The Commercial Case for Offshoring EA Functions
In my course, I speak openly about the commercial reasons organisations decide to consolidate EA roles, collapse them into each other and expand support ratios.
Or offshore functions entirely.
This is a topic I’ve wanted to speak about publicly for a long time, but I knew that when I did, it would be uncomfortable and perhaps confronting for some.
The only way to understand why organisations make the decisions they make is to strip out the emotion, be clinical and see the choice the way an executive does.
Commercially.
Think about a current challenge your organisation is facing right now.
Cost pressure.
Inflation.
Supply chain issues.
High investment in technology.
Volatile markets.
The high price of oil following the US-Iran conflict.
Organisations are operating in edgy times.
And when things are edgy, the scope for saving money gets broader.
That includes restructures. Sometimes that means removing individual roles. Sometimes it means removing and outsourcing entire functions, typically back-office functions.
That includes payroll, EA and accounts, not just admin.
Turn your mind to this.
A company has 20 EAs on $100,000 each. That’s $2 million in salaries.
The organisation is, like most organisations, investing heavily in technology and opening up the licences for Power Automate, expecting that things are going to get faster, smarter, more productive and more effective.
Everyone is still busy, but not much is changing materially.
The executive team experiences this:
An awesome cohort of humans in the EA function who love what they do and love the organisation.
They care about their teammates in the business unit.
They work hard, they respond fast and they want to please everyone.
They are helpful and reliable.
Good people. Hard workers.
But the executive team is under pressure to do more with less and meet strategic objectives.
The conditions they’re operating in are different now.
Then you add organisation-specific challenges.
Or there’s been a crisis or unexpected project to be funded, and everyone is being asked to give something up.
I’ve sat in those meetings myself as an EA to a CEO, and I’ve heard how they go. There’s always a lead-up to that moment over months. Everything has been tried. Creative accounting hasn’t solved a long-term problem.
This is where offshoring becomes attractive.
The gains are compounded over time.
It’s not about the great humans or their capability.
Being hardworking doesn’t mean the right work is happening.
That’s something I’ve been training EAs on for years. Know the difference between busy work and the work that moves the needle.
It’s about value for money. That’s the conversation.
If the sense is that the same service and value can be found elsewhere for less, why wouldn’t that equation make sense?
Take the emotion out of the decision.
Apply commercial thinking.
Apply critical thinking.
This is where organisations are landing.
I’ve been speaking to executives with offshore EAs in corporate organisations over the last year, and here’s what I’m hearing.
EAs desperately want hybrid or remote work flexibility. I get it because I loved it too. One day a week or fortnight made so much difference to my productivity and general wellbeing.
They tell me:
If their EA isn’t in the office all or most of the time, what’s the difference between Melbourne and Manila, or Canberra and Kolkata?
It can’t be argued. The EA already isn’t always there.
The job is still happening.
The other feedback I’m hearing is that the work is happening to the same quality.
The work might have changed slightly. There will always be changes to the services executives will receive from offshore EAs. But they’ve agreed to sacrifice some elements and keep the core services, and those services are being delivered well.
In some cases, companies are having the exiting EAs train their offshore replacements. That’s brutal, but there will always be EAs who will do it. Honestly, it’s probably a good opportunity and experience to have on your CV if you want to think about it strategically, even if it’s culturally hard to swallow.
I asked a lot of questions about the cost of running an EA function offshore.
I’d been told the quality of work is equal, so it comes down to cost.
I was told it is half, if not slightly less than half, the cost of providing the function onshore.
So instead of paying $2 million, you’re likely paying under $1 million, with this additional gain:
You don’t have to have development conversations or performance management conversations. You’re receiving the service within a new scope and without all the people management that goes around it.
Your new team has been trained in what’s important and, with an inevitable few settling-in bumps, your service levels are in place.
Yes, things are different.
Culture is one consideration. There will always be a culture gap.
It might mean support rather than partnership, but that’s the sacrifice the executives have agreed to make.
There is also the loss of someone being right next to the team and acting as that built-in conduit who reads engagement.
But organisations can put different leadership responsibilities and cultural rituals in place to monitor it.
So, when an EA isn’t around anyway under hybrid arrangements, how do you argue that the role needs to be onshore?
And if the perceived value is the same as the work an onshore EA provides, how do you argue the case for onshore versus offshore?
An EA is an EA. Why shouldn’t an EA in Manila or India also have access to work they enjoy that sustains them and their families?
One executive also told me that the time difference has now been resolved.
