Best alternative to the business world

 

21^st century outside and all humanity has turned out to be put in a deadlock while facing the new Coronavirus infection taking more and more human lives away every single day, every single hour. Personal interaction has been announced to be the most serious risk for the infection spread at a frightening speed. Consequently, we are to restrict our face-face communication and every separate sign of social activity to a minimum in order to struggle this pandemic together. The business world has always been in solidarity with humanity and this time it is of no exception. Remote model of work or “work from home" is the key shift we witness nowadays. While before the Covid-19 pandemic not more than 10% employees used to work from home on the regular basis in the US, for the time being, the WFH vector changed drastically: approx. 64% have practiced a flexible working mode and, what is more, the absolute majority is planning to go on with it. Quite a striking switch, isn’t it? Sounds good to reflect on the issue then.

Remote working model: a short insight

What does working from home imply? Where do its main challenges and arising complexities lie? This mode of work does comprise a number of challenges every company meets while trying to ‘dislocate’ one’s office place to one’s home place. It is not a computer, a chair and a monitor merely, but also a good deal of back end procedures to make your working process proper and flawless. The very team is another challenge to handle in all this wild ride. A ‘human factor’ plays a really important role here: an ability to self-discipline, self-organization and to go on with your work decently is something not characteristic of every employee. Thus, managers have to double their efforts to keep a worthy remote team. The slightest mistakes and all the years of hard work vanish into a thin air. The whole world is surviving the hard times but still pursues the target to struggle and go on. In the existing situation, it makes perfect sense to refer to the experience of the IT outsourcing companies that have been working in such a remote mode for years and recommended themselves as being highly stable on a global scale with more than half of all the existing companies turning to a third-party support.

Outsourcing Companies are at your Service

Established outsourcing companies have seen their main mission in assisting other businesses with their issues delegated and are targeted at making their clients profitable and successful. Under the worldwide crisis conditions, offshore outsourcing sector appears to be particularly useful and helpful taking into close consideration their baggage of necessary skills and knowledge concerning new working conditions and challenges they represent. Go on with the article and all your beliefs will definitely undergo a number of modifications. 

In the current situation, when an invisible but obvious border between office-based and home- based businesses seems to be wearing away, it would be great to focus on those who do not have enough experience and are not ready, either technically or psychologically, to shift to a ‘homeworking mode’. At this very point, outsourcing companies appear to get a head start as working remotely is nothing new to this very sphere of services.  

In order to stand up to the existing and prospective clients’ expectations, the established outsourcing companies in the filed offer a wealth of benefits for any business around the world presently (e.g. nearly 300,000 jobs in the US are outsourced yearly), which have been gained throughout many years and appear to be a stronghold against business lockdown facing the challenges of quarantine and remote work.

·        Well-established processes and practices for remote and distributed work along with a good knowledge and expertise.

What serves a pledge for the successful remote work efficiency of the outsourcing sphere? First of all, these are proper processes optimized for remote work, careful well-thought planning on all the levels and project stages, permanent and thorough control over a task/project execution, and effective communication processes using video-, voice- and desktop-sharing practices. Yes, definitely, remote development processes are areas of expertise where outsourcing companies invested a lot of effort. So now they are reaping the benefits of them and use well-calibrated processes as essential advantages comparing to newcomers who are just starting to learn how to work remotely.

·        Well-prepared managers and engineers for distant cooperation and collaboration.

What about project managers in all this tumultuous business environment? They are doing their best to satisfy the clients and to enhance the cooperation with the oncoming ones. The managers in outsourcing companies are accustomed to remote work as they manage a number of projects where different parts of teams as well as stakeholders, e.g. a customer product owner, architect, engineers, and so on, are located in different places and, even more, in different time zones. Consequently, the project managers have enough expertise to fulfill such projects successfully. They appear to have corresponding practices to:

1.    efficiently communicate with remote project team members and stakeholders;

2.    carefully plan tasks between engineers taking into close consideration the remote location of the latter;

3.    assure good control over the tasks progress and initial project execution;

4.    foresee and mitigate risks related to remote and distributed teams, etc.

For example let's take Agiliway as a sample of software outsourcing where, as a standard Project Manager always knows how to make sure that a developer located at home in another development center works effectively and does not hang on unexpected problem. If the developer gets stuck at some point, the manager spots the issue instantly and helps to solve the problem so the developer will not waste hours or even days struggling to handle the difficulty on his own.

·        Established and proven toolsets along with certain communication methods.

To enhance the uninterrupted and thus efficient processes of distant communication and support, the outsourcing companies practice a wide array of methods, tools and techniques. They have an effective toolset for remote collaboration including a number of proven video-conferencing platforms, which comprise video and audio meetings, desktop sharing, shared discussion boards, conversation recording and other options. What is more, there exist the tools for tasks planning and prioritization work, progress reporting and control, documents and knowledge sharing and much more. Instant communication (messaging) platform between particular engineers and entire teams/sub teams is another bonus the outsourcing companies propose regarding the remote working model.

·        The remote, as well as geographically dispersed, outsourcing team is psychologically and morally ready for both office and home modes of working.

The new environment calls for innovative sets of soft skills and additional qualities to implicate. There exists the entire working culture how to work remotely and demonstrate good performance and results. Since most engineers are accustomed to working remotely, they will not get nervous because of the fact that there are no office workers around and they will not be stuck because there is nobody aside to consult: the case is that know how to cope with all these issues remotely using proper communication tools. So, they continue demonstrating high performance comparing to the engineers who have just shifted from office to WFH mode. Self-organization and time-estimation appear to be fist priorities for effective and well-structured remote work.

·        Different locations and time zones are not a problem.

Last but not least, good expertise as well as management and planning strategies allow the outsourcing sector to cooperate with a wide array of geographical places on the planet while eliminating all the possible issues and arising misunderstandings.

Nowadays, all the world, including a business one, is undergoing dramatic changes and general shifting concerning all its main schedules, processes, frameworks and common working activities. The new working environment is full of challenges and, sometimes, traps. A mainstream and so much accustomed to office work and cooperation has changed to a new one: remote and distributed. Offshore outsourcing sphere of services has good expertise, established processes and practices, properly prepared managers as well as necessary sets of tools and methodologies to ensure professional distant work and management. If you are focused on quick and painless WFH switch, choose an experienced outsourcing company with a good expertise in the sphere of the remote and distributed work merely to consult if not to hire.