Get ready for the second edition of "Onix Insights!"🎉This time, we'll discuss important considerations when building your project's development team.
When it comes to building a startup, one question frequently is, "What is the ideal development team size?" While there's no one-size-fits-all answer, there are some factors to consider when determining the right team size for your project.
The size of your team should be based on the scale and complexity of your project:
- Scale: The scale of a project can be determined by the number of features, functionalities, and users involved. For instance, the project scale will be significant if you are building a product or service that requires many features, a vast customer base, and a great effort. On the other hand, if you are developing a simple website or mobile app for a small group of users, the scale of the project will be small.
- Complexity: The complexity of a project is determined by the technical difficulty involved in developing it. Factors that affect the complexity of a project include the level of integration required, the technologies involved, and the level of customization needed. For instance, the project's complexity will be high if you are developing an application that integrates multiple APIs and technologies, complex database structures, and intricate data flows. However, if you are building a simple website with minimal functionalities, the project's complexity will be low.
Once you have determined the scale and complexity of your project, you can then decide on the appropriate team size. A team of 5-7 developers may be suitable for small to medium-sized projects.
However, a team of 10 or more developers may be necessary for larger and more complex projects. It is crucial to underscore the importance of team communication as it plays a vital role in the success of any project.
Here you can learn 10 tips to provide a communication strategy for an offshore team:
As the team grows, communication becomes more challenging, and it's important to have tools to ensure everyone is on the same page.
For example:
- Regular team meetings
- Daily stand-ups
- Slack or Microsoft Teams.
The experience and skill level of your team members is also crucial. While a larger team may have more resources and skill sets, a minor team with highly skilled developers can often be more efficient and effective.
It's also important to consider the project timeline and budget. A larger team may be able to complete a project faster, but it will also come with higher costs. On the other hand, a minor team may take longer to complete the project, but it may be more cost-effective in the long run.
Learn more about how costs can affect software development 👇
Software development team size doesn’t mean hiring a random number of employees. It results from proper research and analysis.
Consider the budget, employment model, project complexity, timetable, and tech expertise to build an optimal but, more importantly, customized number of experts for your dream project.
In this research, we set out to find the optimum software development team size, consider key roles, and explain their responsibilities to help you know who you should hire.
We hope you enjoyed our second digest - follow us to stay tuned for further issues!
Write in the comments what you want to see in the next issue 👇
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FAQs
What is the optimal size of a development team? Sneak peek: Small to midsize projects usually require 5 to 7 members for effective communication and agility. Larger projects benefit from 8 to 15 members or more, including specialized roles to manage increased complexity.
What is the optimal team size for development? ›
For most agile projects the optimal team size will be 4 or 5 people, but there are times when you may want a larger team. How you decide between a small team and a larger but less productive team depends largely on whether you need the project done as quickly as possible.
What is the best development team size? ›
From the 491 projects that were analyzed we would conclude that a 3-7 person team has the best performance (3-5 would be the best, but 5-7 people is a very close second).
What should be the team size of developers? ›
Once you have determined the scale and complexity of your project, you can then decide on the appropriate team size. A team of 5-7 developers may be suitable for small to medium-sized projects. However, a team of 10 or more developers may be necessary for larger and more complex projects.
What should be the size of development team in agile? ›
Some prefer 6, while others prefer 9 cross functional Agile team. But all agree that there shouldn't be more than 10 people. However, 7 is the ideal Agile team size where most Agile professionals are on the same page. Otherwise, it is better to create multiple teams or choose SAFe over Agile.
How big should your development team be? ›
What is the optimal size of a development team? Sneak peek: Small to midsize projects usually require 5 to 7 members for effective communication and agility. Larger projects benefit from 8 to 15 members or more, including specialized roles to manage increased complexity.
What is the rule of 7 team size? ›
The rule states that every attendee over seven reduces the likelihood of making a good, quick, executable decision by 10%. The rule of 7 is especially important when managing a remote or distributed team and when you're coming together to make decisions.
What is the 15 10 5 rule in scrum? ›
Specifically, this means dedicating: 15% of a team's capacity to technical debt and refactoring, 10% of a team's capacity to bugs, and. 5% of a team's capacity to explorative spikes (when potentially helpful).
How big is a SAFe development team? ›
An Agile team in SAFe is a cross-functional group of 10 or fewer individuals who iteratively define, build, test, and deliver value to their customers. These teams have the authority and accountability to manage their work, which increases productivity and accelerates time-to-market.
What is the ideal DevOps team size? ›
How Big Should Be Your DevOps Team? The ideal size for a DevOps team is 5 to 10 people. Such a limited team size reduces complexity of communication and alignment within your team. Furthermore, your team lead and team members do not spend and waste much time with errands and overhead.
Generally speaking, smaller teams are better, and so do the agile teams. An agile development team should be between 3-9 people. However, modern CIOs believe that 7 is the magical number of an agile team.
What are ideal team sizes? ›
Team research continues to affirm the fact that smaller teams outperform larger teams. Teams of 4-6 people make higher-quality decisions and address issues more effectively.
What is the typical size for a scrum team? ›
For large enterprise projects, the ideal Scrum team size is 7 people (product owner, scrum master, and 5 developers). Smaller projects typically consist of 4 team members (product owner, scrum master, and 2 developers).
Is scrum good for small teams? ›
Scrum work only if the team is small, up to 9 people. Any team larger than that changes team dynamics, thus rendering Scrum ineffective.
Why are smaller agile teams better? ›
What Makes Smaller-Sized Agile Teams So Impactful? Small teams have the ability to move faster, make decisions quicker and, in essence, be more agile than their larger counterparts.
How do you estimate team capacity in agile? ›
Get the availability and time off for each person. For each person, subtract time off from Net Work Hours, and multiply the result by his availability to get his individual capacity. Add up the individual capacities to get the Team capacity in person hours, and divide by eight to get the capacity in person-days.
What is the optimal size for an effective team? ›
Hackman's research on team size
For their research they created teams of 2 to 7 people and asked them to complete tasks that required decision making and judgment. They then asked them to score whether they thought the team was too small or too large. From this they found out that the “ideal” team size was 4.6.
What is the optimum solution development team size? ›
For this to be effective, DSDM suggests that the optimum Solution Development Team size is seven +/- two people. (The Solution Development Team comprises the roles of Team Leader, Business Ambassador, Business Analyst, Solution Developer and Solution Tester.)
What is the optimal size of an improvement project team? ›
Ten or Less is Better
By smaller, we mean projects teams of ten or less. Some even say 7 is better than 10. Researchers at Bain recently reported that each extra member of a decision-making group over 7 reduces decision effectiveness by 10%.
What is the ideal team size for innovation? ›
From my experience with teams, I have concluded that the optimal innovation team size is 6-8 people. Any more than that, and the team members might lose focus and feel disconnected.
