When do you decide that specialized expertise is worth the premium cost rather than developing the skills internally?
Sort by:
It is a risk-reward balancing act. In government, tight deadlines and compliance requirements often necessitate bringing in specialized expertise to avoid penalties or noncompliance. I involve business leaders in these decisions, weighing the cost of external expertise against the potential risks and penalties of not meeting objectives.
Licensing in large environments is another area where expert consultation is invaluable. The right expertise can result in significant cost savings by ensuring optimal license usage and avoiding unnecessary expenses.
If there is sufficient time in a project, we invest in developing internal talent. However, during our recent digital transformation, we needed senior experts to transition from an on-premises Oracle environment to modern cloud solutions. External consultants brought immediate value and could train our internal staff, but not everyone could match their pace or expertise. For critical areas like security, it is essential to bring in experienced professionals rather than train from scratch, as the risks of inexperience are too great.
Certain skills, such as cybersecurity or machine learning, are difficult and costly to develop internally, especially in a smaller organization. In these cases, it is more efficient to acquire external talent. However, as tools and resources improve, this gap may narrow in the future.
For me it is always a balancing act. Key factors are time and cost/benefit. If the need is immediate, often the only way is to procure an expert. If the need is for a longer period with some ramp-up time, internal development is a possibility, especially if the skills are not hot commodity. For some areas (cloud, security, AI), it might not be beneficial to develop the skills and then lose the talent to a better paying job (I work in the public sector with limited means to compensate super skills). One aspect I also think is the cost of keeping the skills up-to-date. Those with constant development (i.e. AI), it would need constant and costly effort to keep the internal talent on par with external experts. But of course, one does need some internal skills to know what to buy. And what not to.