One of the advantages of being a business owner is the ability to work from home, or a coffee shop, or well, anywhere really. You’re not limited by seating arrangements in an open office, you can get away from the noise and bustle of a crowded workspace, and you can leave all those office politics behind.
So when your workload starts becoming unmanageable, and the thought of hiring staff starts to rear its ugly head – it can seem like a threat to your working style and freedom. Will you be able to manage sharing an office? How can you even go about bringing in an employee when you work from home?
Outsourcing work to virtual staff not only enables you to carry on working how you want to – it gives them the freedom to do the same.
According to the University of Warwick, happy employees are 12% more productive than their miserable counterparts. Combine that with the findings of IPSE, that 86% of freelancers are satisfied with the way they work and only 2% want to return to employment – you can see how outsourcing to virtual staff can be a good return on investment, with better productivity levels than traditional employees.
So what other benefits can outsourcing bring to my business?
Ok, so I’ve talked in length about the benefits of outsourcing to a virtual assistant in terms of managing your workload in previous blogs– from email management to newsletter writing and social media marketing, those time consuming tasks can be easily taken care of by freelancing professionals, freeing up your time for the day to day running of your business.
But there are other benefits to outsourcing offshore, and not just in terms of cost!
You might be deterred from hiring a freelancer based elsewhere in the world. They have all the skills you need and it feels right when you talk to them, but they’re not in the time zone, let alone the same country! So why would you outsource elsewhere?
Working with freelancers from around the world can actually be a benefit. Imagine being able to log on to your computer first thing, and find a folder with all the information you’ve requested from them, or your emails already responded to and a list of the ones you need to address?
You might need a freelancer who’s familiar with your target audience if they aren’t in the same country as you. If you’re based in England and have a successful product you want to launch in Spain, it’d make sense to hire freelancers to take care of your copy writing, marketing, and admin who are based in that country and native speakers – much better than perhaps missing the mark through cultural misunderstandings.
Technology enables you to work with virtual staff and freelancers from around the world easily and effectively.
Essentially, you can work with anyone, from anywhere, if you have the right processes and technology in place (and if you haven’t, we can certainly help you with that!). Cloud storage like Dropbox is essential so everyone can access the necessary documents quickly and easily. Conference calling or instant messenger apps like Skype or Zoom are also beneficial for ease of communication.
The prospect of hiring someone else to work on your business is always a conflicting and confusing time – getting the right person for the job, and having confidence that they’ll add value can be tricky. But once you have the right team in place working with the passion for your business as you do – you’ll wonder why you ever had second thoughts about outsourcing!
To find out more about adding Banks’ Business Solutions to your team, get in touch with us