In local news, eyes are focused on Costa Mesa, California, a city neighboring GHRO’s headquarter city of Irvine.  The City of Costa Mesa faces a budgetary dilemma: a dilemma it plans to solve through outsourcing many city services.  On the list to be outsourced are in-house information technology, maintenance services, employee benefits administration, and payroll staff, among others.  In six months, these employees will be looking for jobs.  It’s tough news and a tough lesson about how outsourcing has long kept the government afloat.

According to an article in Federal Computer Week, outside contractors have proved a long-indispensible government resource.  Outsourcing allows the government to perform work beyond its typical staffing, equipment, or monetary resources. It also creates a more efficient government through reduced costs and increased productivity.  In a time of budgetary concerns, outsourcing may be the only way the public sector, and even small private-sector businesses, can maintain necessary service levels.

Cost-savings occurs, in part, because contractors cost less than permanent employees.  Last year, USA Today reported that government employees received roughly $28,000 in annual benefits—over $12,000 more than their private-sector counterparts.  Data has also shown that pay rates in state and local government increase faster than private-sector rates.  Total compensation at all levels of government tends to be higher.

But lower pricing isn’t the only benefit of outsourcing services.  Outsourcing to private companies often results in new, fresh ideas beyond the government status quo.  Outsourcing is a great resource for small, private businesses, too!  It allows businesses to receive services they may not otherwise have been able to maintain or afford.  For instance, outsourcing human resources tasks to GHRO allows businesses to meet their HR needs, from hiring, payroll, employee benefits, to the latest in HR regulations and trends, at a fraction of the cost of maintaining an in-house HR department.  It is low-cost efficiency at its best.

How can HR outsourcing benefit you?  Contact GHRO today for a free quote!

It’s usually very clear why a company would invest in hiring an excellent law or accounting firm to represent their interests.  These two industries offer services that save their clients countless amounts of money annually. Business owners easily see the intrinsic value of investing in these firms, yet often have a hard time seeing the benefits of investing in their company’s human resources.

Recruitment Services: Attract Better Talent

It is necessary for a firm to identify the skill set that they are seeking in a potential employee in order to target their search appropriately.  An empowered Human Resources team is able to clearly identify their firm’s hiring needs and is less limited in the tools available when seeking out the best ways to fill those positions.  In the long run, better hiring practices will bring better employees.

Employee/Labor Relations: Minimize Employee Turnover

Maintaining high levels of job satisfaction amongst staff is the key to keeping long-term employees, especially in this tumultuous economy.  By investing in Human Resources, companies are able to stay on the leading edge of benefits; employees can trust that their employer cares about their health and happiness, adding to their overall opinion of their workplace.

Human Resources Management: Increase Productivity

By identifying and targeting productivity goals, firms are able to set realistic expectations for growth and monitor progress over time.  Additionally, maintaining long-term staff allows for growth and development within a position, allowing employees to bring more beneficial skill sets to the table and positively impact their work environment.

By putting these ideas into practice with Human Resources Outsourcing, companies are able to focus directly on the task at hand and become more productive and thus, more profitable. What would your company be capable of accomplishing if you streamlined your operations through HR Outsourcing?

Companies are finding that information management is evolving at a pace difficult to keep up with. Left with the challenge of filling and maintaining special skills positions that require savvy, businesses are looking for employees who are up to date on all of the latest advances in information technologies.

By utilizing some of the many outsourcing solutions available to them, companies are finding more sophisticated ways to make sure they have the human resource capabilities to process complex business transactions and information. With these advancements in Human Resources Outsourcing, they gain a competitive advantage that allows them the flexibility to expand their businesses by venturing into new fields and raise the level of competency in their present ones with little to no effort on their part.

Technology is responsible for greatly enhancing many industries including healthcare, education, transportation, engineering and manufacturing. Finding employees who have the knowledge to support current and developing technologies is vital for companies to effectively compete in today’s marketplace.

In the past, companies had to rely on in-house IT capabilities and were burdened with the responsibility of recruiting, training and managing their own teams of specialists to operate and maintain information systems.

Today there are other viable solutions to meet the challenges of finding talented employees who posses the skills to operate and maintain these complex information systems. Outsourcing IT is one way to meet this challenge.

Primary Benefits of Outsourcing IT:

• Organizations gain access to flexible infrastructure.
• Organizations achieve higher standards and levels of service.

