The document provides 6 ways to de-risk outsourcing a project, including defining product requirements through sketches and lists, leading with high-fidelity design specifications, following an agile development process with bi-weekly builds, assigning ownership of code to the outsourcing partner, maintaining open communication throughout the project, and avoiding selecting partners based solely on the lowest bid.

1. 6
PROJECT
W A Y S T O D E R I S K Y O U R
O U T S O U R C I N G
DEFINEYOURPRODUCT
Write down your requirements. Revise them. Ask
customers what they think and repeat. If you're a visual
person, make sketches on napkins or computer paper.
Create bulleted lists and organize your thoughts.
LEADWITHDESIGN
A complete set of high-fidelity user interface (UI) designs
act as a visual spec, which tells your development team
how to build your product.
FOLLOWAGILEPROCESS
Agile development brings more transparency to the
outsourcing process because you receive development
builds of your product every one to two weeks.
ASSIGNOWNERSHIP
Give your outsourcing partner ownership of your entire
product or an entire piece of your codebase. The reason
we recommend this is because it avoids delays related to
merging different versions of your mobile, web and
backend applications produced by different developers
MAINTAINCOMMUNICATION
You and this company will be partners for the duration of
your project, so it is imperative that the lines of
communication stay open, honest, and most importantly
active.
AVOIDTHELOWESTBID
You may be tempted to select the lowest bid you
receive, but don't be fooled because you'll save yourself
many headaches by paying a little more for a quality
development firm.