There are many diverse reasons why companies choose to outsource part of their business and in today’s competitive marketplace it is almost a necessity in many industries. But if you can clarify the various factors that went into your decision it can often shed new light on your goals and objectives. If your strategy does not satisfy the demands that caused you to outsource in the first place, then some adjustment may be necessary.

Likewise, clarifying your goals is an important exercise to undertake before beginning an outsourcing initiative. And it’s important to consider not only your outsourcing goals but also your overall goals for your business and even personal goals to ensure that there is harmony among all levels of your activities.

The participation and acceptance by your local staff of your outsourcing plan is essential for its success. If there is not a complete buy-in by your team, or at least a willingness to try and make things work, then the effort will be crippled from the start. There are always growing pains when transforming entrenched processes or adding new services and everyone needs to feel like they are on the same team striving for a common goal.

While it is now very easy to communicate and collaborate with overseas teams as if they were in your office, there is still a very clear benefit in systematizing and codifying your processes so they may be easily picked up and replicated by team members wherever they happen to be located.

As part of the documentation of your process, setting expectations and establishing performance measures is extremely helpful in managing the performance of your offshore team.

Your outsourcing provider should be able to assist you with setting up a training program for new employees. Being able to replicate your process is one of the keys to building equity in an offshore team.

For many processes, retention is critical to long-term success and equity building. There are many employee development programs that can be instituted to promote employee satisfaction and increase their value to the team. Instilling the idea that their position is not just a job but a career in which they have room to grow is a great way to build loyalty.

There are number of ways to collaborate with an outsourcing provider, so it’s good to discuss roles up front and make that part of the outsourcing plan.