The economic uncertainties coupled with rising competition in the marketplace create tremendous challenge for businesses – large and small – to cope. Some companies opt to delay hiring new staff while they wait for the “right time” for the market to stabilize. Remember that you have some existing projects and your clients are waiting for you to deliver. Plus, you obviously need to maintain certain service quality within your limited resources. Some opportunities might have already slipped past your hands if you will not act.
Hiring or building a relationship with an independent contractor can save your days, months or years (figuratively and literally). Like your own in-house personnel, a virtual worker or independent contractor are your staff who perform duties and responsibilities albeit their own resources and could be working as part of the business process outsourcing (BPO) sector.
Independent Contractors and Business Growth
Why hiring an independent contractor or virtual worker good for your business? While they may work remotely for your business, generally the loyalty and hard work of your offshore staff are dedicated to you. In our experience though, some of our clients have placed some of their virtual workers with Big Outsource to an actual employee status at some point in their productive careers. Generally speaking, the BPO model offers a win-win solution both to businesses and service providers.
The ideal uses of independent contractors and virtual workers are in the management of project fluctuations, addressing limited labour budgets, and scarce work facilities. Especially for startups, hiring a virtual worker or establishing a relationship with an independent contractor can meet the businesses’ needs for temporary contractors who can work on a limited time.
You can grow your business operations together with an independent contractor or your virtual staff through their parent business process outsourcing company. Here are some tips for you:
List the details in writing. While you may have tried with luck to enter into an agreement through purely verbal means, however, this time around, you have to be more careful. Together with the service provider, sit down and take the time to draft a comprehensive agreement for the service. List both you and the independent contractors’ details, including the extent of the service or work that will be performed, terms and schedules of the payments, and other terms. Make sure both of you signed the agreement and each have a respective hard and soft copy on file. When necessary, you and the service provider can agree to amend the contract.
Identify project goals. Again, this is important that both you and your independent contractor site down to come up with a project list. Include realistic and measurable goals, milestone dates, etc. This document will serve as a fall back when all else fails, and you need to retrace or have an alternative set of options to manage the steps of your business process outsourcing strategy with your independent contractor.
Provide access to resources. Paying your independent contractor doesn’t equate to success. There are certain project logistics that you must ensure to allow your independent contractor to work seamless with you or together for collaboration with your in-house personnel. Have you granted access to your central system to your independent contractor? Does your independent contractor already have access to your project collaboration tools to track projects and get relevant information?
Open Communication Lines. It may be a cliché, but communication can really make or break your business. Always open your communication lines with your service providers using teleconferencing facilities. You will find this useful for quick setups for meetings to get updates and progress reports with current and future projects. You might also want to hold a regular daily or weekly meetings as well.
The success of your business process outsourcing strategy will largely depend upon so many factors, but with the tips stated above, we are confident your business will be off to a great start.
