Virtual Back Office: Is It Worth It? - Part 2

In the article “Virtual Back Office: Is It Worth It? - Part 1”, we discussed the various disadvantages of having all the operations and support processes in-house. The points mentioned are for both product-based companies as well as service-based companies. As a continuation, in this article, I will be detailing what a virtual back office is and the various advantages it has over outsourcing.

What is Virtual Back Office?

A virtual back office is a set of individuals who are assigned to work on your processes while their physical location can be anywhere in the world.

A virtual team can be considered as the best source for raw talent. Since they use resources that are part-time or less utilized, the costs are drastically cut. A specialized virtual team can work on any area of your business like marketing, finance, sales, legal, technology and management. It has the advantages of outsourcing (like no overheads from rent, office space, payroll, insurance, etc.) and none of its disadvantages.

1) Control Over Development:

With a virtual back office team, you have complete control over the resources assigned to you and because of that; you can change your priorities anytime. The channel of communication is also shorter as you can directly interact with your team’s lead. By changing the priorities, you can reassign the team to any process you deem to be of high importance. This doesn’t cost you extra time or money if the team is already knowledgeable in the work to be done. In this way, your virtual team will also get multifaceted experience which will help you in the long run.

2) Retention of Knowledge:

With virtual back office, since you have complete control over the virtual back office team, you have 100% retention of knowledge through reports, logs, and such. Also, you can choose companies that provide daily, weekly and monthly reports so that you have complete information on the performance of your virtual team. Since, your virtual team has the experts of the field; you can directly deal with the cream competition in the industry. Also, since it is your vendor who is employing the subject expert, you don’t have the financial strain of employing such a resource.

3) No Long Term Contracts:

Even though many virtual service companies ask for long term agreements, there are some that do not require contracts at all. Thus, you just have to pay on a monthly basis for the work done. If you don’t want the service, you can quit anytime without having to pay an extra dime. Since there are no long term contracts, you can use a virtual back office provider as a testing ground for the outsourcing of the service. If in case you choose to outsource it or have the process in-house, you can do so immediately as there are no contracts involved with these companies.

Thus, if you decide to outsource, the best method to follow would be to get a virtual back office through a vendor. What’s more? You don’t have the hassle of any employee welfare costs, set up costs or equipment costs. You just have to give your requirements and see the results unfold!

To your success!