Choosing your IT outsourcing partner can be quite difficult especially if you are new to IT outsourcing. When partnered with the right IT outsourcing provider, you can reap such great benefits while growing your business without hassle, high costs, and risk.

To help you decide, here are the top criteria you should use when selecting an IT outsourcing firm to move forward with.

1. Consistent Quality of Service

Is the company really what they say they are? Ask about their proven track record and research on what their past and current clients say about them. If you can, try to speak with previous clients and ask if the provider delivered the expected quality.

One way to further check an outsourcing provider’s ability is to actually give them a try. Ask for a free trial, trusted companies will have no problem giving you one. This way you can fully assess not only their capability but also your working relationship with them.

2. Communication

Before you sign your initial contact, ask yourself these questions: Is the outsourcing firm quick to respond to inquiries, transparent, and open to dialogue? Are they accommodating and do they provide further information or assistance? If you answered ‘yes’ to these questions, that is a good sign that an outsourcing firm values communication with their clients.

The next thing to look for is the firm’s overall communication plan. If the business is involved in the process, an ideal communication plan includes regular updates with the PMs and developers. Other IT outsourcing firms allow their clients to directly manage and communicate with their offshore development team thus eliminating the risk of miscommunication. Decide which communication plan is best and convenient for you.

3. Experience

This goes without saying. Typically, it’s best to go with an IT outsourcing partner who has relevant experience already. IT outsourcing companies who have been in the business for years would often be a breeze to work with and will be great at handling clients, troubleshooting issues, and providing service to both clients and developers. Outsourcing firms of four to five years in the business are ideal.

Do note that while experience is extremely important it’s not everything. Make sure to put into consideration other things in this list. There are startup outsourcing firms out there that can offer the same benefits if you just look carefully.

4. Expertise

Each IT outsourcing firm has its own specialization. Some IT outsourcing firms only focus on one area of software development such as mobile app development or web development so it’s always a good idea to consider their speciality to make sure that you are working with someone who really knows what they’re doing Narrow down your search to firms that specialize in the area you need. This would give you a better chance of finding the right software development team.

5. Up-to-date technology

An IT outsourcing company must be able to provide your offshore developer with decent hardware and the latest software. A good tech and infrastructure will show that the IT outsourcing firm is equipped for the project and aid your offshore developer to work efficiently. Ask about their infrastructure, internet speed, hardware specs. If possible, visit their office to see just how conducive the workplace is to your future team.

6. Financial Stability

Knowing if an IT outsourcing firm can financially survive is also very important. It will be a definite risk if you outsource without prior knowledge of the company’s stability as you definitely do not want to work with a company that is at the risk of shutting down. You can use fundamental analysis to measure a company’s competence compared to companies in the industry.

7. Organisation size

This may not be something that you would consider right off the bat, but it is a piece of information you can strategically use. For example, you would not want to give a large project to a small IT outsourcing company for obvious reasons. Similarly, you would not want to give a small project to a large company because you may only get the ‘C’ level talent from the company.

Choose a ‘right-sized’ company to be able to gain a good amount of attention from the business, the best of their software developers, and other perks. Do note that this is just another factor to look for that adds to the company’s overall quality and experience.

8. Company Culture

Looking at an IT outsourcing firm’s company culture will give you an idea of how they take care of their employees and the kind of values they instil in their team. You can evaluate a company’s culture by directly engaging with their employees and see if the values the company shows are consistent with their employees. A quality-focused company is the best IT outsourcing partner.

9. Cultural Compatibility

Ideally, you would want an IT outsourcing partner who is familiar with your culture. Cultural compatibility bridges the gap between both client and developers making for a better communication and pleasant overall work experience. In addition, miscommunication due to language barriers and cultural differences can be avoided.

Choose and hire the right offshore developer for your team. Learn how Cloud Employee works, see our Developer Pricing Guide, or talk to us. You can hire dedicated offshore developers with us across many technologies.