Business Brochure

Celebrating

A Top 5 Reasons Companies in Australia are Having Success in Growing their Business with Offshore Staff P R O F I T M A S T E R . C O M . A U

10

Years

Why the Philippines?

The Philippines has a huge population with estimated 850,000 graduates a year coming out of universities into the work force. The education system resembles that of the US, this is as a result of the US influence in WWII. The offshore industry has been going for more than 20 years, so Australian companies are able to access qualified staff with good Australian industry experience.

Communication - English is of a very high standard as it’s studied at school and university is conducted in English.

Time zone – Philippine time is the same as Perth. Staff in the Philippines start work early and work to Australian office hours.

Work Ethic – by nature Filipinos have a very hard-working culture, they are proud and honoured to be employed by an Australian firm and continually strive to deliver high quality work. By Australian standards they do not have a high salary but in the Philippines working for an Australian client offers a much higher salary and benefits than what they would have working for a local company, enabling them to provide well for themselves and their families.

ACCESS to TALENT As per the Hays Salary guide FY23/24 'skills shortages are entrenched in the Australian and New Zealand labour markets and these unshakeable deficiencies continue to intensify in many industries.'

Staffing is one of the top 3 problems most business face. Skills shortage and work ethic is one of the main reasons more and more firms are embracing having a global workforce

COST

Cost has many elements Staff salary -the staff salary and benefits in the Philippines is on average 30-40% of what you would expect to pay for the same qualifications and level of experience in Australia. That is straight salary, in Australia you have to also consider super, payroll tax and workers compensation, and other benefits which all add to the cost.

Office Costs – with offshore staff you don’t have the cost of an office space for staff to work from. If you chose to work with an established offshore partner like Profitmaster, they will provide an office with power back up and commercial grade internet, as well as IT equipment and additional staff benefits like private insurance, transport and a meal.

Time-consider your hourly rate, how much time is spent looking for staff in Australia, training them and if they leave, the cost of re-hire?

For a fraction of the cost of using an Australian recruitment agent, an offshore partner will do all the sourcing, interviewing, aptitude testing and background checking for you, your only time investment will be to interview and choose the people that best suit your business

GROWTH and PRODUCTIVITY

Business Review

PRODUCTIVITY of your ONSHORE staff - Are you and your onshore team using time efficiently?

What are your staff doing and how are they doing it?

This is the number one question we ask businesses and more often than not, onshore staff are spending most of their time doing admin, unchargeable, compliance and process type work at their desks.

If you only consider cost savings as a benefit of having offshore staff, you are missing the benefit of increased productivity and growth that can be generated by your onshore staff if they have their time freed and are able to move from process compliance work to income earning and client facing roles.

Time spent improving customer service, customer retention, business development and doing chargeable work maximise business growth and profit. Anything that is administrative or process based can be done more efficiently and cost effectively offshore.

Change Management – There can be staff resistance to having offshore staff, but offshore staff often increase the moral and work enjoyment of the onshore staff as they lighten the workload and free up time to allow onshore to focus on the parts of the role they enjoy rather than spending a big proportion of the time doing admin and compliance. If structured properly, onshore will get time back time so that there is a better work / life balance , more enjoyment and less stress in your team. The key is to bring onshore staff on the business growth and productivity journey, explaining clearly why you are building a remote team, so they understand that the offshore staff are there not to replace them but to support them.

As an example, an accountant works long hours and often spends all their time doing compliance work but their real interest and the value they could give to their clients would increase if they were able to focus on advisory work, but they don’t have time for both.

Timeframes Work quality Chargeable hours Repetitive tasks Added value to clients Business development Note:- it’s often better to make small changes first, introduce offshore staff into one department doing easy repetitive tasks. Have success with that and then move onto more skilled complex tasks

PRODUCTIVITY of your OFFSHORE STAFF

It’s often a concern that a remote team offshore will not meet performance standards. Will they as capable as onshore staff?

It is a misconception that that people overseas are not as educated as those in Australia and other Western countries and that they are not able to speak good English. Australia is a country with citizens of many different cultural backgrounds. If you were to employ someone onshore there is a high likelihood that they will not be from the same culture. Opening your mind to the opportunities and capabilities of the Global workforce will offer endless business possibilities.

To get the best results it’s advisable to hire someone with Australian Industry Experience. The salary expectation will be slightly higher for someone with Australian experience, but the additional cost is not significant as compared to what you would pay for that level of experience in Australia. More experienced staff also tend to stay, as if well paid they are looking for stability. Junior staff tend to move easily as they try to increase their experience and salary as quickly as possible.

Performance Tracking - many businesses do not have clear performance measures for onshore or offshore staff. Managers say that a staff member is not working out but can’t clearly say why they aren’t meeting required targets or what needs to be done to make improvements.

