Outsourcing Conspiracy is bunk - part 1
Don’t get me wrong - I’m a fan of Brian Clark and Jon Morrow.
I’m even a charter member of their Partnering Profits program.
But I have a lot of problems with the Outsourcing Conspiracy report they just published.
I understand what they’re doing - they’re setting up outsourcing as a straw man so they can knock it down and make partnering look like the perfect solution.
But there are a lot of flaws in their arguments.
They say “outsourcing really is the perfect solution if:
- you have a budget of at least a few thousand dollars
- you can communicate exactly what you want them to do
- you have time to oversee their work, checking in every so often to make sure they
are doing everything you want
- you are satisfied with merely average or slightly above par work
- you are satisfied with an employee who’s doing the job, but isn’t particularly enthusiastic
about it
- you are capable of replacing them quickly and easily whenever they move on to
another job or fail to meet your expectations
- you feel perfectly secure that nothing you’re doing can be stolen, or if it is stolen,
you can protect yourself”
Almost everything there is wrong.
Let’s go through those items in order…
1. You can outsource for much less than thousands of dollars - I know because I’ve been doing it for 15 years now. So that’s wrong.
2. This is the only one that’s completely true. You do need to be able to tell a freelancer exactly what you want. And I agree with them that a lot of people don’t know what they want, which can make it hard. But if you work with a good freelancer, they’ll help you figure out what you want.
3. You do need to allow time to oversee their work, but there are ways to do it that are not time-consuming.
4. Being satisfied with work that is “merely average or slightly above par work”? I’m sorry - that’s insulting!
As someone who has freelanced myself, as well as someone who uses freelancers, I have to say that they couldn’t be more wrong. You get some of the best, most intelligent, most hard-working people in the world when you use freelancers.
In fact, I’d argue that a freelancer - someone who has to prove themselves every single day - is far more likely to be a hard worker and produce above average results than someone who is an employee and knows they will be there tomorrow and the day after and the day after that.
5. Being satisfied with an employee who isn’t particularly enthusiastic about the job?
First, you’re not outsourcing to employees, so that’s wrong right off the bat.
Second, why would a freelancer not be enthusiastic? Geez… I know Brian and Jon are trying to be inflammatory with this, but seriously….
6. Knowing that you can replace the freelancer at any time is one of the reasons freelancers work so hard. This one doesn’t make sense either.
7. Worrying about getting intellectual property stolen is a reasonable concern. But based on what I’ve seen, you are far more likely to get hit by employees who decide to take what they have learned from you and go off to start their own business than you are to lose important information to freelancers.
And that’s why you have contracts with your freelancers. I do agree that contracts are only worth so much, because most small businesses are not going to pursue legal recourse. But some will. And as a freelancer, you never know which ones those will be.
Besides, word gets around, particularly on the Internet. If you take advantage of your clients, you’re not going to be making a living freelancing for long.
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Tomorrow… Part 2 of what’s wrong with this report…
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