Understanding staff augmentation 2.0: Full-time equivalent model & beyond

Staff Augmentation is revolutionizing businesses all across the world, and empowering the management to hire talented, passionate, and experienced employees via a cost-effective model, as and when needed.

Due to staff augmentation, businesses are now saving money, delivering the projects faster, and able to generate more revenues and more profits.

With changing times, the next version of Staff Augmentation is slowly, but gradually becoming popular among businesses, seeking a talented workforce for their projects.

In this blog, we will share what is Staff Augmentation 2.0, the benefits and USPs, and we will share why your business needs Staff Augmentation 2.0 for scaling and growing fast.

Staff augmentation: Why it works?

The concept of Staff Augmentation has its origin in the 1980s, when fast-growing enterprises wanted hard-working, talented employees, without having the burden of full-time employees. With the staff augmentation model, companies don’t need to hire full-time employees, spend money on their fixed salaries even if there is no work, and can scale up or scale down their human resources as and when needed.

Staff augmentation is basically an outsourced strategy, especially relevant in the IT industry, where finding the right talent for the right job is considered one of the biggest challenges.

With the due course, staff augmentation needed an upgrade, and reform, because of the challenges faced.

Major challenges of staff augmentation model

The sudden onslaught of the Covid pandemic exposed the vulnerabilities and challenges of the Staff Augmentation work model, and this gave rise to the concept of the Staff Augmentation 2.0 model.

Before we share more about the 2.0 avatar of Staff Augmentation, let’s discuss the challenges faced in the original staff augmentation structure.

Talent War

In the IT industry, the bigger companies lure the best talent with full-time employment and a host of employee benefits, that convince them to join MNCs and billion-dollar behemoths, full time. This means that the organizations that are dependent on the ‘only’ staff augmentation model get mediocre and average employees, which impacts their overall productivity. Hence, for the top-tier talent, they are forced to hire them full-time, which basically erodes the benefits of the staff augmentation work model.

Cultural Gap

Another major challenge faced in the original staff augmentation model is the cultural gap, along with time-zone differences. If a company based in Australia, for instance, hires temporary staff via staff augmentation from Europe, then there always will be a cultural gap between the hired employees and the management expectations, and it takes time to fill this void. In some cases, there is a major time-zone difference as well, impacting the overall productivity for long-term, difficult projects.

These loopholes, although not applicable to all the projects, are somehow diminishing the inherent benefits of the staff augmentation model.

And this is the reason, Staff Augmentation 2.0 model is slowly, but gradually becoming more relevant, and popular among the software and IT corporations.

Staff augmentation 2.0: Full time equivalent (FTE) model

Under the Staff Augmentation 2.0 system, organizations are opting for the Full-Time Equivalent or FTE model, for hiring the top talent, as and when needed.

Now, the FTE model incubates all the practical and beneficial properties of the original Staff Augmentation model but refines the terms and conditions to ensure that the challenges and loopholes are removed.

Staff Augmentation 2.0 is based on the Full-Time Equivalent model, wherein the talented employees are hired for long-term projects and are given the benefits and salaries on par with full-time employees.

It’s like the virtualization of human resources: The organizations are able to hire the top talent, without hiring them as full-time employees.

Benefits & USPs of staff augmentation 2.0

Commitment & Dedication

While the original work model of Staff Augmentation focussed on short-term temporary workers, Full-Time Equivalent-based Staff Augmentation 2.0 focuses on engaging and hiring the employees for a longer period of time, almost like full-time employees, but without spending a fortune.

This inspires and motivates the employees to be more engaged, and more committed to the projects, and give their 100% for making it a success, and on time.

This way, the organizations opting for an outsourced work model can avail the services of talented employees for a long duration and win the talent war against billion-dollar Unicorns and IT behemoths.

Culturally Compatible Hiring

The hiring process for Staff Augmentation 2.0 is more in-depth, calculated, and systematic, wherein the cultural aspects and language issues are taken care of, and accordingly, the hiring is executed.

Agencies involved in the Full-Time Equivalent model under Staff Augmentation 2.0 ensures that the employees being hired for the projects are able to relate and connect with the project, and they have the necessary experience and exposure to the culture and language of the clients, for seamless results.

If Staff Augmentation 1.0 was about only hiring a short-term, less-expensive workforce, Staff Augmentation 2.0 is about hiring long-term, sustainable and experienced employees who are aware of the culture, language, and way of thinking of the clients for better results.

Advanced HR-Tech Platforms

Staff Augmentation 2.0 deploys advanced HR tech platforms for hiring the best employees and contractors for the projects, ensuring that only the right candidate is hired, at the right time.

Besides the technical know-how of the candidate, such advanced HR-tech and recruitment platforms analyze the logical, comprehension, and social skills of the employees, and match them with the specific requirements of the clients, to provide the best of the best talent for their projects.

If there is any need, special training and sessions are conducted for the employees, so that they integrate seamlessly into the new company culture, and there is minimum friction, and consistent productivity.

Since the Full-Time Equivalent model is offered, the employees too are more connected, more engaged, and more willing to give their best shot.

Conclusion

Staff Augmentation 1.0 is here to stay, and won’t disappear, but it will be more or less relevant for short-term projects, where temporary employees are needed at a cost-effective model.

Meanwhile, Staff Augmentation 2.0 will more or less focus on long-term projects, where the employees are needed to be more connected, more engaged, and culturally compatible for ensuring the best results.

TechAhead is a leading Staff Augmentation Company, and we are unleashing innovation and ideas into the Staff Augmentation 2.0 work model and empowering businesses to adopt and embrace this new outsourced model for long-term results.

Get in touch with our team to find out why your business needed Staff Augmentation 2.0 and how we can help you, right away.

Schedule a no-obligation assessment of your business right here.