Offshoring - A business growth strategy.

A good offshoring strategy has become a key enabler of high growth and performance in companies that recognise that their competition is increasingly coming from overseas where cost structures are lower than at home.

We truly do have a global economy now and it is not only here to stay, but developing rapidly. The internet and modern transportation methods have largely neutralised the competitive advantage that distance and geographical reach once gave companies. Free trade agreements between countries are also changing the competitive landscape with import duties and taxes less of a concern. Now people can easily and quickly source goods and services from anywhere in the world. Therefore it's not optional anymore for your company's own prices and overheads not to be internationally competitive.

In operating Depth Offshore my team and I are helping clients relieve cost pressures by up to 75% in salaries and other expenses associated with employing people locally. In some cases it has meant that our clients business has maintained its viability and then be able to go after foreign markets themselves.

Smart operators are keeping their IP development team and top minds at home and then supporting these people with a talented offshore team to enable them to cost effectively accomplish more important and dollar productive work.

Here is a short list of some more reasons to offshore:

• Offshoring is a business growth strategy.
• Fend off global competition and therefore remain viable with globally competitive labour rates.
• You can save up to 75% on salary costs and liberate working capital for business development and growth.
• If your prices are globally competitive then you can grow your company's market internationally from home.
• You do not have to be a huge corporation to offshore! SME’s are successfully doing this with Depth Offshore's assistance.
• Distance doesn’t matter any more. Free and nearly free internet technology like corporate Gmail, Skype, VOIP and video conferencing makes communicating with your offshore team like they are in the same building but on different floor. Depth Offshore will help you with this.
• Offshore to a single person or build a team.
• Be able to afford a higher performance team at home with the savings made on support roles locally.
• Increase productivity of your local staff by supporting them with an offshore team.
• Handle simple, repetitive tasks through to complex technical tasks offshore. Or handle a single project offshore.
• Flexible workforce. Scale your team size up or down rapidly and easily.
• No long term commitments.
• Great, well educated talent that will work your preferred business hours.
• Hard working intelligent people with excellent English.
• People are dedicated solely to your business so they become part of your team. +Depth Offshore does not believe in accomplishing tasks by allocating work to a pool of people.
• Free up your office space locally and lower your capex on office furniture and equipment.
• Far less administration required (no super to monitor, no workcover, insurance, payroll tax, FBT, vacation and sick leave administration, record keeping related to payroll, etc)
• Access to skills and resources that might not be currently available internally. Nearly any task can be outsourced.
• Outsource more menial/repetitive tasks to allow you to focus on the more important aspects of your business.
• Assign tasks to be completed overnight and ready for you to keep going the next day.
• Don’t have to worry about onerous employment laws and regulations. If a resource is no longer needed, or required for less time, the service is flexible.
• Faster turnaround time on some tasks as hours and days worked offshore are generally longer than most western countries.
• Good confidentiality and IP protection.
• One monthly fee that covers everything including office equipment. No additional charges or costs for superannuation, insurance or other benefits to pay and administer.
  
  

All types of work can be successfully offshored from menial tasks through to highly technical work where special skills, experience and qualifications are needed. We have helped our clients get offshore support from clerks through to mechanical engineers, CPA accountants, graphic designers and top notch computer programmers. There are so many tasks that can be offshored these days with phone and internet technology coming so far.

Click here for 99 more examples of simple tasks that can be offshored.

In my own country, Australia, politicians seem to think they can keep placing more and more responsibility and cost on employers and magically businesses can absorb this. Well they can't and many SME's are groaning under the strain! What our governments are actually doing is making it harder and more expensive to employ people locally and thus making Aussie companies unable to compete internationally.

A classic example of this is payroll tax. In Australia, if you manage to grow your business and employ more people then you get hit with a tax for doing this. Companies actually have to pay a tax calculated on the annual salary expense.

What incentive does this give companies to employ more people locally?

All for now,

+Brad Skelton