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In this guest blog post, Rameez Ramzan explores what it takes to build an expert mobile app development team and provides tips and ideas how to do it.

App development is a niche that is surging to the top by every passing day and with WhatsApp, Airbnb, Snapchat, Instagram, Uber, etc raking in fortune, fame and digital revolution, the app development spree is unstoppable.

Almost every business seems to be shifting to apps and the reasons are obvious. They are well received at the user end and with just a single tap, one can accomplish his goal. But, the catch is — developing intriguing, swift and top selling apps is much demanding. It doesn’t only need well-versed research but it actually requires a team of professionals who master the art of developing chart-topping apps.

Finding the right people and building an expert app development team successfully takes a lot of blood and sweat but if you know what to get, you can get it sooner. Similarly, if you are aware of what it takes to build a top performing app development team, you can conquer the art of building captivating apps.

In this blog, I would like to share my experience of building a performance-oriented app development team and by the end of this write, you will get the answer of “How to build an expert app development team”.

Experience vs Enthusiasm

Majorly, there would be two options in front of you. First, hiring experienced people so that you can leverage from their app development experience. Second, hiring fresh blood filled with the passion of developing out of the box creative mobile apps.

Don’t make a mistake of hiring a mediocre app developer. It may sound harsh but apps aren’t made of half-hearted code strokes. Decide whether to take advantage of experience or you are good with giving freedom to an app developer to come up with blunt, crazy and innovative app ideas that can make the people go gaga.

Pro tip: If you are building an app that is one its kind, go for an experienced developer. On the contrary, if you are developing an app by adding some different flavors in it, pick a passionate developer. Maybe, he could come up with an extremely appealing feature.

Diamonds Are Expensive

Ever heard of a phrase “ Cheap things are of no good”. Same is the case with app developers. To build successful apps, you need to include app developers who worth it and usually, low-cost resources doesn’t stand in the performing league. Reason? They perform accordingly with their paycheck.

Picking up an expensive app developer may seem itchy but when things will get off to a flying start, you will appreciate your timely and wise decision.

Pro tip: Situations would most likely decide whether you need an expensive app developer or not. For example, if you are a new startup, obviously, you can’t afford to burn your budget by hiring a costly resource, so take your time and go for it only when you can comfortably afford expensive hiring.

Niche Specific

Don’t ever mix sub niches into a major genre. App developer and mobile app developer are two different job roles and surely, two distinctive experiences. While an app developer focuses on enhancing features, a mobile app developer pays detailed attention to the UI/UX of an app.

Moreover, mobile app development is all about optimized taps, stunning app screens, highly engaging interface and seamless experience. A lay developer cannot understand the science of developing mobile apps. Moral of the story, never hire a lay developer or else, your app will be done and dusted.

Pro tip: Mobile or web apps can be subcategorized into other niches such as social network apps, dating apps, games, e-commerce apps, etc. If your app targets specific audience or niche, pick a person who is expert in that very domain. It will help you in cutting cost and time at the same time.

Productive Culture

No matter if you are a team lead or an entrepreneur, if your organizational culture doesn’t promote productivity and agility, even top-performing individuals can be turned into noobs. The idea is to offer incentives, appreciation certificates, salary raise, and most notably, tap on the backs.

Agility in the app development process ensures focus on milestone based production. With implementing agile methodologies, parts of app development gets divided into sprints eventually resulting in projects wrapping up before time and trust me, it is a sheer sense of achievement for developers.

Pro tip: Train your human resource department to make an engaging, lively and worryless culture. If the culture, behavior, and growth of an organization is on the inclining side, an employee is more likely to go extra-mile to accomplish his task along with his teammates.

Teamwork Achieves the Dreamwork

A common problem of top app developers is they like to work on their own. With an extensive hands-on experience and popular portfolio, these coding geeks love to work in isolation and this is the real challenge.

One has to make these app geniuses gel in with the team. Cracking engaging conversations, holding regular standup meetings and setting mutual milestones are some of the best practices to overcome this challenge.

Pro tip: Genius people are loner. It is extremely difficult to make them interact with the masses but as a project manager, entrepreneur or team lead, sometimes, you would need to become a bridge between an excellent app developer and the other team.

While there are many more tips and tricks to build a successful mobile app development team, the above-written aspects are the most crucial. Building a team sounds great but trust me, it takes a long tenure and sheer hard work to build a team that one can be proud of.

Rameez Ramzan is a Senior Digital Marketing Executive at Cubix.

Building great apps: teamwork makes the difference

Thank you Rameez for sharing your experiences on building apps. There’s one thing for me that stands out in his post: teams and how people work together in teams makes a big difference.

People like working in teams, if there’s a good environment and culture where people can actually work together and feel valued. Then you can have great teams. Agile retrospectives can help you to establish this environment and culture, and keep on improving it.

Individuals matter in teams, there is an Ï” in team. I spoke about this with William Perry when I interviewed him about his book iTeam.

If you want to build great teams, I recommend reading the books Liftoff and TES: The Team Engagement Strategy.

Games can be an effective and joyful way to improve teamwork. The Agile Self-assessment Game is there to find out how agile you are and decide what your team will be working on to improve their agility.