A few things which I think dedicated in-house teams can do better than external contractors:
1) Flexibility
2) Deep process knowledge
3) Protective about the Org
4) Quick-Wins
5) View the full software lifecycle
6) Sceletons in the closet
Disclaimer: I completely see the value of external contractors for several reasons. Maybe another post.
1) Flexibility
Wednesday afternoon, marketing came up with a great idea for a campaign they quickly wanna test. An in-house team can immediately help you implement a prototype in Salesforce to get started. The same is true for bugs. Leads can’t be converted anymore, your in-house team drops everything and get’s it up and running again. Externals have a way harder time being that flexible.
2) Deep process knowledge
Oh, the deep knowledge of every process, field, automation, and Page Layout one develops when you have been around for a while.
But it’s not only the technical knowledge, it’s also the knowledge of the organization itself: Have a question on invoices, quickly ring up Sandra from accounting.
3) Protective about the Org
In-House, you really learn to build for the long-term. Every bad decision, every shortcut, and every rushed implementation will hurt you eventually. This can be an upside and downside at the same time. Negatively, the in-house team can become very protective about their Org and stop innovation.
4) Quick-Wins
Internal teams can be really good at quick wins or low-hanging fruits. Often enough, a change doesn’t need a whole project just a few hours of dedicated work. Back in my in-house days, sometimes I’d implement multiple un-planed quick wins in an afternoon. Frank Marter was the king of quick-wins.
5) View the full software lifecycle
As an in-house team, a project doesn’t end with go-life, go-life is when the fun starts. User adoption, training, improvements, and maintenance have a way bigger weight if you see the org and the Users every day.
6) Sceletons in the closet
In-House teams know the skeletons in the closet an external team can not know about. This might be organizational like a certain team being understaffed or technical like the Lead object being a mess. An in-house team knows and can work around such problems.
These are just a few of the advantages. I think a good mix of internal and external resources can do wonders.
PS: Being an in-house consultant with audibene was one of the best times of my career.