Replacing Talent through Remote Work Teams

When Judy, a working mother had her third baby, she decided to stay at home. Her employer, Matt was worried. After all, Judy was one of their most diligent accountants. What made matters worse was that Judy‘s decision came at a time when baby boomers were retiring and the company was hard pressed trying to retain and recruit talent.

Matt had three options:

• He could hire another person
• He could outsource/offshore the work
• He could persuade Judy to join the country‘s growing league of telecommuters

Hiring another accountant meant lost time as he would have to scout around for the ideal candidate and spend time training him/her. Offshoring meant he would have to work with someone he had never seen. Telecommuting seemed a viable option but he wasn‘t too sure Judy would be able to do justice to her job with three kids at home. It was a tough call

Matt‘s Discoveries

Telecommuting - the Future of Work

Telecommuting, teleworking, e-working, working from home, distributed work, remote working, home sourcing, virtual offices�call it what he did, Matt realized that it had been the buzz word for a while and was predicted to be the next big trend in the future of work. With huge corporate giants in the country investing on building remote work teams, there was a growing curiosity and interest among the general public on the advantages of telecommuting. Just like industrial revolution transformed the agrarian economy, remote access technology was redefining the concept of the workplace. Virtual offices were no more the fantasies of a deluded mind but a growing reality. Thanks to advanced technologies like VPN, VoIP, IM, videoconferencing, the possibility of connecting remotely to desktops and the growing presence of the broadband internet, virtual offices could flourish just as effectively as a brick and mortar presence. For someone like Judy, it would mean flexible working schedules; for employers like Matt huge savings on infrastructure and salaries as teleworkers often took home almost 30 % lesser salary than their non-virtual counterparts. Besides, statistics showed that encouraging employees to work remotely for just one day in a week could result in reducing fuel costs by almost 20%. Translate that into fuel savings for the entire nation, and reduction of environmental hazards and Matt could understand why the concept had an increasing number of takers.

But what was the Hitch?

Matt had almost decided that telecommuting was a feasible option, when a thought struck him. Though telecommuting had phenomenal potential, the fact remained that for many years now it had still remained the next big thing, and never the big thing. One main reason was that it called for a total revamping of systems and mindsets. Managers preferred to be in the know of things and having an employee physically present made it easier to monitor progress. Telecommuting asks for a decentralized approach. Matt wasn‘t sure if he was ready for that. He feared that lack of supervision might result in a lack of time management. Matt might seem a little too cautious but given the fact there have only been too many instances of employees not using their time responsibly, Matt‘s fear was not totally unfounded. Yet another very real fear was the lack of security. While most organizations do put some safety procedures in place, there was still the occasional instance of information leak and laptop theft. Naturally, these few cases gave Matt reason to pause. Moreover, until now, time put into a job had served as a yardstick for measuring work done. Telecommuting meant that he would have to come up with a quantifiable metric to measure performance. He would have to come up with a metric that allowed him to make a performance-based assessment rather than a time-based assessment. Did he really need to go through all of that? Wasn‘t there an easier option?

Why Matt Decided to Offshore the work

When Matt reviewed the case, he felt that offshoring was the most financially and logically viable option. His reasoning was simple -

• The offshoring facility in India that he selected had trained accountants, who had worked on several US portfolios. Their references were commendable.
• Their talent and skills were not just as good as Judy‘s, but in many ways better because they had worked for other clients and had better exposure to the global market.
• They worked during a different time zone and this ensured that work was getting done 24/7.
• The company already had invested in infrastructure, training and employee benefits, so he didn‘t have to concern himself with HR issues.
• Even if Judy was willing to work for less than 30% of the salary she was currently drawing, it was still higher having to pay her in dollars rather than paying a virtual accountant in India. Money savings from offshoring were definitely worth considering.

Why Outsourcing or Offshoring Scores Over Teleworking

Outsourcing your work either to a domestic partner or an offshore partner has tangible benefits as opposed to teleworking.

• An existing talented, resource pool to draw from
• No hassles of recruitment and training
• An accountable system with measurable metrics
• Drawing upon global talent
• More savings on specialized equipment, social security taxes, insurance, infrastructure, HR issues and perks, as these fall under the purview of your outsourcing/offshoring partner
• 24/7 operation in the case of offshore development facilities like India that are in the perfect time zone to help you operate 24/7.
• Outsourcing gives you the confidence that someone is responsibly managing the workforce, even if it is another manager.

A TA client would be able to testify about the efficacy of offshoring. Most of them consider us an extension of their own business, in spite of the fact that we are continents apart! And that‘s not surprising. It just proves how little distance impacts business in today‘s competitive world. What really matters is finding cost-effective global talent.