Back-office tasks are critical, but not all businesses can handle them efficiently. Learn why back office outsourcing is a great option for your company.
Ask anyone about what makes a successful business, and they’ll give you different answers. Some will define a successful business by how well it can sell its primary goods and services. Others will define success by how many recognize their brand. Others may look at a company’s longevity as the most important criterion.
There may be a few who will consider a company’s ability to do its job while continuously upscaling its operations. After all, administrative work isn’t typically the most recognized job, so a company’s ability to adjust its operations isn’t something that you often think about.
The kinds of work that keep a company operational are categorized as back office. Like what the name implies, most of the work that falls under the back office is things that your customers or prospective clients do not get to interact with. Human resources, accounting operations, and other support work that don’t require your employees to face clients are part of this umbrella.
These back-office operations are critical to the success of your business, as they allow your sales teams and other client-facing departments to focus on their work. Without a proper back-office team working on the company’s taxes or IT infrastructure, it will be hard for any company to operate at full capacity.
Moreover, a capable back office can help your business meet its key performance indicators (KPIs). An able HR department will be able to find and hire talented employees; an IT department that knows what it’s doing can provide tools that improve workplace efficiency; a solid accounting team will ensure that your payables and dues are settled on time.
Does your business need to expand its operational scale but don’t have the necessary manpower in your back office departments to take on the increased load? It may be high time for you to consider getting back-office outsourcing services.
Defining Back-Office Outsourcing
Back-office outsourcing is as straightforward as its name suggests. Companies of various industries and sizes look for third-party organizations that can do some of their back-office responsibilities for them. These outsourcing companies have the manpower and infrastructure requirements to take over such responsibilities so that companies can focus on the core aspects of operating the business while generating income and profits.
Being able to outsource such important work to capable companies provides a great deal of relief to companies, as it allows them to focus on branding, customer services, and other revenue-generating activities. Be it upscaling operations or improving your company’s workflow, outsourcing important clerical responsibilities allows you to focus your efforts on growing your company.
Which Back-Office Tasks Can Be Outsourced?
The outsourcing industry has grown tremendously over the past few decades. While there are still people that think customer service is the only kind of work being outsourced, there are now plenty of tasks that you can get a reliable outsourcing company to do in your stead.
If you’re still unsure about which business processes to outsource, this segment should help you identify which parts of your business can be handled by an outsourced team of professionals.
Accounting Operations
Accounting is a vital part of your business that should always be done right. Having a complete account of your business’s assets and liabilities helps you make better business decisions and ensure that you properly pay your taxes, among other benefits.
If you plan to expand your company’s operations but don’t have a sizable accounting team to handle the increase in workload, it’s in your company’s best interests to outsource the work to a reliable accounting team that can handle all those requirements for you.
Human Resources
A company is made up of professionals working to achieve a singular goal. Since your employees are, arguably, the most important resource in your company, it’s important to make sure that their needs are properly met.
Outsourcing your HR tasks will enable you to quickly grow your company without having to worry whether your HR department will be able to quickly incorporate your new employees into the fold. This also ensures that any employee benefits or programs will be quickly incorporated into your company’s back-office operations.
IT Support
In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, a company’s IT department has become one of the most important back-office departments. Cloud platforms became more popular, as the world was forced to adopt a remote work setup. The latest IT trends will have a major impact on how your company operates moving forward, as well.
If your company doesn’t have the time to build a competent IT team from scratch, then outsourcing them to a trusted company will help your company remain technologically competitive. An outsourced IT department that can provide the necessary software to your organization can boost your business activities.
Moreover, cybersecurity has become a matter of great importance over the past couple of years. Cybercriminals stepped up their efforts over the past two years as cyberattacks became more common and dangerous. Outsourcing your network’s security to qualified and experienced IT professionals will ensure your systems are safe from most kinds of attacks.
Customer Experience Management
It’s inevitable for companies to run into customer service issues. While you may have built an in-house customer service team to handle the load, increasing the scale of operations may overwhelm your team.
If downscaling is not an option for your company, getting a third-party customer experience team to share the work with your in-house support team may be a wise decision. Most outsourcing companies have the necessary manpower and infrastructure to support any kind of customer experience your company is implementing.
Data Entry and Document Management
Businesses handle a lot of documents, too. Whether it’s employee files or your business’s tax returns, there will always be considerable amounts of information that needs to be organized and recorded immediately. The last thing you want as a business owner is not finding a specific contract or tax returns from a certain year because your documents weren’t neatly organized.
Companies that don’t have large teams to work on data entry and document organization should consider getting outside help through outsourcing. Companies in this industry can quickly look for qualified individuals with considerable experience in organizing information to work on your specific needs.
The Advantages of Tapping Outsourcing Companies
Company owners and managers who have seen the quality of work that outsourcing teams can provide first-hand swear by such services. If you’re still on the fence about whether you should tap the services of an outsourcing company, the following benefits might be able to change your mind.
Makes Scaling up Easier to Achieve
If you know you have a good product or service and there’s consistent demand, there’s no other way for your company to go but upwards. However, not all companies can expand quickly without compromising the quality of their work. In fact, there are dangers to upscaling too quickly if you aren’t careful with your approach.
Hiring a third-party company to take care of repetitive yet essential tasks for you will enable you to scale your operations more safely. While you cannot completely remove the risks that come with increasing your operating size, outsourcing makes your back-office tasks more manageable.
Gives You Access to Industry Experts
Finding competent people to work in your company can be a hard task to accomplish, but your business cannot just wait for HR to find the right person for the job. Certain situations call for competent manpower that can start working for your company immediately.
Outsourcing companies hire industry experts that have years of knowledge and experience in the specific field that you’re looking to outsource. The benefits of getting experienced personnel working for your business will be tremendous.
Moreover, these experts will give you an idea of how such tasks can be approached. You and your company can learn a lot by seeing how outsourced teams manage the task you’re offloading to them.
Allows You to Focus on Core Competencies
Small business owners will tell you how hard growing your business can be when you’re trying to manage everything on your own. Addressing every facet of your company will take away precious time from helping your business grow.
Outsourcing tasks that take more time than necessary will allow you to focus on core competencies that make your business stand out. The freedom that back-office outsourcing offers can help you grow your business by doing what you do best.
Ensures Cost-Efficiency
When you’re trying to oversee everything yourself, there will be certain aspects of the job that could cost you more money than you originally anticipated. While these expenses aren’t noticeable right away, combining these expenditures will reveal just how much money it takes from your budget.
By getting an outsourcing company, you will be provided with the manpower, infrastructure, and training to keep your day-to-day operations running smoothly. These companies can provide you a quick peek into how to properly do specific tasks while spending as little as possible.
Experience Exponential Growth With Back Office Outsourcing
There should be no shame in letting an outsourcing company handle some of your back-office work. While tapping such services come with their own set of inconveniences—which may include data security, language barriers, approval delays, and the like—the benefits that they can provide far outweigh these challenges.
Identify which processes you should pass off to a reliable outsourcing team, and you’ll immediately feel its impact on your business. The day that you get third-party help for your back-office tasks will become one of the game-changing days for your business as a whole.
Author Bio
Jamie co-founded optiBPO in 2008 and has over 25 years of experience in organizational transformation, shared services, and outsourcing. He has worked with over 100 companies in the past 5 years to offshore a range of business operations to the Philippines.