2016 Deloitte’s Global Outsourcing Survey shows that outsourcing is becoming a vibrant pathway for small and medium enterprises to drive innovation and create improvement opportunities for their clients.
Some of the survey’s key findings include:
- 78 per cent of respondents have a positive feel about their outsourcing relationship
- Beyond cost savings, value is being achieved by more than 35 per cent of respondents through the impact of outsourcing, ease of relationship management, and improved strategic flexibility.
- Outsourcing is expected to increase in all areas, particularly Finance, IT, and HR.
- Finance sector, with 36 per cent, has the highest number of expected increase in use of outsourcing.
- 45 per cent of respondents see outsourcing as a key enabler of M&A activity
Why do companies outsource?
Cost, solving capacity issues, and improvement in core business functions are primary drivers to outsource. Outsourcing helps in driving transformational change and improve business results like:
- Cost cutting – 59%
- Enables focus on core business – 57%
- Solves capacity issues – 47%
- Enhances service quality – 31 %
- Critical to business needs – 28%
- Access to intellectual capital – 28%
- Manages business environments – 17%
- Drives broader transformational change – 17%
How to start a successful outsourcing?
If you’re considering outsourcing, learn how to get it right through these five key steps to successful outsourcing.
- Learn the different outsourcing models Deciding which model works best isn’t easy. The best approach is to learn the different outsourcing models to know which one to adopt and which one would best fit your organisation.
- Virtual Model — This model works on low cost and project basis. You can list a job or task and choose who you want to complete the job from all the individuals who bid on the task.
- Seat/Staff Leasing Model — This is for companies with up to 30 staff and growing, and wanted to keep their staff all under one roof. This way, you can have control of your operating team.
- Incorporation Model — It’s viable for companies with over 30 staff that have outgrowing seat/staff leasing. It’s a great way to get scale and be able to control the whole offshore culture and team.
- Choose your outsourcing strategy
- For Solopreneur — Use a combination of virtual model — full-time, part-time, or one off service — when starting out. Most solopreneur choose these model because it suits their budget.
- For Business with staff — You can also use a combination of virtual model to work under your key staff. Your key team can project-manage the tasks to someone who works under them so people remotely are connected to one another.
- For Business with staff in growth phrase — Look for seat/staff leasing model and create an exclusive team that all work under the same roof in the same offshore office. This helps maintain and build your company culture offshore.
- Choose and set-up the right software
- Cloud-based software — Only use software that is cloud-based. Google apps for work, Microsoft office are all cloud-based where you can get the app on your smartphone or iPad that links the information together that makes it really easy and handy.
- Password-protected software — This is useful when you’re working with the new person and you haven’t formed or established the relationship yet and just employed them the project independently. This resolves issues with risk and security.
- Marketing and Accounting software — When working someone else, whether local or overseas, having these software set-up makes everything transparent. It enables you to keep track of all the tasks and see how the project is progressing.
- Email marketing software
- Customer relationship management software
- Accounting software
- Project management software
- Identify which tasks to outsource Gain clarity on the repetitive tasks that your business performs and record how much time these take. Measuring time is important and it’s one of the factors to successful outsourcing. Repetitive tasks that are time consuming are perfect for outsourcing because you can create system around these. Some of the most common tasks to outsource include:
- Corporate secretarial and ATO correspondence management and work
- New entity set-ups
- Client service roles — from engagement agreements, to ethical letters to data base management and tax lodgements
- Executive assistants
- Marketing roles (one firm have 7 marketing roles)
- Bookkeeping
- SMSF tax and compliance
- Personal tax returns
- Business tax returns
- Recruit and manage the best team In recruiting the best person or team, you can either learn the do it yourself recruitment process, recruit someone through an agency, or set up your own team offshore. Here are some tips to best manage your offshore team.
- Become best friends with screen sharing software
- Check the work at the end of the task rather than at the end of the day or week
- Be available on skype for questions, motivation, and feedback especially at the start and on an ongoing basis
- Set time frames for tasks at the start of the delegation for the tasks
- Schedule a weekly face to face meeting
- Provide training, feedback or ask for feedback
- Reward your team with positive feedback or financial bonuses
“Keep team members engaged, productive and motivated because even the best people can get lazy.”
The Outsourced Accountant helps accounting firms from all over the world grow their capacity, margins and profits through global outsourcing. Contact us to find out more about how we can help your firm.
