Most Startups never reach the market; often, the cause is an unprepared team. According to research by Startup Genome, up to 90% of MVPs fail for this reason. To lower risks early, it’s crucial to bring in the right experts from the start. This article will explain who belongs on your MVP Team, how to decide the correct size, which internal processes to establish, how to steer clear of common mistakes. And those who read to the end of the article will get a nice bonus.
What Is an MVP and Why Your Startup Needs One
A Minimum Viable Product is the simplest version of a development that contains only the essential features for validating a business idea with real users. According to Wikipedia, the term was first introduced in 2001 by Frank Robinson and later popularized by Eric Ries and Steve Blank.
The primary purpose isn’t to showcase design or advanced technology — it’s to quickly confirm if the offering addresses the problem it was designed to solve.
For instance, you’re planning to build a food delivery app. The full version might include restaurant integrations, a delivery map, online payments, a loyalty program, and a review system. But the initial variant can be much simpler: a menu with dish price, an option to place an order, and a field to leave a phone number for confirmation. That's enough to test whether potential customers are even interested in ordering this way, and if the interface satisfies them.
An MVP is a tool for quickly testing an idea with minimal costs. It helps avoid spending months or even years building something that may not have real demand. To learn more about a pilot version, watch the video where Artur, the CEO of Osmium, shares his insights on creating an MVP and hiring the right team to make it successful.
Why a Clearly Defined Team Matters for MVP Success
For a basic version to deliver real value, you want experts to be responsible for their specific area. Let’s explore how well-outlined assignments shape the development process.
- Defined Responsibilities. When roles are outlined, group members understand their mission within the process. This eliminates overlap and reduces the risk of important steps being missed because it was assumed someone else was handling it.
- Deep Expertise. Each task is handled by the person most skilled in that area. This improves the quality and allows the employees to be more productive.
- Seamless Communication. Knowing exactly who to contact for a specific question keeps things moving and prevents confusion over responsibilities.
- Accelerated Implementation. When a contributor concentrates on their to-do list, the workflow becomes smoother — progress speeds up.
- Reduced Risks. Clear positions help minimize mistakes and prevent chaotic decisions harmful to the project.
This approach provides the greatest chances for a successful launch within a tight timeframe.
Key Specialists Needed for an MVP Team
A Minimum Viable Product team should include experts covering essential areas—from shaping the vision to delivering a stable release. Let’s take a look at the roles critical for success.
Product Owner (PO)
Defines the main features. Shapes the offering’s vision, sets priorities, and keeps the staff focused. Acts as the link between clients and workers, always keeping business goals front and center.
Project Manager (PM)
Responsible for organizing the process, including:
- Planning
- Deadlines
- Employee coordination
- Monitoring progress
The Project Manager ensures the MVP project moves forward at the appropriate pace without chaos or missed deadlines.
UI/UX Designer
Makes the platform clear and easy to use from the first click. The professional creates mockups, tests how intuitive the interface is, and adapts it for different user scenarios. Their goal is to ensure real-world testers understand how everything flows without any explanations.
Tech Lead
The brain of the project. Selects the tech stack, designs the system architecture, and establishes coding standards. Leads the developers and makes crucial technical decisions.
The Tech Lead ensures the Minimum Viable Product doesn’t fall apart under its first load.
Front-end and Back-end Developers
These are the core builders who transform the idea into a functioning solution.
The Front-end Dev handles what the user sees and interacts with — buttons, forms, pages — bringing the design to life by making the interface interactive and easy to use.
The Back-end Dev manages everything “behind the scenes”: databases, service logic, authentication, order processing, and handling requests.
Both roles must cooperate closely. When a user clicks an icon, they expect immediate results. That’s why the interface and the underlying systems must function correctly, without slowdowns or errors.
QA (Tester)
Verifies that everything functions as intended. Their mission is to catch bugs before customers do (technical glitches, buttons not responding properly, order processing errors, or usability issues).
While the prototype doesn’t have to be perfect, it must be stable and straightforward, and that’s the tester’s duty.
DevOps
The person responsible for setting up all the technical infrastructure for a prototype: servers, production environments, automated deployments, and service monitoring. With DevOps, Engineers don’t waste hours on manual configurations — operations run smoothly, and updates happen with just a few clicks.
Without DevOps, the MVP might never launch, or each release could drag on for days instead of hours.
This is the minimum necessary to deliver custom MVP development within 2–3 months. Missing even one of these roles can lead to overloaded workers or put the product at risk of setbacks and failures.
