Why a Small Dedicated Team Can Be Better Than a Large One
About us
MoldoWEB is a software development company, located in Romania, specialized in providing outsourcing and team augmentation services for clients around the world.
Table of contents
- The Myth of Bigger Is Better
- The Key Benefits of a Small Dedicated Team
- But What About Large Teams?
- How to Decide the Right Team Size for Your Project
- Conclusion
When it comes to building a team for an upcoming software project, many businesses’ first instinct is often “the bigger the team, the faster we’ll get it done.” And that makes sense on paper, right? More hands, more brains, more speed. But in our experience, that’s not always how things work out.
In many cases, big teams can slow things down instead of being more productive. This can happen due to many factors, like too many opinions, endless meetings, and miscommunications. We’ve seen it happen. Of course, there are situations where a small team just doesn’t make sense, but we will get to that later. On the flip side, when you hire dedicated developers, even a small team can often reach further than many companies would think. Roles are clearer, communication is direct, and decisions happen faster than in a large team.
If you’ve ever been part of a team where things were running smoothly like a well-oiled machine, you probably know exactly what we mean. Today, we’ll look into why dedicated software development teams often outperform large ones, when they make most sense, and how to make them work for your project.
The Myth of Bigger Is Better
It’s easy to assume that adding more developers to the team will speed things up. Spoiler: it doesn’t usually work that way.
Bigger teams often bring bigger challenges as well. Communication, setting up meetings, and staying aligned become more challenging with a larger team. Meetings multiply, decision-making slows down, and misunderstandings are more likely to happen.
Good project management, however, can help with these, but, in our experience, not a hundred percent. We’ve seen projects with 12-15 skilled developers, where progress still felt slower than a tight five-person team working on the same feature. Why? Because, in large teams, the context often gets diluted. People don’t know who owns what, or somebody is waiting for the other person to catch up. We’ve seen this happen a lot.
And we’re not saying that working with large teams is useless. They have their place. For example, for large enterprise projects with heavy workloads, they are a better fit. But if your priority is speed, clear communication, and efficient collaboration, a small dedicated team works great.
The Key Benefits of a Small Dedicated Team
When you’re working with a small dedicated software team, the advantages will stand out almost immediately. First, there’s no confusion around roles in your team. Everyone knows what they’re responsible for, which helps avoid the “oh, I thought someone else was handling that” situations.
A small team is also better when it comes to communication. You can throw out an idea in the morning and get feedback before lunch. There are no endless emails back and forth or Slack threads to communicate an idea, feedback, or update. Everyone on the team is up-to-date with the project and the priorities.
Thanks to that, a small team also moves faster. Decisions are made quicker, since there is no need for layers of approval. This gives room for more flexibility to test out ideas or change priorities if necessary.
Another thing we’ve noticed is that small teams tend to have a sharper skill focus. Everyone’s doing what they’re good at, and that shows in the quality of work. Mistakes are easier to catch and fix, and improvements happen almost in real time.
But What About Large Teams?
Now, large teams are not the enemy. They are a better fit for a massive project that needs lots of specialized skills at the same time. But, the downside of large teams is that it’s more difficult to keep everyone in sync. Communication takes longer, meetings multiply, and chances are, team members end up spending more time syncing than actually doing work.
When speed is not a priority, and you have a large project on your hands with a variety of skills needed, working with a large team won’t be an issue.
But if your goal is to move fast and keep things tight, a dedicated software development team will usually beat a large one. Big teams make sense when the goal is to scale huge systems or split complex work across different roles.
How to Decide the Right Team Size for Your Project
So far, we’ve talked about when a big team actually helps and when a smaller team just works better. Small teams move faster: fewer approvals, fewer check-ins, less waiting around. Big teams can handle more pieces of a project and bring in more specialized roles, but keeping everyone on the same page takes a lot more coordination and effort.
If it's still not clear which one is better for your project, you can ask yourself these questions to help you decide:
Is the scope well-defined or still shifting?
- If the project scope is clearly defined, a small dedicated software team will build quickly and help you launch your product faster.
How critical is speed?
- If speed is a priority, fewer people work better. But, for a large project with strict deadlines, a bigger team makes more sense.
How complex is the tech stack?
- If your project has multiple integrations, handling compliance, or infrastructure-heavy work, one or two developers won’t cut it.
Do you actually need specialists, or can generalists handle it?
- A small team of generalists can cover a lot of aspects of the project. But if you need a dedicated DevOps, QA, frontend, backend, designer, or PM from the beginning, you’re already in larger-team territory.
A good approach would be to start small and add people when the workload increases or when you need additional skills. But if the struggle is too many meetings, or slow decisions, then more people is the last thing you want.
| Aspect | Small Dedicated Team | Large Team |
|---|---|---|
| Speed | Faster, fewer blockers | Slower, more approvals |
| Communication | Simple, and direct | Complex, harder to align |
| Flexibility | Easy to adapt | Harder to change course |
| Specialization | Generalists do more | Specialists for each role |
| Ownership | High responsibility | Shared, less clear |
| Coordination | Minimal overhead | More meetings, more planning |
| Best for | Simple scope, fast launch | Big, complex projects |
Conclusion
Even with a small dedicated team, you can achieve your goals, and, in most cases, faster. So, team size isn’t about the bigger the better every time. It really is about fit. With a small team, you have quick communication and feedback with fewer distractions.
To decide what your project needs, think about how quickly you need results, what your project’s goals and scope are, and it will become obvious which approach makes sense.
In our experience, when a client chooses to work with a small dedicated team that clicks, it’s hard to go back. There is a focus and accountability that big teams rarely capture.