With the changed work conditions post-Covid there is often little in place to manage and track activity of staff who are working from home or hybrid and it’s very challenging to keep staff (particularly junior staff) engaged and productive. This contributes to high staff turnover and frustration.

With an offshore partner like Profitmaster, staff are fully managed and kept accountable. Each staff member has an operations manager who works with them, helps them embrace the culture and values of the company and is your first point of contact if you have any concerns. They also work with you to break down tasks and put performance tracking methods in place. Staff respond well when there are clear processes, clear and measurable goals, and financial incentives for reaching targets. It’s important to give staff regular feedback, they respond positively when feedback includes praise for what they are doing well as well as what the need to improve. We will help you put performance measures in place and assist with performance reviews and implement performance improvement plans if necessary.

Staff work on average 15 days more in the Philippines as compared to Australia which also adds to their overall productivity.

PRODUCTIVITY of your OFFSHORE STAFF Productivity and Profit

Australian Accounting Firm

Profitmaster intermediate Accountant

Number of working days p/a

218

235

Charge out Rate

$185

$185

Average Productivity %

75%

80%

Fees Earned

$241,980

Write off %

10%

10%

Write off $

$24,198

$24,824

AU Wages VS PH Salary and Management Fee

$90,000

$57,132

Superannuation

$9000

Total Cost

$99,000

$57,132

$117,882

$193,284

118%

338%

Gross Profit

SAVINGS with offshore

43%

INCREASED profit

39%

$278,240

Note; There are the additional costs of employment in Australia that haven’t been included here, things such as office costs, payroll tax, staff team building and engagement activities.

Client Feedback email – Sarah T (RCBS)- Bookkeeper “Hi Delia, As per our discussion, I would like to give Joan a pay rise. Joan makes amazing contributions to our team and I feel that she needs to be compensated more for this.

This increase is a thank you for the amazing work that she does for me every day and without hesitation.

The working ethics and quality that Joan has are very hard to find, especially at this point in Australia, and if she was here this would be a much higher salary to compensate for her experience and qualifications.

Joan never complains about the work she is given and is happy to do training courses (online) when I need her to, she learns quickly and is always keen to know where we are going with the business and how she can help. Joan has become a valuable member of our team and I would like to reward her for that.”

MAINTAINING CONTROL Many businesses are hesitant to have offshore staff as they fear the unknown and feel that because the staff aren’t in the office they will lose control of how work is done. This may result in their reputation for meticulous work being tarnished which would be a bad outcome.

Offshoring VS Outsourcing The loss of control perception often arises because many people confuse Offshoring VS Outsourcing as both refer to getting another company to do work for you.

Outsourcing This is fundamentally a service model, where you look for an external company to do a task or role that you don’t currently do in house. For example, building your website, improving your SEO, doing your reception or your payroll. These tasks are performed on an ad-hoc, project or per hour basis. The Outsourcing company would have trained people (onshore or offshore) that are skilled and capable of doing the job. You would agree a project scope or per hour rate and hand over the work. You deal with the outsource company owner or sales team and explain your requirement but do not have any part in choosing who actually does the work.

The Outsource company will allocate the work to the team members they have available.

Possible problems This can lead to frustration as the work will not necessarily always be done by the same person, this can lead to inconsistencies in work quality The staff are trained by the Outsourcing company and do the work their way, they do not learn your processes and procedures.

Staff will be working for multiple companies, so staff do not go out of their way to learn about your business, this is a service model that typically follows cookie cutter methods where you fit into their mould.

Offshoring This is fundamentally a people model, where you are involved in choosing the staff (who are based in the Philippines) to join your team. The people who are hired will work only for your business, they learn your processes and procedures, they follow protocols and become part of your business team and culture.

Benefits You chose the people who will work for you.

You communicate directly them and maintain complete control over how work is done There is consistency as it’s the same person doing the work each day They become part of your team, they embrace your culture, they share your values and are part of the journey of growth in your business They do not have any personal information or another companies records or email on their computer.

Their computer is provided by Profitmaster, we oversee the systems and security is set up that is done in accordance with your requirements under ISO27001 guidelines.

“If you deprive yourself of offshore staff and your competitors do not, you are putting yourself out of business.”

-Lee Kaun Yew First Prime Minister of Singapore.

Considering Offshoring? Let's Talk!

Let's explore the possibilities together! Schedule a call with me to discuss how offshoring can streamline your operations and drive growth.

Looking forward to our conversation!

Celebrating

10

Years

Delia MacKenzie Director - Client Engagement and Growth Contact Details: + 61 438 434 188 delia.mackenzie@profitmaster.com.au www.profitmaster.com.au