outsourcing pros and cons
TRANSCRIPT
Outsourcing Pros And Cons
Outsourcing has become extremely popular among businesses in the US for a number of reasons – not least of which is cost. This document is going to walk you through some of the outsourcing pros and cons, and also give you a couple tips and resources for getting the job done effectively!
Outsourcing originally emerged as a way for businesses to cut costs by having work done overseas at quite a low cost. Originally, work included a lot of manual labor, assembly and manufacturing. Lower wages and overall lower expenses contributed to these reduced costs. Bottom line, the lower costs greatly improved the profit margins for companies.
Now, outsourcing is gain momentum for other reasons. While cost reduction is still a primary advantage, other elements such as access to worldwide industry experts, a bigger workforce and more flexible options are being embraced as welcomed advantages offered by outsourcing.
There are a lot of outsourcing pros and cons – but I’ll keep this as brief as possible…
Cost Reductions from Outsourcing
As previously mentioned, cost reduction was the original purpose of outsourcing. And although it has since been demonstrated to have other huge advantages, lowering costs is still a big driving force. Companies and businesses look to outsource tasks which would be more costly to complete in‐house.
For instance, my friend, John Jonas has put together a site called ReplaceMyself where he walks you through finding highly qualified outsourcers in the Philippines for about $250 a month. I have to vouch for the level of work they do! It’s phenomenal.
What Projects Can You Outsource?
When I first got into outsourcing, it took me a while before I was comfortable with the idea of outsourcing some of my more crucial business processes. What I had to do was keep a spreadsheet open on my computer with a list of tasks that sucked up a lot of my day and then hand them off to my new team.
Examples of these types of tasks would be a virtual assistants, Twitter developers, and graphic design; of which oDesk is a great place to look. oDesk has this amazing feature where you can actually look in on your team members as they’re working throughout the day to monitor their progress or make sure that they’re doing what they’re supposed to!
Access To Industry Experts
One reason I personally outsource a lot of my company’s work is so that we can have access to an industry expert on a contractual basis for much less money that if we were billed in the United States. Usually, this work lies in the realm of software, Internet marketing, search engine optimization or pay per click marketing. The efficiency of an outsourced expert will enable him/her to complete the task much more quickly than it could have been done in‐house.
If the task were not outsourced, on‐premise employee would have had to complete the project and may have taken significantly longer; costing the company more in the long run.
On Call Experts
We just got done discussing how industry experts, no matter where they were located, can make an incredible impact in your business. Another crucial question when talking about outsourcing pros and cons is to ask what new opportunities an outsourced worker can provide the company.
I love hiring an outsourced team member, training them, and then seeing what they’re capable of. They have incredible life experience that we simply don’t have here in the United States.
With experts as part of your team, the company is able to go after larger and more specialized types of work. This is important because in doing this the company can find themselves enjoying much more success, much more frequently!
A Larger Workforce
Another outsourcing pro is the benefit of having a larger workforce without having to dig too deeply in the company’s coffers. Outsourcing companies can bring in additional employees on a contract basis
during busy times without worrying about what you’re going to have to do with them when the work runs out. This is particularly relevant in industries involved in peak seasons and off seasons.
A con of having a larger workforce is organization. Sometimes, it’s difficult to manage staff remotely, especially when there isn’t enough for them to do in the first place!
More Resources
For more information on outsourcing pros and cons and other outsourcing tips, visit our team training site.
If you’d like to get a jump start on finding an outsourcer to join your team, take a look at my favorite two sites, Replace Myself and oDesk. I use them both with great success…