How hiring an OFS compares to hiring a VA agency
Here’s the 2nd part of my response to this email I received.
I know you are presenting work from home jobs. We were also approached by a firm who provides a nice office space and handles IT infrastructure, electricity, and some supervision. Can you speak to pros and cons of each model, with experience?
Let’s talk about the pros and cons of hiring an Online Filipino Specialist (OFS) compared to an agency.
Let’s start with the pros.
– You get the exact talent you want/need.
An agencies incentive ISN’T to find you the best worker. Their incentive is to find you the fastest available worker to see if you’re a good employer.
Their incentive is to pull a warm body off the street and give them to you to test and see what kind of employer you are.
– You get access to talent all over the Philippines. Requiring an agency to find “the best” within a 2 hour commute of their office is the same as asking you to find “the best” within a 2 hour commute of where you live. It’s hard.
– It’s ~1/3 the price. No agency markup. No double paying for internet/utilities (they’re already paying for these things at home.
– No contracts. When you hire an OFS on your own, you don’t have to have a contract. There’s no minimum, no required number of months, no requirements on your end.
– It’s better for the OFS because they don’t have to spend for fare going to the office, food, clothes, etc. So even if you’re spending less, they take home more money.
– It’s also safer for them, especially if you have someone working nights because they don’t need to commute.
– There’s less turnover. Your OFS grows with you. The longer they stay with your business, the more high-level tasks you can outsource to them, unlike an agency where you can only outsource mostly low-level tasks.
Here are some of the cons of hiring an OFS directly.
– You need to be flexible because of power and internet outages. But these outages aren’t that common anymore. You’ll also experience this with smaller agencies if they don’t have a generator and multiple internet service providers. When I started in 2005, power and internet outages were common. They’re not so common anymore. My team rarely experience them and they’re all over the Philippines.
– It may take longer if this is your first time. The good news is, you’re going to do it again and again as you grow and it gets easier and easier. OneVAAway.com makes this easier the first time.
– Your OFS will have to handle paying their own taxes and benefits. But it’s not that hard to do that anymore since they can do most of this online. We provide them instructions.
– You’ll need to learn how to communicate and manage people. You’ll need to train them. That takes time. But then again, you will need these skills as you grow your business and hire more people regardless of how you hire. Also, we’ve made training easier for you with VAsMadeEasy with training modules you can give your OFS. Getting the training from you helps build their relationship with YOU.
Yeah, doing the hiring, training, and management yourself looks harder initially. But it gets easier once you start hiring someone.
If you want a step-by-step guide on how to hire, train, and manage your OFS and not have to worry about all of the cons, just go to OneVAAway.com
John

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