Outsourcing jobs is a matter that companies should not take lightly. Deciding whether or not to outsource particular tasks has always been an important human resource issue, particularly for start-up companies aiming to make a mark in their respective industries. Indeed, job outsourcing could be a strategic tool for making your business more productive and profitable; that is, if your business really needs it and if you know how to make full use of its benefits.
So which aspects of your operation should be done in-house and which should be delegated to job outsourcing companies? This is a key strategic decision that may be critical in determining your business success.
The rule of thumb on this matter is this: elements of your business that are critical to generating profit and achieving a competitive advantage should not be trusted in the hands of people outside of your organization. As such, the very first thing you need to do before engaging in job outsourcing is to identify the critical aspects of your operations and set them aside as mission-critical and therefore “none-outsource-able.”
Once you’ve done this, you then need to determine which among the remaining jobs in your company involve routine tasks that waste valuable time and energy and that people don’t particularly enjoy doing. Also, identify the seasonal tasks that are not regularly done or are done only when the need arises.
Once you’ve pinpointed these, then it’s time for you to do the math. You have to make some computations and determine whether it is less expensive for you to do job outsourcing for these tasks than to get full-time employees to do the work. In doing this, you should take into consideration the employees’ basic pay plus fringe benefits (as well as other peripheral expenses like office equipment and supplies) vis-a-vis the cost of outsourcing the jobs. Once you’ve done all these, you will then have a clearer idea of which jobs should be outsourced or not.
Job outsourcing is definitely a practical option for almost every aspect of a company’s operations–from data encoding, outsourcing your payroll, accounting, and copywriting to product manufacturing, employee training, IT managing, technical support and customer service. Outsourcing jobs enables you to invest your time and resources into more critical and more profitable activities.