IT Functions Most Commonly Outsourced:

• Data Entry
• Application Development
• Data Center Operations
• Network Management

As companies are increasingly reliant on IT to conduct business the price tag of recruiting, training, managing and developing capable employees has exploded, not to mention the long-term continuing education these employees need to stay at the top of their game. This is why businesses are choosing to transfer IT assets, employee leasing, HR Management, HR consulting and other HR services to a professional employment organization that will deliver cost reduction without losing ground to the competition.

Companies invest a lot of time, money and energy sending recruiters to job fairs conducted all over the world. However many employers are finding they are leaving empty handed, frustrated and without the qualified employees they were seeking.

Although job fairs are not completely unsuccessful, many companies realize that the resumes they collect at such events are far below the standards they were originally searching for. The fact remains that most employers are just not willing to settle, especially in an economy ripe with individuals seeking employment.

Top Reasons Why Job Fairs Fail to Find Talent:

• Low Caliber of Attendees
• Poor Turnout
• Disorganization
• Lack of Strong Candidates
• Insufficient Promotional Efforts

The failure of companies to effectively find strong candidates at job fairs is one of the major reasons they are turning to professional employment organizations as an alternative. By utilizing the staffing and recruiting services of human resourcing outsourcing specialists companies are finding talented employees when they need them. A PEO will provide the expertise to handle recruiting, pre-screening, position placement, training and even HR management.

Top Reasons Why Human Resources Outsourcing Works To Find Talent:

• Large Inventory of Candidates
• Thorough Pre-Screening Procedures
• Highly Skilled
• Invaluable Referrals
• Flexibility

By choosing human resources outsourcing over a job fair for finding talented employees companies can rely on the expert recruitment services of a professional team of HR specialists to assess each candidate ensuring the right fit for employers while saving them both time and money.

To the relief of consumers, a large percentage of United States companies are bringing their call centers back to American shores. Many have found it difficult to interact with call center operators, as the operators often find themselves easily confused by slang and vernacular used by native English speakers.  Because of this disconnect in communication between caller and operator, callers are becoming less likely to use information or help hotlines and often ending their phone calls more bewildered than they began­– without the help, clarification, or instructions they were seeking in the first place.

In response to the widespread disappointment from American consumers, companies are bringing their call centers back home meaning ease in communication as well as an increase in jobs available across America.  While companies have previously found it very profitable to outsource jobs, the payoffs are now nowhere near as high as they used to be.  Inflation, as well as a rise in the pay expected in foreign countries, has pushed the cost of outsourcing to popular “call center countries” such as India and the Philippines through the roof.  Once companies began to take the cost and quality of service provided through their call centers into consideration, many began to bring their business back home to the States.

Another bonus for American firms seeking a solution to their call-center dilemma: they are now able to contribute further to strengthening the American economy.  Experts currently estimate that hiring someone in Nebraska to work at a call center costs only 15% more than hiring an employee in India.  Take into account any potential tax-breaks the company may receive for hiring new (American) employees, as well as the impact that employee could have on their local economy, and the benefits of an American-run call center begin stacking up.

American consumers are voicing their opinion about their feelings about outsourcing customer service overseas. Reports have been conducted that have found customers expressed more favorable feedback when they perceived a call center in the U.S.

A few facts about American Call Centers:

• Consumer satisfaction is 1/5 higher when calls are (or are perceived) to be handled within the United States.
• Consumers are more likely to have their problems solved when the person handling their call can understand the issue and properly articulate the solution.
• The opportunity cost of employing operators in other countries is beginning to far outweigh the benefit.
• U.S. companies are looking for cost-effective, economy-building labor solutions across the board.  Housing their call centers at home, rather than abroad, brings more employment opportunities for unskilled laborers and strengthens the lower classes.

While outsourcing call centers may have not been a viable option in the long run, companies are still looking for cost-effective options for their businesses.  Human resource outsourcing, such as benefits outsourcing, employee and labor relations, employee leasing, government compliance, HR audits, HR consulting, HR management, payroll services, and recruitment services, are becoming popular ways for companies to save time and money, allowing them to bring you better products and services for less.

Human resource outsourcing is becoming a commonly used business solution for companies who want to lower their expenditures while expanding their labor pool. Most companies are seeking creative and effective strategies to improve their profit margin in a troubled economy.

One of the most popular alternatives is the outsourcing of non-core business such as HR management and payroll services to save money and increase output without cutting back on quality.  Human resource outsourcing is important to any business because it is more cost efficient and time saving to hire an agency to recruit and train employees rather than to do it in-house. Outsourcing workers also relieves companies of the burden of assuming all of the risks and responsibilities of employee/labor relations, safety and workers compensation.

