While big companies have the pick of the litter when it comes to recruiting, small businesses have always had the issue of having whoever is leftover. The problem with finding quality staff is exasperated by the rising wages, especially in the US. In order to stay competitive, small businesses have had to raise the amount they’re willing to pay staff. This means higher overhead costs, even for businesses with 50 or fewer employees.
While not the miracle all-cure that people are looking for, remote staffing or outsourcing may be the solution for several of the positions small businesses are looking for. Countries like the Philippines have whole business process outsourcing (BPO) industries spread across large cities in the country, where experts in different fields are already working for overseas businesses, both big and small. The reason this option is a potential fix is due to the cost of hiring. The limiting portion of the service is that physical tasks cannot be done as the work must be done remotely.
Recruitment Problems
Small businesses have always had to compete with more prominent companies for talent. As stated before, they don’t have the funds to compete with big established companies. With smaller budgets both for recruitment and for employee benefits, smaller companies have a hard time attracting top-level talent to their companies.
In addition to competing for talent, the pool is also small. With people being taken by much larger companies offering more robust compensation packages, the pool is already limited, factor in geography and the pool of candidates gets even smaller.
With a small pool of talent and not getting to choose from the first draft picks, small businesses may run into skill issues. The people applying may not have all the skills needed by the company. In the event of this, small companies may not have the budget for someone to be trained, which makes finding someone with the right qualifications even harder.
The last and possibly most overlooked problem small businesses have with recruitment is recruitment itself. The time and resources needed to actually pull off recruitment puts a strain on businesses, even large ones. All the processes involved with kicking off recruitment are time-consuming and will either strain the workloads of current employees or cut into the already tight budget small businesses have.
BPOs Offer A Solution
Partnering with a BPO or hiring remote staff, means offloading tasks onto professionals at a much lower cost. They allow you to get the job done without sacrificing quality while saving money, avoiding liabilities, and while getting oversight for your staff.
While you may still have to compete with bigger companies that elect to use BPOs as a means to reduce overhead costs, you still have a much larger and diverse pool of talent to choose from. All you have to do is give the BPO your requirements for the position and wait until you get called for a final interview. The candidates presented to you will meet all your needs and sometimes even more, with the added benefit of being more cost-effective.
Saving money is probably one of the biggest solutions BPOs offer small businesses looking to recruit specific positions. Job positions will sometimes be half the cost in a different country due to currency differences. With technology advancing in the way it is, many jobs can be done remotely, meaning more and more positions are available to be hired at a BPO.
Instead of just being locked into having customer service, technical support, or sales agents, you can hire more specialized positions such as bookkeepers, graphic designers, and even whole marketing departments can be hired. Your talent pool grows exponentially when availing a BPO. Jobs that are difficult to source locally can be filled as long as the job can be done on a computer.
The Wrap Up
Hiring staff can be a challenge for small to mid-sized companies, but BPOs can help make it easier. They gain instant access to a global pool of talent that helps them save on employee overhead in addition to recruitment costs. If you’re a small business owner looking to bolster your team with a budget without sacrificing quality, consider working with a BPO to overcome the usual challenges associated with hiring.
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