1-800-507-1622After going through Part 1 of this “Beginner’s Guide to Outsourcing,” you should have a value-driven, prioritized list of projects, tasks, and responsibilities ready to be outsourced.
But don’t start looking around for a provider just yet. To research and pick an outsourcing partner without carefully defining your needs will leave you frustrated and likely to waste time and money.
There are two important considerations at this point:
Documentation and training:
My feelings on documentation are mixed.
On one hand, I feel that documentation is only important to the extent that it will actually happen. Too many times I speak with a new client who is excited to get started working with us and the conversation ends with, “Alright, well let me work on my documentation and then I’ll get back in touch with you.” Two weeks later I reach out to see what happened and they say that they are still working on their documentation and they’ll be ready soon. After that, I generally never hear from them again.
As with so many other things in life, doing it is sometimes more important than doing it perfectly if you are never going to get it done perfectly. It is better to jump in with weak documentation than to never jump in because all the i’s and t’s aren’t dotted and crossed.
On the other hand, good documentation is helpful and generally helps things go much more smoothly.
Taking both hands into account, I would give this advice: create as much documentation as you can in one sitting and consider that good enough. Then, knowing that everything might not be perfectly complete, be very available early on to answer, and quite tolerante of, clarification questions.
While video documentation is very easy to make, it is not great for the person responsible for the work. A lot of it is wasted time as someone is walked through things they could have easily figured out on their own and then the brief, important moments that are actually helpful are hard to find and refer back to later. Written documentation is the way to go.
Putting that written documentation in the cloud, for instance on a wiki, and encouraging your outsource partner to edit and add to as necessary is a great way to make sure that you both stay on the same page with how things are supposed to be done.
Pick the appropriate service provider:
Now, this is where I have an unavoidable bias but I will try to be fair and even-handed here (Full disclosure: I own a virtual assistant company that competes with the alternative outsourcing solutions I will discuss).
Referring back to your list, next to each task you are considering outsourcing write down all necessary skills, resources, and training.
If you have a recurring task of posting your blog articles onto various social media networks your qualifications may be:
- Ability to write well
- Knowledge of social media
- 4 hours of free time a week
For this task, you wouldn’t want to outsource to a non-English speaker and you’ll need someone with tech-savvy. Another task may be to create banner ads of various sizes promoting your new book. Your qualifications for this task may be:
- Knowledge of graphic design tools
- An eye for design that mirrors your own
- A quick turnaround time
For this task, you may want to be weary of a busy freelancer because they may be bogged down with other projects. Now, list requirements that may be more general and not task specific. Such as:
- Stability (will be in business next year)
- Availability (I can reach them when I need to)
- Dependable (don’t call out sick or “show up” late)
- Security (legal protection, bonded, security protocol)
- Budget criteria (how much do I have to spend on this project per month?)
Consider what type of outsourcing partner is most appropriate:
- Freelancers (eLance, oDesk, Rentacoder, Behance)
- U.S. virtual assistants (work from home, alone)
- Virtual assistant service (work as a team, work at an office)
- Foreign virtual assistant company (work as a team, work at an office)
To summarize the pros and cons, foreign will be cheap but not well-suited for complex assignments. A U.S. virtual assistant will be most expensive. A U.S. virtual assistant service will have middle of the road pricing and offer a wide breadth of services. A freelancer will be very good at one thing but won’t be able to assist with anything else.
Please see this chart for more information on the pros and cons of different outsourcing options.
In Part 3, the rubber hits the road and we will discuss best practices for beginning the outsourcing process and how to keep the relationship successful over the long-term.
