I have many clients struggling with these business dilemma’s;
- Their business is growing or about to take off!
- They are over-worked and/or suffering a poor work life balance.
- They cannot find reliable and qualified staff, the training and cost is a risk they do not want to take.
Very often my advice to business owners is to never be under-staffed BUT rather be slightly over staffed.
The benefits are easy to see, having an additional staff member provides your business with some shock absorption for the unknowns that can strike, it provides the excess capacity which will allow it to;
- Withstand staff member leaving or getting sick.
- Handle growth in the business.
- Enable a greater work life balance for the owner/s..
It’s more cost effective than most business owner realise i.e. for those paying tax at 46.5% the cost of the extra staff is in effect the after tax to you, approx. 1/2!
The use of an overseas staff resource is now very established in many small and large businesses where they have employed staff from cost effective and professional providers who provide;
- The staff member fulltime and exclusively to your business, you train the staff and they work your business hours.
- They are very well-educated and have good communication skills and clarity, the Philippine’s is most popular.
- The screening process, IT support and modern offices.
- The cost is very cost effective at $25K-$30K in most cases for admin staff (they provide a full list and fixed price for various roles).
The feedback I hear from business owners is very positive;
- That the new staff resource learned quickly what they needed and then added value in a very quick timeframe much to their surprise.
- That they were not well-prepared for the teaching and handover to the new staff member but they were pleasantly surprised at the initiative demonstrated and how much pressure the new staff took off them.
I decided to contact one of the reputable suppliers, and I was impressed with;
- Their process and points of difference.
- They have no lock in contracts so there is little to lose.
- They are large enough to provide modern premises, IT security, human resources plus other necessary support to their clients.
- They have answers to all the common concerns business owners have from their years of experience placing over 800 staff!
There are many of our clients I would recommend to explore this cost effective option, it’s a simple and logical process to get ready for this step;
- You essentially need to create a staff duties list for all staff in your business,
- You then allocate the most appropriate tasks to the overseas resource and reallocate the duties to the staff here.
- The rest happens in the roll out, to date I hear surprise at how much the new staff resource takes on and grows into, so perhaps this is worth giving a go!
