dashboard to manage the users, products, custom themes, and much more.

• The users can shop anything from a highly appealing storefront to buy any product of their choice.

• The administrator can also customize the home page design, testimonials, contact, about us, privacy policy, and many other pages.

The Challenges:

• One of the biggest challenges was to revamp the eCommerce website to mold it as a marketplace.

• The second problem was to overcome the problem of getting customer data.

Apart from the aforementioned challenges, we also got other custom requirements for the project. Some of these are as under:

• Adding Google Shopping

• Sitemap for SEO

• SSL renewal

• Supplier data import

• Copying the website

• Integration of forms

What solutions did we provide them?

We took the responsibility of building a strategy to manage the project effectively. We planned which technologies would fit the best for the project, by listing a few innovative technologies. Some of these were React JS, Laravel, and Tailwind CSS.

The result?

This project became a success and the client was able to onboard 57 vendors on their marketplace website.

Elite Alliance Case Study

Wrapping Up!

Using remote work patterns has been a boon for organizations. Giant Software Development and IT companies are hiring remote developers using IT staff augmentation hiring process. By hiring remote developers on a short-term basis, companies can meet their software development needs easily.

The organizations are also integrating their existing team with remote teams managed by a dedicated project manager. By using proper communication tools, organizations can manage software development projects easily.

FAQ