How to choose the right engagement model for IT applications

Cegeka offers four engagement models which we use in application modernization. Why these different models? Because every organization has its own level of IT maturity and varying needs or challenges. An organization with its own development team that just needs to bridge certain staffing gaps has different requirements compared to an organization wanting to delegate full responsibility for its applications because IT isn’t part of its core business.

Four distinct engagement models

The difference between our four engagement models is the value we deliver, the extent of our engagement, and the commitments we make. In ascending order of value, engagement, and commitment, these models are:

• IT Team Extension

If your organization needs to bridge certain staffing gaps, say a project leader, developer, or analyst, we can supply these skills as needed. Our commitment to you? We have skilled professionals on hand who can be quickly added to your team. When you request a specific profile, we’ll introduce you to a few of our experts and let you make the selection. You coordinate the selected profiles and incorporate them into your organization, whether it is on site or remote, with local IT professionals or in nearshore or offshore contexts. Whenever you require more people or different expertise, you can scale up as needed. And we still take full responsibility to train our professionals and do people management.

• Team as a Service

If you have a good idea of what you want to develop or maintain, but lack the technical expertise in-house, we can provide you with a complete team. In our Team as a Service engagement model, we provide you a team that meets your capacity and quality requirements and a group of skilled people who work together efficiently. For instance, you might request a development or service team with specific expertise. We then leave you to oversee the team and assign them their tasks. Nevertheless, we still provide access to a program manager who assists you in optimizing the team’s efficiency.

• Projects & Services

If you prefer not to coordinate the people working on your IT applications, you can transfer end-to-end ownership of a project or service to us. In this engagement model, we choose the right experts for the task and we also manage them. Our commitment as your IT partner is measured by our project deliverables or service level agreements (SLAs). For projects, this commitment is based on the scope, time, and budget we’ve agreed upon. For services, it’s based on key performance indicators (KPIs) such as application availability and upgrade speed, among others.

• Outsourcing

Alternatively, you can delegate full responsibility for your IT applications to us. In this Outsourcing model, we translate your business needs into IT projects and a roadmap, while fully managing the required projects and services. Our commitment revolves around project deliverables and service level agreements, in addition to the roadmap. Our business analysts and enterprise architects define that roadmap, which we then implement over multiple years.

How to choose the right engagement model?

As you can see, these four engagement models differ in terms of value, engagement, and commitment you can expect from your IT partner. So when choosing an engagement model, the main question to ask is: which responsibilities are you comfortable with to handle and which ones do you want to delegate?

Responding to this question depends on your answers to several others:

• Is the application part of your core business?

If an IT application is part of your core business, you most likely want to retain control and develop knowledge about the application in-house. After all, this gives you a competitive edge. In this case, IT Team Extension or Team as a Service are typically the more appropriate choices. For IT applications that are not integral to your core business, it makes sense to transfer end-to-end ownership to your IT partner or opt for complete outsourcing. This gives your own IT department time to concentrate on your core business applications.

• Do you have robust IT governance in place?

Perhaps your organization has experience managing IT applications and is already using ITIL’s best practices for IT services. Or you have a seasoned development team using an Agile project approach. In these cases, your organization is experienced enough to handle governance and can therefore select an engagement model where you remain in control. If your primary need is to bridge some staffing gaps, IT Team Extension would be a good choice. If you are lacking technical expertise, Team as a Service may be the right solution. However, if your organization lacks well-established IT governance processes, Projects & Services or Outsourcing are more appropriate engagement models.

• What degree of commitment do you expect?

The more responsibilities you want to maintain, the less commitment your IT partner can provide, since that would be dependent on what you deliver. Therefore, if you’re looking for strict commitments on project deliverables and/or SLAs, collaboration through Projects & Services or Outsourcing is advisable. However, if you only need your IT partner to commit to the availability and quality of an IT profile or team, and you still want to be in the driver’s seat, IT Team Extension and Team as a Service are the ideal engagement models for you.

In close cooperation

Cegeka is unique in offering all these engagement models, allowing you to select the one that best suits your needs or combine these models for optimal flexibility. Furthermore, you can transition to another model whenever the time is right. For example, if you start with Team as a Service but eventually find that you lack the in-house governance skills to lead the team, you can move to the better suited Projects & Services model. All of our engagement models can also be used with local IT professionals or in nearshore or offshore contexts.

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