Dedicated Development Team: When You Need It

We recommend dedicated software development as a collaboration model for most projects. It allows you to get a team tailored to your business needs and tech requirements. You can fully outsource the development process or delegate a part of tasks. Dedicated engineering also saves you money – the reason for 70% companies to outsource, followed by flexibility (40%) and time to market (20%).

Yet, sometimes, time-and-material or fixed-price models may be more suitable. Alternatively, you may choose to complete the project using in-house resources by hiring engineers directly.

This article clarifies what is a dedicated development team model, when you need it, and other critical aspects like hourly rates.

What is a Dedicated Development Team?

A dedicated team is a core collaboration model for custom software development. The main idea is that the provider’s software engineers are fully dedicated to the customer’s project. As a customer, you get a remote development team that performs all the functions an in-house team would perform. You have daily meetings, reports, and continuous communication. At the same time, you don’t need to rent an office, maintain hardware, manage payroll, and other administrative processes.

Dedicated team composition

The actual team composition depends on the project size and tech specialists you need. It may also change as software development progresses from one stage to another. Still, a standard dedicated team includes the following roles:

• Front-end software engineers
• Backend software engineers
• UX/UI designers
• DevOps engineers
• QA specialists
• Business analysts
• Project managers
• Product managers

You should also consider involving marketers and sales representatives to promote your newly designed product to the target audience. It will help you get off on the right foot and achieve market success.

Key benefits of the dedicated team model

Unlike project-based outsourcing models, the dedicated team approach means working with specialists who integrate directly into your processes, culture, and workflows. The main advantages include:

• Access to diverse expertise – Teams typically cover a wide range of skills, including backend, frontend, DevOps, QA, and UI/UX.
• Full focus on your project – The team is fully dedicated, ensuring higher commitment and alignment with your goals.
• Seamless scalability – Quickly expand or reduce team size depending on project stage.
• Long-term collaboration – Lower turnover compared to freelancers.
• Cost efficiency – Transparent pricing structures make budgeting more predictable.

In today’s remote-first culture, dedicated teams are even more effective thanks to mature collaboration tools and well-established hybrid work practices.

Let’s consider alternative options to the dedicated team approach.

Fixed-price and T&M models are dedicated development alternatives for smaller projects. Here’s what they are about and when you should prefer such collaboration to full-time teams.

Fixed Price Model

The fixed price collaboration means a client pays a previously agreed amount upon project completion. The task of a software development provider is to estimate the scope of work and hours accurately. Hence, such a model is best for short-term projects when the volume is clear.

T&M Model

In the Time&Material model, a client pays for the time and effort engineers spend to complete a specific task. It’s usually a part-time collaboration, so hired developers may contribute to several projects simultaneously. Thus, the T&M model is recommended for projects with changing requirements or as occasional tech help.

When to Hire a Dedicated Software Development Team

As we said, a dedicated team is an excellent choice for most projects since software development is usually laborious. In particular, you should hire full-time developers when:

Manage an Early-Stage Startup

If you have only launched a new project, you probably expect to begin development as soon as possible. Outsourcing to a software development company allows you to assemble a team much faster. They can fully replace in-house engineers or do the assigned tasks to reduce your time to market. Another reason to hire dedicated developers for startups is cost efficiency.

Read step-by-step instructions on hiring for startups here.

Have a Long-Term Project

Long-term projects significantly change and expand over time. It means you need to involve various tech specialists and do a lot of recruitment. Besides, you will have to maintain and update the product even after the launch. That’s why hiring a dedicated team that will handle all these tasks is an optimum choice.

Requirements are Not Clarified

When you still haven’t finalized the product’s market fit, tech stack, and functionality, you need a team to make the requirement discovery for you. Afterward, they will continue working on the product to bring your idea to life. Development from scratch takes a lot of effort, so only a dedicated collaboration model is suitable.

When NOT to Hire a Dedicated Software Development Team

Sometimes, a dedicated team may be too much for your project’s needs. Consider T&M, fixed-price, or other collaboration models if:

Time and Budget are Limited

Hiring someone part-time is preferable when funding is limited or you have a small task to complete. The hired person will work as a third-party consultant for the agreed number of hours.

You are Not Ready For Long-Term Commitment

If you doubt whether outsourcing is an option for your company, you can start by delegating separate tasks to see how it works. You can expand the collaboration and switch to the dedicated team model if everything goes well.

The Project is Short, or the Scope is Clear

When you know the project scope with all the features and processes planned, choose the fixed price or T&M model. We would also recommend these approaches for short- and middle-term projects that don’t require full-fledged involvement.

How Much Does Hiring a Dedicated Team Cost?

To estimate the cost of hiring a software development team, you must know the scope of work and team size. It will allow you to calculate the hours necessary to complete the project and learn the final price.

The hourly rates of software developers vary based on two factors: experience and location. Typically, engineers from the US and Western European countries have the highest charges, which may reach even $150 / hr. Software development outsourcing companies from Eastern Europe have much lower rates offering the same experience. Here are approximate hourly rates in Ukraine for guidance:

Leobit is a software development company offering dedicated development among other models, including fixed-price and T&M. We use our internal human resources and find the necessary specialists locally to assemble teams for our customers. Just tell us your project needs to initiate the requirement analysis and hiring process.

We have provided dedicated software development services to create a global payment processing platform, a home security mobile app, and other projects.

The dedicated engineering team model yields the best results for long-term, large, or complex projects. It’s also advisable for startups that need continuous tech assistance and flexibility regarding team size. For occasional help with tech tasks, you should prefer T&M and fixed-price models.

If you need professional advice on how to arrange your software development process, contact Leobit. We can recommend the most suitable collaboration approach for you and provide full-stack remote development services.