After a perplexing year, business owners and marketing teams globally are searching to boost their growth over the following 12 months. This year, the focus should be on increasing your team’s performance and overall productivity while doing so on a budget.
Welcome to the world of outsourcing and virtual assistance. Virtual assistants are a cost-effective staffing solution that is a game-changer for many businesses worldwide.
Comment by Daniel M. from Southpoint Media
“When we set off to expand our team, we had to learn a lot of lessons the hard way. Lessons like: Finding the right people is hard, finding the wrong people costs a tremendous amount of time and money; and, most importantly, finding someone who can help with all of your staffing needs is a game-changer. Mads and his team have helped our business find the right staff to fit our needs and improve our staffing-related processes. Their insight and knowledge have been invaluable in helping our hiring from the top down and we are so grateful for their help in managing the team.” (Daniel M., from Southpoint Media, review of Aristo Sourcing).
How can outsourcing help your business?
The comment by Daniel sums it up – outsourcing is a game-changer that can help a business scale up faster. But let’s go into more detail about the five key benefits of outsourcing.
Focus on core tasks.
A business’s back-office operations will grow as the company grows; however, this growth could demand hiring more on-site staff. This equates to more significant business expenses, ranging from higher salaries, additional workstations, and equipment, more work for your HR department, or even the recreation of your home. Still, the back-office operations are needed to keep the business running successfully.
If a company outsources these laborious and tedious yet important tasks to a virtual assistant, the in-house staff can focus on their core tasks. The costs of completing these admin-based tasks will be lower than having your in-house staff complete them. In addition, removing this type of work from your core staff’s workload will increase their productivity. Moreover, they will not be drained by work they were not originally hired to complete.
Maintain lower costs
Although mentioned before, an important point to remember is the cost savings. The reality is that funds are being spent on additional equipment. These can include items such as laptops, company phones, desks, and chairs, not to mention stationery, which always seems to disappear from the office and eat into the budget. Add to this the need to rent a larger office space to accommodate all your employees, and the amounts become ridiculous.
In contrast, outsourcing allows the company to grow by using virtual assistants working remotely from their home office and using their equipment. There is also no need to spend any funds to accommodate off-site staff. More so, this is a massive saving for the business. This approach can also work for companies wanting to downsize somewhat. Many companies are opting for smaller teams to work for them. These highly skilled professionals would command respectable salaries and excellent benefits. Some businesses outsource their administrative work to remote assistants to counter this expense. Such costs are much lower than having an on-site worker. The savings cover the high wages paid to the core team.
Additionally, some companies outsource selected departments, such as their HR department, to remote assistants. This is simply because HR may not be the company’s focus. It reduces expenses to outsource the HR. All the HR work is thus completed, but at a lower cost.
Promote growth
The business overhead expenses of some tasks are incredibly high. Nonetheless, such costs are needed to offer the client excellent service, expand the company, or be competitive. Outsourcing can be a perfect choice to reduce these costs and gain access to much-needed talent, thus ensuring the success of the projects. Moreover, this can increase the business’s efficiency, making it more robust than its competitors. For instance, when a business outsources its customer service department, it ensures the clients are well looked after. At the same time, the company saves money by not hiring on-site workers who demand higher salaries and benefits.
Preserve operational control
Outsourcing should be considered for tasks that demand mounting costs. Specific departments could have developed over time into disorderly and poorly managed spaces. An outsourcing company would offer suitable candidates who can correct these departments through onboarding the skills needed to restructure and develop the company. For example, this could be the HR department or the IT department. Outsourcing, for instance, the IT to a freelance assistant, means that the work is completed as it should be, and the processes can be returned to their stable best.
Provide staffing flexibility
Outsourcing permits tasks or departments with recurring difficulties to access additional resources when needed. Moreover, outsourcing some tasks means the company can quickly and flexibly make necessary changes. For instance, during tax season, a company might need accounting skills; outsourcing allows the business to onboard these skills solely for the season. Once not required, the skilled workers can be dismissed.
Offer stability and risk management.
Times of high worker turnover can add ambiguity and unpredictability to any company. Outsourcing offers continuity to the business while decreasing the risk that a substandard level of work could bring about, even over a brief period. For example, the HR manager could be on a lengthy medical leave, and the admin assistant then leaves the company. Outsourcing HR duties eases risk and permits the business to function despite the manager being absent. It similarly offers you time to employ a new associate instead of rushing an assessment, the office being short-staffed.
Grow internal staff
A vast project can need skills your workers might not have, which is where outsourcing can help. For instance, if a business requires a new website, a website designer can be onboarded to complete setting up the website. With outsourcing, a company can onboard the skills needed to assist the current staff in completing their work. You can facilitate onboarding and offboarding without fear of hurt feelings or reprisals.