Communication Tips for Making an Offshore Team Work

Working with an offshore team has become increasingly common in the global marketplace nowadays. More companies opt for services from outsourcing companies in the Philippines to keep up with the competition while staying on budget. Offshoring demands extra supervision and attention, even though it has many benefits, to make sure that the distance does not hinder productivity.

It is important to understand and know how to overcome the challenges that come along with leading offshore teams, one of which is building strong communication. In order to prevent setbacks for your business, we will go over a few communication strategies in this blog.

Why is Good Communication Important?

One of the vital parts of establishing a successful and productive offshoring team is establishing strong, clear, and consistent communication. Without proper communication, collaboration and work quality will fall off, which might hinder the whole team from attaining their goals.

Good communication will aid offshore teams to operate smoothly, and it will eventually build trust among the team members—a kind of trust that is essential in working offshore to work better together and create an efficient global team. If you are able to stabilise trust through proper communication, commitment to work comes along, and this commitment will lead to your offshore team’s competence and efficacy.

According to statistics, 86% of employees blame inefficient communications for workplace failure. Poor communication can have a devastating effect on a business, leading to costly mistakes and a decrease in efficiency and productivity. Failures in communication result in unfinished work, dissatisfied clients, and underperforming staff. This can cost businesses time, money, and reputation. To avert these failures, constant and good communication between the offshore and onshore teams is essential.

Tips for Effectively Communicating With Your Offshore Team

To ensure that your offshoring team is collaborating effectively, it is important to have highly effective communication strategies in place. Here are a few tips to help you:

1. Build clear work instructions/procedures – As you work with an offshore team, it is very important to ensure that you are giving clear and concise work instructions. You wouldn’t want to leave any room for misinterpretation that could lead to work errors, as it can be costly and time-consuming to rectify.Make sure that each task is thoroughly documented to avoid confusion or doubt. Help your team effectively work by producing a standard operating procedure (SOP) that documents the expectations for every task. Work protocols can help reduce the back-and-forth of email communication.
2. Make daily/weekly communication a priority – Having regular communication with your offshore team is paramount to success. This will guarantee that everyone is on the same page and prevent any misunderstandings or misconceptions. Set up weekly team meetings and keep ongoing communication open daily, so any issues or questions that arise can be addressed immediately. Make sure that your channels of communication are secure and reliable so that everyone is communicable at any time.
3. When recruiting a new team member, test their communication skills – Being able to interact effectively with remote teams is a key competency. That is why it is important to evaluate each applicant’s communication abilities before bringing on new offshore team members.If you are hiring for a Customer Service role, test their communication skills by asking them to resolve customer queries or questions that will give you insight into how they communicate with clients, how they provide feedback, and how they take instructions. This exercise will demonstrate their level of confidence and patience while dealing with challenging clients.At optiBPO, we are dedicated to helping our clients build an outsourced customer service team that provides solutions to improve the customer service experience and meet the needs of their customers. Download our job description today, and let us help you build your customer service team!
4. Take time to get to know your team and understand their culture – If you’re working with BPO companies in the Philippines, you should anticipate that your team members will come from diverse backgrounds, exhibiting a variety of cultural norms and values. Therefore, invest in getting to know them and developing relationships with them. Continuous communication can help you get to know one another better, build trust, and promote understanding—all of which are essential for working well as a team.

Developing a High-performing Offshore Team

Creating a high-performing offshore team depends on efficient communication and good management. Establishing effective communication and collaboration between team members leads to improved performance, making offshore operations more successful.

• Establish clear expectations and goals

  To ensure successful collaboration with your offshore team, make sure everyone is aware of the expected timelines, quality, and scope of work. Clearly outline how often the team should submit progress reports, when tasks must be completed, and any other specific requirements. This will help manage and monitor expectations, fostering a productive working environment.

• Make sure everyone is heard

  To manage an offshore team successfully, establish an atmosphere of respect and openness. Each team member should be heard, valued, and their concerns addressed. Making time to listen and demonstrate that everybody matters will create relationships that promote productive communication and high performance. Avoid treating your remote staff as mere hired hands; it will only lead to poor working relationships.

• Encourage collaboration

  Given the possibility of distant teams, collaboration is key. Team members must trust and offer honest feedback to each other for efficient work. Promote collaboration by making it part of the team’s core values and expectations.

• Utilise video conferencing technology

  Maximise today’s technology to reduce distance barriers. Establish video conferences with remote staff to keep everyone informed. Make collaboration the norm, and use technology to enhance it.

• Conduct virtual activities

  Virtual activities that promote effective communication can be a fun and powerful way to accelerate success for your offshore team. When done right, they provide the chance for both onshore and offshore teams to build rapport and have meaningful conversations in a natural, enjoyable setting.

Here’s a list of fun ideas:

1. Themed team virtual meetings
2. Online trainings
3. Playing multiplayer virtual games
4. Virtual party (birthdays or holidays)
5. Free online team building games
6. Virtual coffee break
7. Virtual appreciation day
8. Virtual scavenger hunt

Benefits of Effective Communication With Your Offshore Team

When constant and healthy communication is practised between your onshore and offshore teams, results and benefits will flow naturally, including:

• Builds deeper relationships
• Boosts team morale
• Increases efficiency and productivity
• Creates a sense of transparency and improves accountability
• Quickly identify and address any errors or miscommunications
• Fully engaged and accountable to their role
• Prevents Assumptions
• Decision-making process is more clear, accurate, and on point
• Creates an atmosphere of loyalty, trust, and collaboration

CASE STUDY:

There is a success story from a client who was having trouble engaging their small customers and had an expensive onshore sales crew. The solution optiBPO provided was to build an offshore workforce focused on lead generation, outbound connections and sales, and business development. By effectively communicating tasks, the team was able to provide support for lead generation, outbound connections, sales, and basic business development functions that helped push through the lower end of the sales funnel.

If you use the right method and adequate communication, outsourcing will produce remarkable outcomes for your company. Learn more about the complete success story of how to build an offshore sales team and understand the important aspects you can implement in your business.

Start Building Your Offshore Team with Us!

Team up with optiBPO to unlock your business’s potential and achieve success. Our offshore partnerships open new opportunities and strengthen existing operations, giving you the support needed to succeed. We are one of the trusted outsourcing companies in the Philippines, and we will help you build and manage a dedicated team that serves as an extension of your organisation.

Contact us today to get started on building your offshore team with us!