Your business has grown and it’s starting to get a little crazy juggling your books, answering your phone, scheduling your appointments, invoicing and collecting on those invoices. Likely someone has suggested outsourcing to you but you just want your own person sitting in your office. It’ll be easier and it’s cheaper.
Is it though? In this post we’re going to review the top 5 reasons to consider outsourcing to a virtual business support services firm and compare the bottom line.
1. Hive mind and skills vs skills and ideas of one person.
When you outsource to a local firm you get the benefit of the hive mind and the skills of a team. A firm will have professional receptionists, admin and bookkeepers who all work together to support you. Rather than being limited to the ideas and skills of one person – even one rock star – you get to draw on a larger talent pool.
2. Work with professionals.
There are unicorns out there who are skilled and want to do it all. That’s how I grew my career. But they are few and far between. By working with a team you will be working with professionals who specialize in what they do – which means they will do it well and with enthusiasm. Seeking out that unicorn will likely end with you hiring someone super junior which will bring it’s own set of challenges. Alternatively it might result in hiring someone who is unhappy with 2/3 of their work duties.
3. Scaling up and down with ease.
Planning on rapid growth? A firm with a team can scale up with you. Want to work hard all year and then take time off in the winter / summer – no problem a firm can scale down when you don’t need all of their services. Before launching IYT, my employer was faced with my senior salary while vacationing with his daughter. Call it an a-ha moment. Now, just like all of our members, he can just scale down his services when he takes the summer off.
4. This isn’t a side hustle.
These are local professionals building their careers and paying their rent by supporting you. Often when people hear “outsource” it brings up stories they’ve heard of the disappearing VA, the VA that took three days to respond or the overseas VA who just didn’t understand the nuances of supporting your clients (in between power outages). If you look for a firm that works with employees then you will be working with people who have a higher commitment level to supporting you. They are getting paid well, get to take vacations and it’s what they do! They aren’t trying to squeeze you in after their day job or between loads of laundry. It’s win-win; you get the benefits of outsourcing and tapping into the gig economy and they have full-time rewarding employment.
5. Let Someone Else Manage the HR, the Sick Days, Vacation and Benefits.
Hiring and managing people is hard. You’re likely already experienced in hiring and managing team members in the field. It will be no different when hiring for the operations of your business. Hiring takes time, hiring wrong is expensive. If you’re hiring one person to fill multiple rolls it can have huge impact on your business if they’re sick or when they go on holidays. When you work with a firm the hiring, onboarding, training, supporting etc is no longer your responsibility. If someone isn’t working out you aren’t faced with the tricky dance of what to do next: the firm you’ve hired will manage that for you. At It’s Your Time our promise is that you pay us for training once – when we start with you – and never again. So this huge cost of someone not being the right fit is no longer yours to bear.
To summarize, outsourcing to the right firm can bring you greater resources and experience while allowing you to scale your business. Below is an infographic that shows the real hourly cost of hiring an intermediate admin assistant in Vancouver.
