Tech talent needs are changing at an unprecedented rate. For today’s executives, the question shouldn’t be whether you invest in technology talent; you should be asking yourself how fast you can access the right skills without disrupting delivery or overspending. With AI acceleration, tightening budgets, and increased pressure to innovate, leaders are re-evaluating a fundamental question: Should we build internal teams, buy full-time talent, or borrow contractors and blended teams?
The truth is that most organizations likely need a combination of all three. The challenge is understanding when each approach drives the strongest ROI, and how to combine them to keep your technology roadmap on track.
Why Tech Talent Decisions Are More Complex Than They Look
Five years ago, hiring a permanent engineer or architect was a straightforward strategic choice. Today’s environment is different:
Tech needs can shift quickly, with skills for AI, data engineering, cybersecurity, and cloud transformation constantly evolving.
- Access to niche expertise is scarce, especially for mid-market companies competing with enterprise salaries.
- Delivery pressure is constant, whether it’s modernizing legacy systems, improving security posture, or supporting product growth.
- Budgets fluctuate, making full-time hiring a risk when long-term workload is uncertain.
This mix of volatility, urgency, and skills scarcity is why many US organizations are turning to contract talent and blended teams as part of their core strategy.
Build, Buy, or Borrow? The Decision-Maker’s Guide
Organizations will have different priorities and needs based on their size, industry, and age. So there’s no right answer as to whether to build, buy or borrow: you need to choose the right model based on goals, risk and time to value.
Build: Grow Internal Capability
Growing internal capability is often the best move for core systems, long-term product ownership, institutional knowledge, architecture and leadership roles. By building internal teams through building career pathways, upskilling existing talent and providing comprehensive training and mentoring, you’ll increase cultural alignment and long-term continuity and gain control over quality and strategy. For functions like architecture, security governance and proprietary product development, internal ownership matters.
Building a team does have its drawbacks. Business leaders need to be aware of and manage the slow internal hiring and development processes that many companies have, the higher long-term costs of developing roles, the risk of emerging skills gaps as tech evolves and competing with enterprise compensation packages.
Generally, it’s best to build when the work is a core part of your competitive advantage or requires deep organizational knowledge.
Buy: Hire Permanent External Talent
Getting the right talent in place, permanently, is usually recommended for functions or skill sets that are stable, predictable, and strategic. Buying talent is ideal when you know you’ll need the skill for multiple years. It helps establish maturity in a discipline and reduces the operational turnover that comes with contractors.
As with capability building, those looking to buy need to remain cognizant of long recruitment cycles and the often-inevitable burnout that occurs in roles that demand BAU and innovation.
It’s also important to consider that it’s harder to pivot quickly if priorities shift when you’ve invested in specific and costly internal talent building. On the whole, it’s best to buy when your roadmap is stable, your long-term tech stack is clear and competition for the skill set is manageable.
Borrow: Contract, Contingent, or Blended Teams
Borrowing, or adding short-term talent to meet a current need, is best suited to high-urgency projects, specialized work, transformation, legacy remediation, spikes in delivery demand and short-term or uncertain workloads. Borrowing tech talent gives organizations the capacity and expertise they need immediately. Whether it’s modernizing infrastructure, accelerating a cloud migration or securing a product launch, contract talent brings flexibility without long-term headcount risk.
Additional advantages include access to niche skills not available internally, faster deployment and lower onboarding friction and the ability to scale up or down with changing priorities. Securing contractors also typically results in reduced burnout for internal teams while simultaneously giving your internal talent the opportunity to learn from contractors.
Borrowing can be the best option when speed matters, expertise is scarce, you’re looking for niche skills for a short-term project or need or you need to derisk transformation work.
The Magic of Blended Teams: Making Hiring Strategies Work Together
For many organizations, the most effective approach is not choosing one path, but rather integrating all three. Blended teams pair internal staff with contractors and external specialists, creating a flexible delivery model that can:
- Stabilize legacy operations while accelerating innovation
- Provide expertise for migrations, integrations, and modernization
- Train and upskill internal teams through embedded knowledge transfer
- Reduce delivery bottlenecks without overextending FTE headcount
This model is especially powerful for CIOs and CTOs facing dual pressures: keeping the lights on while advancing digital strategy.
Key Questions Every Decision Maker Should Ask About Their Hiring Model
Before choosing a talent model, leaders should assess:
- What skills do we need now, and what skills will we need in 12 months?
- Is the work strategic and ongoing, or project-based and time-bound?
- Do we need speed, stability, specialization, or all three?
- What’s the cost of delaying delivery if we hire too slowly?
- Are we equipped to compete for full-time talent in this market?
- How will we manage knowledge transfer and risk?
A structured approach ensures investment aligns with both operational needs and long-term strategy.
When it comes to creating a high-performing organization, strategy wins. Technology doesn’t stand still, and neither can your talent strategy. Organizations that combine built capability, bought expertise, and borrowed specialists outperform those reliant on a single model. They deliver faster, pivot more easily, and stay competitive in a market where the only constant is change.
A flexible tech talent strategy empowers leaders to move confidently from uncertainty to execution, with the right people at the right time.
Engaging the right teams to support this balance is vital. If you’re looking to build a strong team that can support long-term growth, get in touch with MCG today.
