Because I suspected the somewhat volatile commenting community might just shoot it down in flames and hurl personal insults at me. But with the exception of just one commenter who noted…

“The author sounds like a complete idiot who hasn’t done any real research on this matter.” LOL!

…the rest of the community had an intelligent, sensible discussion about an important topic. As for “real research”, I wonder if the fact that I outsource to two different people (one in the Philippines, one in the US) counts as real???

Some of the commenters had some valid points – outsourcing isn’t for everyone and I for one had always wondered just how a control freak (like myself) could bring oneself to let go of the reins and start letting other people do some important stuff in our business.

Here is what we outsource:

• Market research tasks like identifying and gathering potential prospects for the different solutions we offer.
• Technical build of some of the blogs we design for clients.
• Personal and LIP-related tasks like initial research for flights, hotel and other accommodation.
• More complex technical tasks we’re asked to do that we could figure out ourselves but it’d be time-consuming and not the best use of our time to do so.

The point is, we outsource a combination of things we can’t do ourselves (therefore enabling us to offer a better, more comprehensive service to our clients) and things we can do ourselves but choose not to (therefore enabling us to spend time on the things we’d rather do and the things we’re better at).

And for me, that’s the key to outsourcing for control freaks…identifying the *right* things to outsource that:

• You find boring
• You can’t actually do yourself
• You can just about live with not having to do yourself

So I’ve finally (after several weeks of researching, searching & then several more weeks of waiting) been assigned my new VA – Shinu.

This will be the first time I’ve had someone working for me (unless you count the husband) in my own business. I’ve managed plenty of people in my days as a management consultant but there you have all sorts of guidelines & policies to follow. Managing my own VA will be different. I’ve been reading in various books & blogs about the DOs and DON’Ts of how to work best with a VA so I’m going to be spending the next few days ensuring that our relationship is going to be a successful one.

Here’s some of the things I’ve done & will be doing…

• Created a new email folder to file all correspondence between me & my VA.
• Already filed emails/tasks in the folder that I’d like them to do – many of these will be repeat tasks.
• Creating email & document templates that I’ll ask him to use for certain tasks.
• Created some Camtasia video tutorials of some of the key tasks I’ll be asking him to complete (such as blogging/Typepad tasks).
• Creating separate user accounts/login details for some of the online services he might need to use.

I’m sure there are others but for now that’s quite enough to be getting on with. Please let me know if you think/know there’s anything else I can be doing to ensure our success!

I have been keen to embrace the strategy of outsourcing for a while – specifically, hiring a VA (Virtual Assistant) – and now I’m even more keen. In fact, it’s top of my priority list and I’m waiting to hear from 2 different companies to see which might suit me best.

I’ve done my bit of research about hiring one, managing one and how to get the best out of your VA relationship, so I think I’m ‘ready’ – although at the moment, it’s only going to be a 3 month experiment to see what kind of impact they actually have on my bottom line (the business one, not my rapidly-expanding-because-of-all-the-food one).

One thing that I am super aware of is the experience many of my ‘clients’ had way back when I worked as a Mgt. Consultant. The ‘big boys’ and super corporates embraced outsourcing years ago and were lured by the massive cost cutting they could achieve by offsore outsourcing to India. Many are still doing it because, of course, it can make very good business sense.

A large number were burned however, faced a massive customer backlash and got it totally wrong.

Why?

Because they outsourced some of their core competencies & functions.

Small business outsourcing is no different…whilst the draw of getting more stuff done, leaving you more time to get more customers & more business (or go to the beach, in my case) and more time to do the things you enjoy and less of the things you don’t…beware of falling into the trap of outsourcing the very things that drive your business or upon which your business & reputation is built.