From employee benefits services and payroll processing to HR consulting and technology services, more and more companies are relying on outsourced employees to bring specialized skills to their businesses. High quality employees are any company’s most critical asset.  Outsourcing for fields such as technology and professional services has been proven to be advantageous for companies who want to focus on their core business and but still progress in the marketplace.

Your company more likely than not already outsources some services for these reasons. The most common functions outsourced by employers include:

1.    Call Centers
2.    IT
3.    Distribution
4.    Security
5.    Customer Service
6.    Tax Advisory
7.    Applications Management
8.    Bank Tellers
9.    Technicians
10.    Front Office Administration

Using the recruitment services of a Professional Employer Organization (PEO) or an Administrative Services Organization (ASO) allows a company to rely on their recruitment services and employee leasing services without having to pay the additional high price of employee benefits.

Keeping up with the competition is more difficult to do in a down economy. Utilizing human resources outsourcing is an efficient way for businesses to raise their performance while lowering costs. HR outsourcing is an invaluable tool for recruiting the right people with the experience and expertise that will help a business stay competitive.

Andrew Mason is a 29-year-old music major from Northwestern and appears to be an average guy, save for one discernable feature: he has single-handedly managed to establish the fastest-growing company in Internet history.

Groupon is an online e-commerce website that is racking up astronomical sales making it the one of the most profitable portals for retailers to offer their wares. Mason combined the words “group” and “coupon” to come up with the aptly named Internet company “Groupon.” The website offers online customers attractive discounts for products and services.

Not only did Mason have the foresight to set up operations in an 85,000 square foot warehouse (previously owned by a Montgomery Ward) in the heart of Chicago, but he also took advantage of human resources outsourcing and tapped into a valuable commodity by utilizing a group of talented writers, many from the Chicago Improv scene, to help him take a unique concept and turn into reality.

The witty taglines and clever campaigns have helped the company effectively capture and dominate not only the public’s attention, but also a competitive share of the e-commerce marketplace. Despite its fledging status and the fact Groupon has only been in operation just shy of 2 years, it was recently valued at 1.35 billion.

The call to action used by this young entrepreneur “Act now” is nothing new in regards to advertising strategy in and of itself. However, coupled with the ingenious idea of making purchasing items a team effort by providing the stellar deals contingent on a number of online purchasers following suit by buying the same item on the same day and then executing the concept with upbeat advertising pitches has effectively turned his site into to a retailer’s dream and consumer-driven powerhouse.

The newly made millionaire shares profits with vendors of upwards to 50% of the take which would ordinarily make retailers scoff at such ridiculous profit-sharing strategy; but   selling in bulk is the name of the game and with the site’s over 13 million subscribers Groupon is hitting homeruns with the public as well as with its participating affiliates.

Investors like Digital Sky Technologies, (the group backing Facebook and Zynga) only add to the company’s cache and investors estimate Groupon will surpass 500 million in revenue this year alone. Groupon presently has expanded into 88 US cities and 22 countries including Turkey and Chile.

Pangea 3 is a legal outsourcing firm in Noida, India specializing in outsourcing young Indian lawyers eager to get assigned to lawyers in the United States. With most of the world’s legal outsourcing firms setting up shop in India and only a significantly smaller percentage establishing firms in other countries such as the Philippines, companies like Pangea 3 are actively recruiting Western lawyers who are willing to leave Wall Street for New Delhi.

They are relocating them in order to manage the growing population of English speaking lawyers who work for a fraction of what a law firm in the West would charge. Greg McPolin, managing director of Pangea 3’s litigation services group is one of these Western Lawyers who divides his time between India and New York. He says his company is “getting more resumés from United States lawyers than we know what to do with.”

Legal outsourcing in India has grown from a few tiny firms who were more of an experiment than a serious investment to becoming a mainstream addition and is currently how law is practiced around the world. Large multi-national corporations, Wall Street banks, Energy giants, Insurance companies and most other leading industries are using outsourced lawyers from India to do everything from research and constructing legal briefs to due diligence and contract law.

However, for the more sophisticated public relations aspect of the law business Indian firms are continuing to bring in more seasoned lawyers form Great Britain and the United States.

