Kindo’s CTO Simon Hartley, Trinity Perspectives’ founder Cian McLoughlin, Endo45’s founder Juliet Oliver, and Techwondoe CEO Jas Singh share hard‑won lessons on choosing, briefing, and running development partners. From a production outage caused by the wrong database tier to a COVID‑pivot that required rapid partner augmentation, they unpack what to ask, how to start, and the controls that keep cost, quality, and speed in balance.
Key themes include:
Partnering beats outsourcing (most of the time)
Aim for enduring relationships, not one‑off build‑and‑leave engagements.
Use the CRAFT framework:Cultural fit: aligned ways of working and values.
Relationship: treat partners as an extension of your team.
Asking: demand domain experience, tech stack specifics, and real references.
Feedback: establish regular strategic and project‑level loops, both ways.
Trust: start small, prove outcomes, then scale the remit.
Be ready to partner: arrive with clarity
Bring a detailed prototype. Better inputs = better estimates and faster onboarding. Understand how the team will work and pressure‑test the proposed architecture.Start small, de‑risk the engagement
Pilot through short sprints with clear deliverables and a scope‑change process. Use outcome‑based work first; move to team‑based augmentation after trust is earned. Treat UI/UX as first‑class: design early so devs can translate aesthetics into code.
Key takeaways:
Use CRAFT to select and run partners; prove trust with a small outcome‑based pilot before scaling.
Arrive prepared with prototypes, a clear decision process, and a product voice embedded in sprints.
Put governance in writing: detailed estimates, sprint plans, milestones, and caps or fixed/outcome‑based contracts.
Hit play to watch the complete walkthrough and real-world tips.