7 Signs Staff Augmentation Could Work for You

After the pandemic, many firms have begun to recognize how different their workplace is now. The large-scale shift to remote work in 2020 has enabled many AEC firms to increase agility and resilience, drive competitive differentiation and save money. This shift has also underlined the enormous challenges faced by leading firms, including proper staffing levels, employee retention, and technical skill gaps.

So, how are firms finding balance and getting peace of mind in today’s murky market? Many have found the answer lies in the staff augmentation model.

Here are seven signs that staff augmentation may be a good option for your firm.

75%

of leaders believe applicants are missing required skills. -SHRM

1. You want to fill skill gaps.

More and more firms are adopting new technologies as part of their workflow. More dependable data collection methods get introduced, unique projects require a specific skill, your firm moves to Revit Modeling and BIM. In any case, it makes sense to have an experienced person as part of the team on the front end to help choose software and make training more efficient.

2. You need to have tight integration with your internal processes.

As an extension of your team, Coast 2 Coast works under your guidance to complete back-office work like drawings, construction documentation, base 3D models, etc. By aligning our workflow schedules and deliverables to our clients, we collaboratively create processes that make both teams efficient and agile. It’s an ideal way to decide whether you should outsource BIM entirely or develop BIM capabilities internally.

1/3

of small businesses prefer to onboard a few people at a time. –Manifest

3. Your team needs to focus on top priority projects.

By leveraging external experience and expertise, you solve many distraction problems caused by staff turnover and recruiting issues. By freeing up valuable time and resources, the focus is on other priority work like business development and completing projects within the deadline. Services may include laser scanning, as-built surveys, modeling services, BIM Coordination, training, 360 visualizations, etc.

4. You require control throughout the life cycle of a project.

Some long-term projects necessitate having the same dedicated resource embedded alongside your team members. The staff augmentation model provides you with a way to source talent and shows you if a candidate is the right fit. This personnel is managed and directed by your project management lead throughout the contract period. You’ll provide the project/design direction directly and use your normal oversight process to maintain QA/QC standards.

5. You want to avoid over-staffing.

Increasing staff through a third party means no resources are sitting idle, and you can decrease the size of your team from the consulting firm without any impact on your business or hurting staff morale. When business is booming, you can scale teams quickly instead of waiting through the recruiting and onboarding process and hoping you have the right people before you need to deliver.

67%

of employees believe burnout has worsened in 2021. -Indeed

6. You need to add capacity to your team.

Many of our clients find they overloaded with work, but since the spike in demand seems temporary, they do not want to grow their firm prematurely. Combined with the struggle to recruit experienced talent and constrained budgets that do not match the rising labor costs, it makes sense to leverage the additional resources and expertise offered through staff augmentation.

7. You must ensure you prevent staff burnout.

As business returns to a more normal pace, firms see their key employees burdened with too many projects and an overload of responsibilities caused by covering vacancies. These issues can result in project delays and mistakes, low morale among the staff, and missed business opportunities. The right size team with the right skill sets are pre-requisites for success. We are committed to providing a professional team of experts who will deliver speed, scalability, and agility to your workforce.

Keep Reading

To learn more about how Coast 2 Coast helps Clients with their Staff Augmentation Needs.

Hint: 20 years of experience, we’ve put our technical leadership to the test, proven our expertise within complex environments, and become a trusted partner because of the peer-to-peer support we provide to your team.