In the piece, “Outsourced Marketing, Part 1: The Market,” blogger and CEO of Kinesis, Shawn Busse, writes that “the concept of outsourcing is nothing new. While many think of ‘outsourcing’ as sending jobs overseas, modern outsourcing is much more sophisticated.” Busse continues to note that these outsourcing businesses often provide greater service at a lower expense. Busse provides examples of outsourced IT, Virtual Receptionists and Human Resources.
“In the HR space, we’ve seen the rise of PEO (Professional Employment Firms) and HR outsourcing. These solutions can be a complete turn-key department (payroll, benefits, insurance, and even employee handbooks). Examples in the northwest would include a company like Xenium which serves clients in the Portland and Seattle markets.”
Business leaders are becoming more comfortable outsourcing non-core functions of their business. Outsourcing is a term often associated with job-killing due to the perception that jobs all move overseas. In fact, it is a concept business owners are becoming familiar as they shift from in-house to a local or national expert. Busse makes the point that “if you have an accountant, you’re already ‘outsourcing.'”
If a particular business function is not core to business operations does it make sense to shift the responsibility to someone who can do it with higher quality and lower expense?