Every business seeks to be profitable while keeping expenses as low as possible. But with profit comes tax, upgrade of office equipment investments in real estate and other worthy ventures that ensure money goes back to the local economy and creates more jobs.
However, when business owners refuse to adapt their models, profit dries up, tax and wages are no longer paid, and some even go into government benefits, which takes money out of the economy. And this is happening every day across Australia. Businesses that hold onto past models and misconceptions are bound to fail today.
This article seeks to put an end to those misconceptions and wrong beliefs that hold people back. So let’s get started.
1. Are Jobs Being Taken Out of Australia?
Some people think that by outsourcing jobs overseas that they are stealing jobs in Australia. But this is not true.
The truth is that everybody wins!
If a business gives a job to someone in another country, as the business grows and expands output and productivity, it can hire more hands among locals as not all jobs can be outsourced.
Within a short while, more jobs have been created in Australia and the business pays tax and spends more money. The offshore professional wins, the business wins, and the local community wins.
2. What Can They Do?
There are endless tasks that offshore virtual staff can do. In fact, businesses are only limited by their imagination. Here are some of the simple but time-consuming tasks that can be outsourced:
- Deal with customer enquiries and clear out junk mails.
- Contact people when emails bounce or return to the sender to ensure data is current.
- Update website with content, optimise new pages for search engines and reply to blog comments.
- Post to social media and monitoring of feedback.
- Generate marketing reports on website analytics for smarter decision making.
- Typing minutes from meetings, creating presentation slides, doing research and sourcing images.
Related article: 4 Tasks That Entrepreneurs Should Consider Outsourcing
3. Is It Taking Advantage of Overseas Workers?
Overseas workers prefer working for Australian clients. Since the time difference between the Philippines and Australia are minimal, they can work during the day and get paid more, most of the time even more than working for clients that require workers to work on night-shift. Working in day shift allows them to have a better work-life balance and spend more quality time with their families.
The fact that they can earn more working for international clients motivates them greatly which increase their productivity and build loyalty to your business.
So again, this is providing a great employment opportunity at a higher rate better than what is obtained working for a local employer.
4. Is It Possible To Find Good People?
Just like in every human endeavour, there are great people and there are bad ones.
When it comes to finding the best people (And by the best people, we mean people who are highly skilled, have a degree or even double degree, speak excellent English and great work ethics), all it takes is some effort to search for the right outsourcing partner and the willingness to pay a little more than everyone else.
Having said that, people are only as good as the system they follow, so it is crucial that new hires are trained and inducted properly into the company processes.
5. What About Business Data Security?
This may be a little tricky but it’s not any riskier than hiring local staff. All it takes here is following proper employee contact practice and if needed a non-disclosure agreement. However, this is more of an obstacle and not entirely a solution, but is pure common sense.
When it comes to the main work, they’ll only be granted access to the core folders and systems required for their job. Cloud-based files sharing systems are the best bet and if they need access to special tools, password management tools like LastPass or RoboForm are great for this. With vital information, they can only be allowed to view them but not to delete or export data until they are tested and proven.
Given the importance of data security, a better option is to find an outsourcing partner that can help protect your data. This is what outsourcing companies like Dynamic Business Outsourcing Solutions (DBOS) have made a significant investment in infrastructure and connectivity as these are paramount in delivering a high functioning offshore team.
DBOS placed high importance on privacy and security. Our facilities and systems are equipped with both logical and physical security. Most importantly, DBOS observes the provisions set out in the Privacy Act to protect our Client’s intellectual properties.
6. Is Managing Offshore Staff Difficult?
Any serious business willing to make money must take staff management seriously and it is not any different when it comes to offshore staffing. It is important to have the right tools and maintain consistent communication as best practice.
Here are some great tools for offshore staff as well as in-house staff:
- Gmail, Google Drive and other Google tools
- Asana or Trello for project management
- Skype or Zoom for face to face communication through video
- Voxer for sending memos on the fly
- TimeDoctor or Toggl for time tracking on projects
Conclusion
Outsourcing doesn’t have to be the way it has always been seen. Rather than thinking that it steals Australian jobs, businesses should see it as a great way to create more jobs in the country. Business people who are ready to join the shifting tide can take the plunge now or wait to be the last man standing, which might be an undesirable position to be in the future.