When to Bring in Additional Specialists
The basic MVP development team is usually enough. However, sometimes new tasks arise during the stages that need extra expertise.
- Marketer. If the MVP is heading directly to market, a marketer becomes essential. They handle advertising campaigns, craft compelling copy, run lead generation efforts, and analyze beta testers’ responses. Namely, a Startup wants to check demand for a service — a marketer runs several ads and gathers feedback.
- Data Scientist. Unreplaceable when working with data or making user-specific recommendations. A Data Scientist sets up the logic, collects relevant metrics, and helps evaluate outcomes. Example: An app suggests educational courses based on visitors’ preferences — the Data Scientist builds and fine-tunes that recommendation system.
- Security Engineer. If there is personal info — medical, financial, educational — you have to make sure all information is secure. A Security Engineer handles that protection. To illustrate: Users enter personal details — the engineer sets up encryption and account security to keep the information safe.
These specialists aren’t required for the entire timeline, but it’s crucial to bring them on board promptly when demand emerges. That’s why flexible Outstaffing is often the most practical solution for an MVP Product Development Team.
How Many People You Need for a Successful Launch
It all depends on the scope of the work. For a simple service, 2–3 professionals might be enough. But if the product includes multiple features, business logic, analytics, or integrations, you’ll benefit from a bigger MVP Software Development Team.
You can roughly break it down into three levels of complexity.
| Complexity Level | Product Example | Recommended Team Composition | |------------------|-----------------|------------------------------| | 1. Basic | A website with a consultation booking form / An app with one simple feature | 1–2 people<br>• Full-stack Developer<br>• UI/UX Designer | | 2. Medium | An app where a person registers, creates a profile, and can request a service | 3–4 people<br>• Product Owner<br>• UI/UX Designer<br>• Front-end Developer<br>• Back-end Developer | | 3. Advanced | An educational platform with user accounts, learning progress tracking, notifications, and chat features | 5–6 + people<br>• Product Owner<br>• Project Manager<br>• UI/UX Designer<br>• Front-end Developer<br>• Back-end Developer<br>• QA Engineer<br>• DevOps |
Staffing arrangements can vary depending on the project. However, as features and complexity increase, you’ll need more specialists to keep everything running smoothly and on schedule.
MVP Team Formation Models
When assembling a staff, you have several options depending on your budget, timeline, and available in-house expertise. Each approach has its advantages and trade-offs.
In-house (Own Team) — you hire MVP developers as full-time employees and manage the process yourself.
| Pros | Cons | |------|------| | • Full control over the unit<br>• Deep involvement with the product<br>• Workers fully integrated within the business | • Takes time and can be costly<br>• Scaling is challenging<br>• Risk of downtime if the MVP doesn’t meet expectations |
Outsourcing — you hand over the entire project to an external company responsible for its delivery from start to finish.
| Pros | Cons | |------|------| | • No need to organize the team yourself<br>• Ideal if you want a turnkey solution<br>• Fast start without hiring | • Less control over the process<br>• Harder to make changes on the fly<br>• The squad may not be deeply involved |
Outstaffing — you “rent” the talent you need and manage the MVP development yourself.
| Pros | Cons | |------|------| | • Quick access to experienced professionals<br>• Flexible scaling (easy to add or replace members)<br>• Full control from your side | • Requires your active involvement in managing the delivery process |
Hybrid Model — you have your own department but bring in a few external specialists to strengthen specific areas (for example, a designer and DevOps on outstaffing).
| Pros | Cons | |------|------| | • Quickly fill critical roles<br>• Flexible cost management<br>• Easily scale during peak periods and reduce it after release | • Requires clear communication between groups<br>• Greater responsibility for coordination |
So, what’s the best choice for your MVP? If speed to launch is critical, and you are missing key experts, Outstaffing or a Hybrid model is often the most practical solution. This lets you bring in the right people quickly without spending time creating an MVP team from scratch.
Processes and Tools Needed for MVP Development
To avoid confusion and constant rework, the entire crew depends on a clear workflow from the very start. The following approaches are commonly used for this purpose.
- Agile (often Scrum). Work is divided into short cycles called sprints, usually lasting 1–2 weeks. At the end of a sprint, the team presents the results, gathers feedback, and plans the next steps.
- CI/CD (Continuous Integration / Continuous Delivery). Automated testing and deployment of updates enable quick changes without crashes or downtime.
