1820: Asiatic Cholera
1920: Spanish Flu
2020: COVID-19. Global outbreak, global disease outbreak, global epidemic
It seems that every 100 years, there is a global disease outbreak as has been observed for the past three centuries. Nature suddenly finds a reason to reboot itself through a global epidemic which goes on to become a pandemic. As people begin falling sick, business and trade gets affected tremendously. Very few are aware of how business was done in the 1800s during times of a global outbreak. Knowledge is only limited to what is there on the internet. Those born in the 1900s were raised on stories of the two World Wars being fought during those times and a Great Depression sinking mankind to its lowest in terms of unemployment. Perhaps we were better prepared to deal with something like this in 2020 in terms of technology, financial management and business operations. Perhaps we were not. Only time will tell.
How did Indian Companies React to the News of a Global Epidemic or Pandemic?
At first, the news of an outbreak of global health pandemic creates a sense of panic everywhere. Clients begin to cancel contracts or not renew them. This puts companies in a fix. While most of the organizations have adopted ‘work from home’, many are still struggling with the idea of laying off employees because of insufficient revenue. Despite this, most Indian companies have decided to fight in the face of adversity with their employees by their side and emerge triumphant.
So, What Steps Are Companies Taking Then?
If you take the example of the recently organized town hall by Infosys BPM, CEO and MD Anantharaman Radhakrishnan, he frankly told his employees that the company, during these times is aiming at optimizing bench strength and not streamlining verticals. Hence, there would not be any termination of jobs during the time being.
Rather, the company is looking at their “central pool of talent” and identifying skills that this pool will require. Infosys BPM, during times of this pandemic, is also looking at cost reduction through automation and not employee lay-offs. Other companies are taking due care of contracted laborers and daily wagers.
Companies such as TATA Group of Companies have committed to pay their daily wagers and temporary workers across India. Reliance Industries Ltd. has also committed to continue making payments to its temporary and contracted workers. Vedanta has set up a 100 INR crore fund to help daily wage laborers and contractual workers.
How are Indian companies helping the Government fight Covid-19?
- They have taken it upon themselves to develop infrastructure facilities. A prime example of this is Reliance Industries Ltd. (RIL). RIL is setting up emergency hospitals and isolation centers.
- RIL has also increased its manufacturing capacity to 100,000 face masks per day with Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) announcing that it will be manufacturing ventilators at competitive prices. Having mentioned this, a pandemic has no time tag. Realizing this pandemic impact, Indian companies are all set to build indigenous infrastructure for health and for supporting their in-house manufacturing capabilities to reduce dependence on imports.
- Serum Institute of India, world’s largest manufacturer of vaccines by volume, is working for several candidates for the novel coronavirus.
These examples make it clear that there is a nation-wide effort to find a cure to this health pandemic crisis and reduce employment as much as possible, which becomes a glaring weak link in a prosperous economy during such times.
Why Are Global Outsourcing Services the Safest Bet During a Pandemic Crisis?
To maintain sanity on the company’s balance sheets, the best decision any company can take during such times is to consider the benefits of outsourcing companies. Only those businesses that use outsourcing to get their work done during times of a pandemic and solely focus on their core business model are the ones to survive the pandemic’s impact. They strive to maintain fluent revenue streams, and outsource other processes related to IT, Mobile App Development, Sales & Digital Marketing, Content Writing, Graphics and Web Designing, Engineering and Architecture, Data Entry, Multimedia, Animation, etc.
There are several reasons behind this:
- Companies will not have to hire or retain full-time employees and pay them full monthly salaries to get these tasks completed.
- They get access to specialized services and an unwavering commitment of having their work done and delivered on time.
- They do not have to set up a separate infrastructure for remote workers as providing for the same is the vendor’s responsibility.
- They do not have to worry about any social security obligations or labor laws.
- The solutions they get are scalable and flexible. This is due to the access they get to a bigger and wider talent pool.
Experience Strategic Outsourcing with Virtual Employee Pvt. Ltd.
I have been working for Virtual Employee Pvt. Ltd., one of the best outsourcing companies, for over a year now as a Content Writer. I have been privileged to be part of so many challenging projects. I am proud to say that Virtual Employee Pvt Ltd is one of the most versatile organizations in its sphere. In these times, it employs over 1500 people spread across various domains. It caters to 3000+ clients spread across 30 countries all over the world and is one of the few companies where all outsourcing advantages can truly be experienced.
Clients can outsource any task in more than the 150 domains that Virtual Employee caters to, such as MS Office, Human Resources and Recruitments, Medical Processes, BPO, Legal Processes, Finance and Accounts, IT and Technical Support, Virtual Assistant, Multimedia and Animation, Data Entry, Engineering and Architecture, Graphics, Web Designing, Content Writing and Editing, Sales and Marketing, IT Outsourcing and Mobile Apps Development.
As far as content writing is concerned (it being my domain of employment), services are available for as less as $12 per hour. If clients buy hours for an entire month, they will get their kind of content written, edited and delivered, irrespective of the enormity of the project, for as less as $1000 to $1200 for an entire month of service. From a strategic outsourcing point of view, this is absolute value for money.
Moreover, resources coordinate with clients all the time over chat facility and email, and even telephone, to keep them in the loop and updated on the progress made. Also, in case if the client is unhappy and dissatisfied with the resource’s work, then the company is happy to provide them with a replacement resource. Hours too are not an issue with the premier offshore service provider as all the remote workers, or virtual employees as they are referred to within the company and by our clients, work according to the client’s convenience even if is at odd hours. These are outsourcing advantages at their best.
The very intention behind setting up Virtual Employee Pvt. Ltd. was to cater to clients who struggle with local hiring in many ways. This holds particularly true for the solopreneurs, the start-ups and the Small and Medium Businesses (SMBs). The challenges they face include having to pay their employees high monthly wages, not getting the desired quality of work out of them, having to settle cases where employees have initiated legal actions against them accusing them of discrimination, workplace harassment and apathy, not getting a commitment from them in terms of having work completed and delivered on time and irate customers who lose faith in them for charging money for a project and not fulfilling contractual obligations. All of this makes VE one of the best outsourcing companies as all of these worries are taken right off their plates by VE’s unique business model.
If you, too, happen to be a company bogged down by such issues, then do not think twice before approaching Virtual Employee Pvt. Ltd. Getting on a phone call with one of our client account managers will not cost you much; rather, it will open up a different world altogether. It may change your fortunes for good.
