Technology
Best Practices
To Be or Not To Be … There
Virtual Working Reality
By Mark Regan
In the last issue, I demonstrated the ways in which you
can save considerable time and travel expense with
online collaboration tools to share with your clients.
That does, however, raise another issue: do you have to
actually be there with your employees?
When our company was first created, it was designed to
be a virtual entity in the interest of cost savings for
a start-up. We embraced software-as-a-service (SaaS) to
its fullest extent by pushing our business into the
virtual world through services and online applications.
Part of the security of storing things virtually opened
up new ways to share and collaborate with employees as
well. As our company grew, so did its online presence
within the business. Back office operations, databases,
servers, email and even our phone systems set up shop
online, making us reachable and versatile. How many of
these aspects of your business do you really need to
have housed within your four walls?
As we continued to grow and our client base became very
healthy, even more online tools started to become part
of our roster. We added Salesforce.com to help us
communicate and keep track of discussions and progress
with our clients. All of our customer databases were
housed on a dedicated machine out-of-state with RAID
back-up should there ever be a failure of any kind. We
have no IT department. That comes with our service.
All of these tools allow you to create a nimble and
robust company without the traditional overhead costs
that can exist when you first set up shop. It also
considerably widens your talent pool. You are no longer
confined to people within driving distance of an office.
The last thing we wanted was to be an environment where
people were clockwatching or having to punch in and out.
A few months ago, however, we had to make a decision
about whether the company should stay virtual or become
some kind of physical entity. It was difficult, because
the versatility of the online world made it so easy to
be mobile and have colleagues who were happier and more
productive working in their own environments. But, as I
mentioned in last month’s article in relation to selling
and dealing with clients: sometimes you cannot replace a
good old-fashioned face-to-face meeting. We wanted to
find a way to bridge the benefits of a virtual business
with a “home base” of sorts for those times when people
just need to be around people.
So we gave in, and carefully chose an office space not
far from my home. What was crucial was that the feeling
of the virtual space and the freedom associated with it
needed to stay intact. It just became important that the
local people we do deal with feel they have a space
where the company exists. There are still no time
clocks. There are still no requirements about local
versus non-local employees as we have many colleagues
who are in different time zones, and even different
countries.
What it boils down to as your business grows is what
compromises you feel you can make. The cost/benefit
ratio becomes a huge consideration when exploring all
the options that we have as small business owners. It is
important to stay flexible. I certainly never intended
to have a physical operation from the outset, but growth
made me reevaluate what would work best for my clients,
as well as the employees and consultants who help keep
the company robust and booming. We are actually very
lucky to have those options in this day and age. We are
not bound only by tradition anymore, and we can allow
ourselves to be guided by what is best for the company.
And truly, that is the most rewarding partnership.
Mark Regan is the CEO and
founder of Flat World Media, an online marketing firm
specializing in optimizing the online customer
relationship through proven data-driven strategies.
Based in Tampa, he blogs at
www.TheInnovationScout.com.
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