Remote Staff

Remote Staff – Do they Share & Grow or Wither in Isolation?

It is as true for Overseas workers as it is for local employees …. Experienced people are usually not still with their previous employer for a reason.   Give me a dollar for everyone I’ve started over the years who showed their true colours after about 3 months with me and I’d be a rich man.

Without doubt my most productive people grew up with me.  They learned everything they know from me and from each other.  Sure, there are set processes, which we are constantly changing, but in the whole, it’s the knowledge they have acquired and accumulated that makes the wheels of business go round.

TACIT KNOWLEDGE

This knowledge is called tacit knowledge.  It’s THE driver in small/medium/entrepreneurial businesses.   It’s an essential ingredient in business.

About 10 years ago platforms began, such as UpWork (formerly ODesk), allowing access to overseas workers from lower waged countries.   These workers typically operate as individuals from home.  Home based workers became, for a short while the “in thing”.   Business on a growth path soon discovered issues.  Without Tacit Knowledge and with restricted sharing, workmanship and service standards slipped.  Look around you – all the large trendy businesses now have their workers in “common office space”.  Nothing yet beats the sharing of work experiences in a team environment.

Don’t get me wrong, you can find great home based workers, and in small numbers they are very productive, but as the business grows keeping the wheels on with home based only workers is more and more difficult.  When workers are sharing in a team environment, they experience knowledge and skills growth with translates to Business Growth & Success.  When those people are working in isolation from others, they can wither and stagnate.Overseas Workers

I have been involved in virtually restarting two businesses who developed larger home based teams and suffered.  Their workers and their acquired Knowledge were lost as we transferred them to office based.  Today these businesses are thriving and highly productive in common office space.

OFFSHORING EVOLUTION

Offshoring is also evolving from home based to office based workers.  The trend I’m witnessing is moving away from Corporate Outsourcing of set processes and away from home based teams; to co-managed environments where a third party provider supplies the legal entity, desk space and computers.  YOU, as the business owner engaging team of overseas workers, select your workers then YOU train and manage them in YOUR business practices all together as a team –

  • YOUR people,
  • in YOUR space,
  • under YOUR control
  • with YOUR culture –

but at third world typically $100-a-week wages.

Mike O’Hagan teaches business owners how to effectively offshore.  On a 3 day intensive business learning tour you will learn

  • the 7 different ways you can engage overseas workers or services,
  • the points for and against,
  • the culture issues,
  • how to locate your team in the right area, and
  • how to source, engage and develop great offshore workers for your business.

For further information regarding future tour dates and details, please email Emma@mikesmanilatours.com