In the high-stakes world of financial services, technology teams don't just support the business—they often are the business. From challenger banks to investment platforms and peer-to-peer lenders, the line between fintech and traditional finance continues to blur, with technology capabilities increasingly determining market winners.
Yet financial services organisations face unique challenges when building and scaling tech teams:
- stringent regulatory requirements,
- cybersecurity concerns,
- economic volatility,
- hyper-competitive market for specialised talent.
This is where team augmentation offers advantages that go well beyond simply filling seats.
Funding Circle's eight-year partnership with Pwrteams illustrates how a thoughtfully implemented tech team augmentation strategy can deliver advantages for financial services companies.
Beyond talent scarcity
While most companies initially consider team augmentation to overcome local talent shortages, financial services organisations discover additional benefits that directly address their industry-specific challenges:
1. Regulatory compliance advantages
Financial services operate in one of the most heavily regulated industries, with requirements that vary across jurisdictions and evolve constantly.
How team augmentation helps:
1. Specialised expertise on demand
Funding Circle's team at Pwrteams includes developers with deep experience in financial data processing and security. As Denislav Naydenov, a Tech Lead at Funding Circle explains:
This architecture directly supports regulatory requirements for:
- Complete audit trails
- Data lineage tracking
- Transaction verification
- Fraud prevention
2. Compliance-ready infrastructure
Pwrteams provides Funding Circle with workspace and infrastructure arrangements that meet financial industry standards, including:
- Physical security protocols
- Data protection measures
- Secure communication channels
- Regular security training and awareness programs
3. Risk segregation
By working with a specialised partner, Funding Circle benefits from additional layers of compliance oversight and risk management, creating a more robust overall approach to regulatory requirements.
2. Scaling during economic uncertainty
Financial services are particularly susceptible to economic cycles and market volatility. This creates a challenging dynamic: the need to innovate and grow during favorable conditions while maintaining the flexibility to adjust during downturns.
How team augmentation helps:
1. Controlled, incremental growth
Funding Circle began their team augmentation journey with just a small team of Ruby engineers in 2015. Over eight years, they incrementally scaled to nearly 30 professionals, aligning team growth precisely with business needs and market conditions.
2. Geographic diversification
By establishing a technology hub in Bulgaria through Pwrteams, Funding Circle reduced their exposure to localised economic disruptions and talent market fluctuations.
3. Financial predictability
Pwrteams' transparent cost+ model provided Funding Circle with clear visibility into team costs, supporting better financial planning during uncertain economic periods.
As Richard Ashworth, Head of Engineering at Funding Circle, notes:
3. Risk mitigation through flexible team structures
Financial services organisations constantly balance innovation and risk management. Traditional hiring approaches often force difficult trade-offs between these priorities.
How team augmentation helps:
1. Technology risk management
Funding Circle was able to explore new technologies like Clojure without committing to extensive in-house hiring for skills that might later prove unnecessary. This created a lower-risk environment for technology experimentation.
Denislav Naydenov explains the advantage:
2. Team composition flexibility
As Funding Circle's needs evolved, they adjusted their team composition accordingly:
- Starting with Ruby specialists
- Adding Clojure experts as data processing needs grew
- Incorporating PHP developers for specific services
- Building dedicated technical support capabilities
3. Rapid response to market changes
The financial services landscape changes rapidly with new regulations, competitive pressures, and technological shifts. Team augmentation enabled Funding Circle to respond quickly to these changes without lengthy hiring processes or restructuring.
4. Business continuity enhancement
By distributing its technical capabilities across multiple locations, Funding Circle enhanced its business continuity posture, a critical consideration for financial services companies handling sensitive customer data and transactions.
4. Enhanced security posture
Cybersecurity is a top priority for any financial organisation, with threats growing more sophisticated yearly.
How team augmentation helps:
1. Security-first infrastructure
Pwrteams implements comprehensive security measures for their facilities and workspaces, including:
- Secure physical access controls
- Network security monitoring
- Encrypted communication channels
- Regular security assessments and audits
2. Security training and awareness
All team members receive specialised security training appropriate for financial services work, creating an additional layer of human security.
3. Multi-layer security oversight
With both Funding Circle and Pwrteams implementing security protocols, the combined team benefits from multiple security perspectives and approaches.
5. Specialised fintech knowledge transfer
Financial services technology requires specialised knowledge that bridges finance and technology domains.
How team augmentation helps:
1. Cross-team knowledge sharing
Funding Circle's team augmentation model facilitates knowledge sharing between their UK-based teams and Bulgaria-based specialists, creating a richer knowledge environment than either location could develop independently.
2. Domain expertise development
Over years of partnership, Pwrteams has developed deep financial domain expertise that benefits not just Funding Circle but potentially other financial clients through shared best practices (while maintaining strict confidentiality).
3. Fintech community engagement
Through Pwrteams, Funding Circle gains access to Eastern European fintech communities and perspectives, broadening their technology outlook.
The long-term strategic advantage
Perhaps the most compelling evidence of team augmentation's value for financial services comes from the longevity of successful partnerships.
Funding Circle's eight-year (and counting) collaboration with Pwrteams demonstrates that team augmentation can evolve from a tactical solution to a strategic advantage.
As Georgi Kostov, Tech Lead at Funding Circle, notes:
This team cohesion, spanning geographic boundaries, creates resilience and adaptability that's particularly valuable in the volatile financial services industry.
Measuring success: the Funding Circle story
How do these advantages translate to measurable results? Funding Circle's experience shows several key indicators:
Business growth support
The team has supported Funding Circle's growth into a leading peer-to-peer lending platform that has facilitated billions in loans to small businesses.
Team stability
Despite the high turnover common in financial technology, Funding Circle has maintained exceptional team stability, with many original team members still with the company 8+ years later.
Technical achievement
The team has successfully developed and maintained core financial processing systems handling sensitive transaction data—a testament to their capabilities and security posture.
Cost-effective scaling
Funding Circle has scaled their technology capabilities in a controlled, cost-effective manner through an economically efficient location strategy.
Is team augmentation right for your financial organisation?
While team augmentation offers compelling advantages for financial services, it's not a one-size-fits-all solution. Consider these questions when evaluating your approach:
- What specific regulatory requirements must your technology team address?
- How do economic cycles typically affect your technology needs?
- What specialised skill gaps exist in your current team?
- How does your security posture need to evolve to address emerging threats?
- What knowledge transfer mechanisms would benefit your organisation?
The answers to these questions can help determine whether team augmentation might offer your financial services organisation the same strategic advantages that Funding Circle has realised.
Building your financial services technology strategy
For financial services organisations considering team augmentation, Funding Circle's journey offers valuable lessons:
- Start with critical needs – Begin with specific skill gaps rather than attempting wholesale transformation
- Partner strategically – Choose a team augmentation provider with financial services experience
- Integrate fully – Treat augmented team as full team members, not external resources
- Build incrementally – Scale gradually as the partnership demonstrates success
- Evolve together – Allow the relationship to mature from tactical to strategic over time
As digital transformation continues to reshape financial services, the organisations that build the most effective technology teams—regardless of geographic boundaries—will have a decisive competitive advantage.
Ready to explore how team augmentation could strengthen your financial services technology strategy? Let's discuss your specific needs and challenges.
