2020 has been a revolutionary year in many ways. Between global medical crises and global social unrest, remote employees, outsourcing, offshoring, and other major disruptive advances continue to accelerate within the business world. In this article, we will consider the prevalence of business process outsourcing and its importance in the new digital age.
There is some very interesting and relevant information about business process outsourcing reported by Market Watch, which, when taken into consideration along with the information you find here, should provide you with enough of a comprehensive understanding to remain competitive in the new normal.
The recent Covid-19 global pandemic was disruptive in many ways, but conversely, it also encouraged some very innovative solutions by both workers and their companies. Business process outsourcing is not in any way new to the world but is becoming increasingly important in terms of how we conduct business while at the same time mitigating any risk to business continuity.
Business process outsourcing has traditionally been relegated to non-essential business functions being outsourced or off-shored to remote service providers. These may be freelancers working online from virtually anywhere in the world, or third party companies providing more specific business functions such as accounting or information technologies support.
As we progress deeper into the digital age, an increasing number of essential business operations are being fulfilled through business process outsourcing. It is not uncommon these days to see remote language service providers translating documents and using live remote interpretation to coordinate efforts across physical borders.
Manufacturing processes have long been relegated to singular locations, but these days it is increasingly common through business process outsourcing to have parts manufactured in different areas, only to be brought together somewhere else to be assembled.
There may be some additional work involved with translation services and interpreters being required along the way, but what are the advantages of business process outsourcing?
Business Process Outsourcing and its Advantages
There may be some concerns about business process outsourcing and the inability of the business to maintain direct control over these processes. It is equally important to look at business process outsourcing and its advantages as this analysis considers what the economic and other advantages of business process outsourcing are for the company. Business process outsourcing and its advantages include increased savings in terms of business operations, reduced tax liabilities and an average savings of literally thousands of dollars for both the company and the employees.
Even as we settle into the post COVID world, we see an increasing number of people actively seeking out work from home and other remote job opportunities. The results for freelancers or other remote service providers include large savings for travel expenses and even extemporaneous expenses such as that morning cup of coffee from the convenience store. These savings can literally add up to thousands of dollars per year for the average remote worker.
Business Process Outsourcing and the Importance of Localization
Business process outsourcing is increasingly international in nature for the digital world we live in these days. As such, translation services will play an important role in the work, but this also means that there is a need to focus on localization as well.
It is important for companies that utilize international business outsourcing to use document translation services for company policies and guidelines, internal memos, and other specific documentation to be made available in the native language of all employees and service providers.
While translation services can be used to avoid any errors in terms of communications, localization services for businesses ensure that there are no cultural misunderstandings or any other serious issues which may cause offense and disrupt the business operations.
International holidays and domestic or national holidays are going to be different. This is fairly common in terms of international process outsourcing but is also one basis for consideration regarding localization in international business. There are many additional factors beyond just matters that will be lost in translation or forgotten holidays that can disrupt business operations.
The purpose of localization is to ensure that this is not allowed to occur and operations continue unabated. Localization in terms of food may be important as pigs, cattle and other animals may be forbidden within some cultures.
The cultural localization of business operations is increasingly important when a business has set up physical operations in a foreign country. In many of these cases, it may be necessary for the employees sent to distant lands for business operations, use interpretation services to communicate until they can learn the local languages.
These people should also be aware of any potential cultural conflicts, and it would help also to use localization strategies in order to determine points of cultural pride and other means of establishing a more personal connection with the local people. This added touch using localization services can help to ensure a more cooperative effort, a mutual understanding, and respect and serve to improve business operations including levels of productivity.
Business Process Outsourcing and Remote Service Provider Careers
As was previously noted, there are people that want to make a career out of working at home. This generally involves starting off in the freelance markets, though some people will ultimately find a job. This, however, can also be used to build your own online business should you so desire. For the purpose of this article, we will use translation and localization services to show you how to go from freelancers to an international business owner providing remote services to BPO firms and business owners.
Among the easiest ways to begin as a remote services provider is starting in the language industry. Virtually everyone has a certain aptitude for languages, and while individual skills may differ, there are other hints that will help the entrepreneurial types. It is equally as easy to find other freelancers online to provide those language services that you may not be capable of dealing with effectively.
Together, there should be a solid enough basis for the creation of an online company that can actively market language services, including translation and localization services to those businesses looking to outsource these activities. However, to accomplish this, it is necessary that you learn how to get started. First things first.
When you first begin providing outsourced language services for businesses, you will need to focus on seeking out long term clients. As a translator online, this will likely mean going to freelance websites. Still, you need to seek out long-term clients so that you can establish a base of people who need translation services on a continual basis so you can spend more time working than looking for work.
People are more prone to hire translators looking for long term clients since they will be the ones more concerned about the quality of their work. Some clients may require localization services or other services that you cannot directly provide, so this is a good time to begin building up a list of people you can rely on to add to your available services.
When you have a regular client base using your translation services, begin looking for new clients but providing those services at a higher rate. In this way, you will be able to continue earning more money as your experience with translation services improves. Keep looking for other translators, interpreters, and localization experts along the way, building up a list of reliable people that you can depend on.
Business process outsourcing is going to be just as important for your translation company as it is for the people outsourcing work to you, at least if you want to build a successful career working online. Once you begin to get more translation work than you can handle, you are going to want to outsource some of that work to those connections you made in the past.
Eventually, you should be able to build up a sufficient amount of work that all of the translation and localization services can be outsourced while you focus on marketing and the expansion of your business.
It may even be possible that you will want to use business process outsourcing to increase the efficacy of your online operations. You may wish to hire people to build your website and even look for a translation agency to translate the website into different languages that are largely unrepresented online.
Social media marketing campaigns and other means of attracting customers online are other examples of business process outsourcing in action. The opportunities for the ambitious person to build a literal online empire, providing a host of services is limited only by the imagination.
A recent report posted on 11 June 2020 on the Business Wire website reported that 47% of hiring managers were more likely to hire remote professionals to provide many of these services and more. At the same time, businesses that were not actively engaged in business process outsourcing to remote service providers were more likely to be actively laying off employees and losing business due to the disruptions caused by the coronavirus crisis.
In short, those businesses actively using business process outsourcing were able to thrive, even during times of a global crisis, while those companies in more traditional work environments were more likely to suffer a serious loss during such times.
Business process outsourcing and its advantages extend into areas that promote both financial and personal success. As we continue into the digital age and more global society, business process outsourcing, translation, and even localization will become increasingly important to ensure business continuity and the ability to remain profitable.
Business process outsourcing should also provide more enterprising types of unique opportunity to build a successful international business that has the capacity to compete with corporate giants online and off. When properly used, business process outsourcing and its advantages can be used to ensure business success under virtually any conditions.