It used to be that offshore support came online later in the morning, perhaps at 10 am. Most offices here in Australia start at 8.30 am, and organisations lived with that. However, now the EAs are starting work at 5 am local time.
That means they are online and working when their executives need them.
The level of commitment matches that of onshore EAs.
So, why is the shift happening?
How can EAs ensure their value is deemed high enough to warrant that extra $1 million?
See business the way an executive does.
Make sure that comes through in your work.
In how you communicate your contribution.
In how you articulate your value.
And in how you speak about the impact you create.
No more thinking that hard work should simply be noticed and expecting people to know the impact you are creating.
Because it’s easy to explain away the surface-level work that sits on a position description and that EAs commonly talk about.
True impact, expressed in leadership language, is understood. It has a dollar figure attached to it in the executive mind.
In nearly every organisation, there will be one strong EA who tries hard to elevate the function. That isn’t enough.
Nor is being valued by one executive alone.
Please don’t think that because an executive values you, or because you have one strong EA advocating internally for the EA function, the value of the function is understood.
It’s not enough for pockets of good work to happen. Speaking to value and impact is an all-hands-on-deck effort.
That’s the new challenge for EA functions.
And this is where I see 95 per cent of the EA functions I work with in-house struggling.
They’re not tuned in to this commercial aspect, or they think it doesn’t apply to them.
It does.
Because when, on the surface, there’s an easy saving of, let’s say, $1 million, as in this example, and the organisation isn’t seeing the value, how can the function make a case for keeping that work onshore?
It’s not about people working hard and being great at what they do.
It comes back to the strategic objectives of the organisation.
Funding to meet those objectives has to come from somewhere, including salary budget lines.
That’s why it’s so important never to leave the perception of your value to chance if you are in an EA role, or any admin role, for that matter.
I spend a lot of time in my course training EAs to pinpoint their impact and communicate it. It’s the focus of the first two modules. We don’t do anything else until they’ve learned to do this.
It was the first thing I built into all of my work when I stepped away from my career to train EAs.
A mission in my work has always been to help EAs see and communicate how their work enables the success of others.
To do that, we need commercial thinking, strategic thinking and critical thinking.
We need to see business the way an executive does.
If you’re an EA hearing this and nothing else about the way the profession is splitting has landed with you, if you feel like AI and automation aren’t an urgent priority, or even if you’re overwhelmed and just don’t know where to start, then I hope thinking about the commercial reasons organisations make the decisions they do helps you work backwards from there.
I hope it helps you understand why it’s important to change the way you think about what you do and the way you talk about it.
Because I see so many talented EAs leaving the perception of their value to chance.
They are leaving their personal brand to chance, allowing someone else to make assumptions and create narratives about them.
To be clear:
Do I want every EA to keep their job in their home country?
Yes, I do.
This is why I do the advocacy work I do, such as making a submission to the ABS to have the EA role reclassified so it accurately represents what the role does today.
It’s why I do the advisory work, helping executive teams and organisations see the potential, both what can be developed and what is currently hidden.
But all the advocacy in the world won’t change a thing if EAs aren’t stepping up for themselves.
I can post on LinkedIn and Instagram every day and shout about the value of the role.
But it doesn’t make any difference.
Don’t carry the false hope that any one person can shift this.
Because what matters at the end of the day is how your executive team is experiencing your cohort.
All of you.
You have a combined brand, whether you think you do or not, and it has a dollar figure attached to it.
That’s the brutal commercial reality.
Rather than seeing that as confronting, see it as information you can work with. There is empowerment in information.
If you want to check your thinking, there are a few ways I can help you.
For free training, visit my website for The EA Compass.
The Strategic EA Reset is another free tool that will help you figure out what you need to work on quickly, so you’re not trying to do everything and can move forward with focus.
I also have a Career Success Shop on my website. The Leadership Integration Kit is a download designed to help EAs understand how to walk in lockstep with senior leaders. The CEO Starter Kit is also a great resource for C-suite EAs.
And, of course, there’s The Elite EA Academy, a 12-week, self-paced online programme that gives you proximity to me through live calls. These are mini growth labs and clinics where we bring the learning to life. There’s also a peer community, so you’re supported between calls.
The bottom line is something I’ve said for years now:
I know how hard you work and how great you are at what you do.
But that’s not enough.
I see you.
But they need to see you, really see you, too.
Thanks for listening. If this episode gave you pause, I’d love to hear from you. DM me on Instagram or LinkedIn.
You can find the links to the free resources and my course in the show notes.
See you in the next episode.
