Outsourcing with staff that work from home – Is it a good idea? Steph from Affordable Staff demonstrates what it means to work from home.

What is it like when people have outsourced staff working from home?

Ideally for people who are working from home, they should have a home office but it’s not true for most people who are working from home. For me, I just had a table in our living room where I work from. So it’s really not an office, just an area where I can work.

On the other hand, there are less distractions when you’re working from an office. The environment is very quiet so it’s very conducive to calls. There’s no television lying around. Your pets are not there to distract you. When you’re working from an office, it’s just you, your work and you can have 100% focus.

The security of the office is also very tight. We have lockers for the employees. We have CCTVS which are on 24/7. And then we have our bio-metric time tracking.

How do outsourced staff working from home handle power outages?

Power interruptions are very frequent especially during summertime here in the Philippines. When that happens, you have two options.

Blackout power options

You can either go to a cafe and work from there. But unfortunately, most cafes here don’t have an internet connection that is strong enough for online work. So it’s always very slow and if you have tasks like downloading or uploading, it’s not really possible to work from there. The other option is you go to a co-working space which has good internet but it’s not practical because sometimes it’s costly.

How bad is the internet when you were working from home and what did you do if you have computer problems?

When you’re working from home, your connection is a residential connection.

Slow internet speed

I only had 3 mbps of download speed and then my upload is less than 1 mbps. It’s a bit slow especially if you have a lot of tasks which involves downloading, uploading, and if you’re working with lots of images.

Poor technical support

Of course, the support also is not that great. Unlike if you’re working from an office where you have a business line which has a dedicated support team that can help you out whenever there are interruptions.

Do you think it’s better for offshore staff to work at home or in an office?

I would definitely say that working from an office is better than working from home.

Backup generator

For starters, the technical support that you need is there. For example, if there’s a power interruption, we have a generator on stand by that work restore the power back before my UPS (Uninterruptible Power Supply) dies.

High speed internet

If we encounter internet issues, we always have a backup line, actually two. So all we need to do is switch the connection and the internet will also be restored.

Constant technical support

When you’re working from home, you’re using your own personal computer and if you encounter technical troubles with it, it’s very hard to replace if you don’t have a spare. But at the office, if your PC dies, there’s always a spare PC to use for working.

Can you summarize why you think businesses should employ offshore staff that work within an office?

In a nutshell, if you compare working from home with working from an office, working from an office is definitely better because it’s beneficial not only for the clients but also for me as an employee.