Christopher Wheeler, a former assistant attorney general for New York State, knows first hand that Western Lawyers are finding it very attractive to be a valuable commodity in India’s rapidly expanding legal outsourcing business sector. Mr. Wheeler took that leap and is now managing a team of 110 Indian lawyers who primarily work for law firms in the United States for pennies on the dollar.

By the end of 2009 there were more than 140 legal outsourcing companies in India. This was a remarkable jump from 2005 when there were no more than 40 in the entire country.

Forecasted revenue for India’s legal outsourcing firms are estimated at $440 million in 2010 and is rumored to surpass the billion dollar mark by 2014.

Making the decision to use human resource outsourcing can be a difficult one for any business to make. However, there are a few guidelines that can help any company to better understand the benefits of outsourcing to make an informed decision.

Lowered Costs: Outsourcing results in lowered operating costs when comparing them to the costs of hiring full time employees and providing them with long term benefits packages. Benefits outsourcing can save a company substantial amounts of money in both the paid hours it takes to process all of the administrative functions to hire and maintain a full time employee as well as the capital that can be reallocated to other interests.

Raised Productivity: The strategic advantage of HR outsourcing allows businesses to meet their growth demands with the skilled employees who can significantly improve a company’s output. It makes sense that relying on employees who are experienced and well-managed will produce larger quantities of  work at a higher quality.

Simplified Operation: Not enough can be said about reducing the burden of navigating the paperwork and logistical details it requires to sustain a full time employee. Small businesses in particular will be able to rely on an administrative services organization that will bring the experience and reliability to make running their business operations more efficient on a day to day basis.

Employee Satisfaction: When people are managed properly they not only feel that their needs are being met and but are more productive when their efforts are being adequately rewarded. This results in employees who are not only more satisfied with their jobs but will also increase their value to a company because their time and energy is focused on input rather than on employee/labor relations.

Expanded Selection of Qualified Talent: Outsourcing can provide the perfect solution for finding talent and qualified employees with the ability to meet the demands of an increasingly sophisticated marketplace.

Allows Focus Application of In-House Resources: Most employers spend time on personnel issues that could be better utilized with their core business pursuits. HR outsourcing simply allows businesses to focus on increasing output.

Reduced Risk: There are many assumed risks companies would benefit by turning over to a Professional Employer Organization (PEO). These include government compliance, safety and worker’s compensation and employee/labor relations.

Global Human Resources Outsourcing will provide viable business solutions that will lower your operating costs, protect your assets and reduce your risks. Whether you have a small, mid-size or large business HR outsourcing will meet your human resourcing needs and allow your company to stay competitive in the marketplace.

Many organizations are restructuring to include outsourcing human resources. Businesses have found that they can not only cut cost and raise efficiency by outsourcing, but they can also improve the accuracy and speed at which a project is completed while having greater access to advanced technological expertise.

Cutting cost is only one of the benefits outsourcing offers both large and small businesses. Outsourcing allows companies to convert fixed costs into variable costs and reduces expenditures which release investment capital and raise profit margins, making them more interesting to investors.

Companies that do not take advantage of outsourcing human resources find they pay more for marketing, development and research, distribution and other operating costs. Outsourcing a contractor also allows companies to focus more on their core business by freeing up their in house employees.

Other reasons companies are choosing to outsource include:

Lowers labor costs – Finding temporary employees for short-term projects can be expensive and time consuming. Attracting qualified and reliable candidates without offering employee benefits can be difficult without the incentives usually involved in the hiring process.

Reduces risk – Outsourcing providers assume many of the HR risk management that face business in regards to HR audits, HR consulting, lawsuits, payroll services, regulations and government compliance, safety and worker’s compensation, short term/long term disability and employee/labor relations.

Increases Efficiency – An outsourcing firm will usually provide experienced individuals who do not require lengthy and expensive training.

Outsourcing human resources can provide businesses with the options they need to stay competitive in current economic climate. Outsourcing has become so commonly incorporated into business strategies that companies are beginning to outsource entire departments rather than individual positions such as billing or payroll.

Companies are able to devote more of their resources to their core businesses and bring products to market faster when they utilize outsourcing. As a result they are bringing in larger numbers of outsourced employees and still find they are lowering costs.

Global Human Resources Outsourcing Total Solutions provides integrated HR management, employee benefits, payroll and worker’s compensation services through an effective co-employment model that provides the benefits of a highly-staffed HR team without the overhead costs.

GHRO understands that in today’s changing marketplace that is continually incorporating advancing technologies, one of the most important resources a company has is the qualified people who are made available through outsourcing.