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Outsourcing Where to Start

As not-for-profit organisations look to stabilize and grow within the current economic conditions, a new “lean” business approach is permeating the sector.

With the emergence of an executive mind set focused on achieving “more with less”, the result is an environment in which efficiency and flexibility is paramount. However, as not for profits organisations strive to bring the “more with less” mantra to life, many are finding that solutions that promise to reduce costs in the long term can create issues in the near term. One of these issues is Where to Start especially when looking at a financial process or function.

At Charity Business we understand that outsourcing a process of a function is not something that everyone has done before, especially when it comes to financial processes other than payroll. Over the next few months our aim is to assist you in understanding what to do and when so that you and your charity can assess whether it is the right move and will fit with your organisation.

The process of assessing outsourcing is key to determining whether it is correct for your organisation or you can benefit from fine tuning as a result of going through it. The process to follow is (where in text in red and box in gray is the current months focus):

Step 1

Pre-Research

Step 2

Resource Identification

Step 3

Objective & Criteria for Selection

Step 4

Due Diligence

Step 5

Decision Making

Step 6

Communication

Step 7

Execute & Evaluation

Step 8

Managing the Relationship

This month we concentrate on the Pre-Research step which is critical to the entire process. As with most things if you follow the process you are unlikely to go wrong.

If you would like some assistance with understanding is outsourcing a financial process or function right for your organisation please contact us on 01793 554204 or complete our online enquiry form.

"As a small charity, finding an organisation able to handle all of our finance and administration tasks was vital. Charity Business has met all our expectations and provided an efficient and professional service, allowing us to concentrate on developing and supporting our range of services to the charity sector.”
(Charity Technology Trust, Full Outsourcing and VFD Client since November 2004

Research findings

Mark Freeman, in response to an independent study, said "Our clients save an average of 40% on back office costs. This could mean a total of £136m extra for charitable activities in the sector".

Shared Services Feasibility Study

A number of leading UK charities agreed to back research by Mark Freeman in partnership with business consultants Arthur Andersen, into the concept of ‘shared services’ for charities – resulting in the launch of Charity Business in 1999.

Summary of the project