In the past when you asked someone what outsourcing was, they would probably tell you something regarding sending work to be done overseas to an individual or company that would do that work dirt cheap. We can all picture calling a North American company for support and end up speaking to someone half way around the world that doesn’t speak English well enough to help us with our problem. Although that is a form of outsourcing and can be extremely frustrating, that’s not what I mean when I talk about small/home business and outsourcing.
Outsourcing for a small business owner is handing over some of your business tasks to someone who has the competence and experience to handle them for you. This gives you more time to focus on other, more important (marketing/planning) and/or enjoyable parts of your business. But, that’s not all.
Here’s part of the definition of outsourcing from Wikipedia:
“Outsourcing involves the transfer of the management and/or day-to-day execution of an entire business function to an external service provider.”
Outsourcing is generally done with an independent contractor (usually another business owner specializing in the tasks you need completed) versus hiring an employee. By hiring a contractor (IC) you, as a business owner, save tons of time and money. You don’t have to worry about paying costs such as taxes, insurance, sick time or vacation time. You also don’t have to dish out money for office space, equipment, energy costs, software, training, etc. You pay the person you are outsourcing the work to for the work they do. That’s it!
Most of these contractors run their own business which means the items they need in order to complete the job are most likely already a part of their business. Whether that’s software, equipment, training, or something else, you are sure to find someone who knows what they are doing and can complete your tasks very efficiently and to your standards. Online you’ll find many of these contractors go by the term virtual assistant or VA. A virtual assistant is just what its name implies, an individual who assists others from a virtual location.
Look for more topics on getting serious with outsourcing in the coming weeks. We’ll talk about why outsourcing can be a small business owner’s most important business builder, what kind of tasks can be outsourced and tips for making your outsourcing experience a positive one.