To keep everything running smoothly, professionals generally rely on trusted tools such as:
- Jira or Trello — for activity management and progress tracking
- Slack or Telegram — for daily communication among members
- Figma — for creating and approving interface designs
- Git (GitHub or GitLab) — for code storage and version control
- Notion or Google Docs — for collaborative documentation work
Well-established processes and a reliable toolset save time and reduce errors.
How to Measure the Effectiveness of an MVP Team
When specialists work on MVP development for a Startup, they do not only launch but also evaluate how the process is going: whether tasks are completed on schedule, if the contributors are making steady progress, and most importantly — whether the offering is valuable to audience.
Here are three key metrics to help assess this:
- Lead Time — measures the duration from when a task is added to the backlog until it becomes part of the finished product. For example, the designer creates a mockup, the coder builds the feature, and it appears in the app. If this process takes only a few days, the team is performing well. If it takes longer, it’s important to identify the cause of delays — whether it’s assignment, prioritization, or approval processes.
- Deployment Frequency — tracks how often updates are released, including new features, bug fixes, and design changes. The more frequently workers push updates, the faster they respond to feedback and adjust to user needs. For instance, one squad might release updates weekly, while another does so monthly. The group with more frequent releases builds momentum faster and tests hypotheses more effectively.
- Customer Feedback — the most valuable source of insight. Is the product easy to use? What’s causing problems or confusion? Which features are missing? Feedback can come from reviews, comments, support requests, or even usage data, like whether users complete the registration process. If feedback is scarce or mostly negative, take it as a clear signal to rethink the approach or adjust the functionality.
These metrics help identify early on what’s working and what’s holding back production or lowering the value. For a Startup testing an idea, this is a crucial way to avoid wasting time and budget.
Commonly Made Mistakes
An MVP should be fast and functional, but that doesn’t mean moving without direction. Many people make recurring mistakes that either prevent the product from hitting the market or result in a version too rough and unfit for effective testing.
- No QA tester. The service may look ready, but without someone checking how it works, users end up facing bugs: buttons don’t respond, pages won’t load, logic breaks down. Even the simplest MVP needs to be stable; otherwise, the first impression will be ruined.
- One person handling several roles at once. When a single individual manages the process, develops the solution, and takes full responsibility for the outcome, progress slows down. Focus gets scattered, assignments get mixed up, and something will inevitably be overlooked. While it may save money initially, it often ends up costing much more in the long run.
- The team provides MVP app development services but lacks a clear strategy. Instead of concentrating on one or two core features, they try to build everything at once. This causes delays and scattered focus. A key point to remember: an MVP is meant to validate a hypothesis, not to be a fully-featured solution.
- No one collects user feedback. The product goes live, but no one has an idea of what customers actually think. No feedback loop, no analytics, and the key question — “is this working?” — goes unanswered. Without this, an MVP loses its purpose.
- Postponing the launch — waiting for the “perfect” version. The contributors hesitate to release anything “unfinished” and spend weeks or even months polishing the item. This causes valuable time, budget, and the ideal moment to validate the idea to slip away.
These mistakes may seem obvious, yet they are the most common reasons projects stall early on. A successful outcome requires a clear understanding of why it’s being built, who needs it, and how to deliver a fast yet stable result.
Practical Example: How We Assembled a Team for an MVP
An early-stage business in the eHealth (or EdTech) sector reached us with a request to Outstaff specialists for MVP web development. We carefully selected talent based on the item’s objectives, set up workflows, established smooth collaboration with the client’s internal crew, and supported the successful start.
Details about the custom MVP development, workers selection, tech stack, timeline, and results — in the full case study at the link.
Bonus for Those Who Read to the End
To make launching MVPs for startups easier, we’ve prepared a free checklist from Osmium’s founder, Artur Patyk: “How to Assemble an MVP Team in 2 Weeks.” All the essentials in one file:
- How to clearly define your idea
- Which specialists you should hire, and where to find them
- How to quickly organize your lineup and get started
- Which tools to set up before rollout
- What to check to ensure your crew is ready to go
These are simple MVP solutions for startups that help you gather passionate experts without extra stress and costs.
Your Idea Deserves to Go-live
To create a stable pilot version, you don’t need a lot of people — just the right ones. The one that understands your goals, gets up to speed quickly, and knows how to deliver the offering to its first release.
Osmium provides startup MVP development services and selects precisely the specialists you need. We work in an outstaffing model — connecting programmers, designers, DevOps, testers, and other experts to your initiative to help omit the delays and unnecessary costs. Whether you look for a single specialist or a full lineup, we’ll find the best solution for your needs. Leave a request, and we’ll get in touch to discuss how to launch your product as quickly as possible.
