What mindset as a partner or business owner you have about outsourcing ultimately determines whether your firm or business can successfully implement outsourcing.

In creating outsourcing solutions for 16 years for team SBA clients, we have seen varying mindsets of potential clients and clients.

So some firm partners have initially difficulty visualising how an outsourced team can work with the in-house team. Once that is broken down into systems access and process requirements then the proposition becomes more palatable.

How to provide systems access securely is often another concern for firm partners or business owners. Once the comprehensive cyber security and physical security measures taken by team SBA is shared then the treatment of that risk becomes much more manageable.

The cost imperative often also is in the mindset. So a firm partner or business owner may be interested strategically to outsource because the cost savings are substantial, but will that mindset excite the in-house team who might be justifiably worried about job losses from outsourcing e.g. Operationally what is to be achieved from deploying an outsourced team must be clearly articulated to the in -house team. So more time for in-house team to deal with client queries, delegation of non-billable tasks ( which frees up time for billable tasks), having an ability to manage an increased work load better through delegation to the outsourced team are all mindsets that are important for the in-house team and for the long-term success of an outsourced engagement.

The two teams in-house and outsourced working across different time zones with some overlap of tines. Another question often in the mind of firm partners or business owners.

The in-house team can catch up with the SBA outsourced team e.g at 2:30 PM AEST in Australia and then when the in-house team goes home, the outsourced team can finish a pile of tasks so that next morning when the in-house team is back then the workday is much more manageable from the start of the day.

Billing work done by an outsourced team, presents great margin enhancements on paralegal tasks or fee earner tasks for law firms. This should be at the core of any outsourcing strategy.

For business owners delegation might often present a challenge in the context of an outsourced team.

I do things the best, no body can do these tasks better than me – that is perfectly right but that perfection has an opportunity cost in scaling the business. Effective delegation of tasks to an outsourced team can create a critical competitive advantage for a business in scaling growth without incrementally increasing costs.

How much time and effort do the in-house team need to spend to train an outsourced team to effectively undertake tasks is often another challenge in the mind of law firm partners and business owners. An outsourced onboarding for team SBA involves a time investment of 2 to 3 hrs in doing a couple of online onboarding sessions related to specific tasks being delegated. This time frame is substantially less than onboarding time for a new in-house team member.

In summary, outsourcing need not be daunting proposition and can be something that adds long term value to a law firm or business by being part of the HR mix of the firm or business.