Recommendation Archives - Homeprenuer®, Entrepreneur working from home.

September 30, 2008October 11, 2018

oDesk and Me

A Couple of years ago, I would have brushed off any thought on freelancing if anyone had mentioned this as a career choice. I was happy with my 9 – 5 job, and life was going on (as it should be , with acceptable highs and lows.) Later, when the “wakeup call” hit me, it hit me hard. I decided to take a sabbatical from work, and turned to blogging to keep myself busy. Oh! Boy, I am hooked to blogging. I came across interests that I never knew existed in me. I could get in touch with few long lost friends, and make some new friends along the way. I was an 8 year old when I actually met my Blog-friend.( call it the new age pen-pal / blog-pal).

I was tired of getting typecast into Cooking – family-childcare-type of posts that were expected from a female blogger. I wanted to offer something different in my own special kind of way. It was during these times, I was searching for information on freelancing to make a blog post. So, in an attempt to gain first hand knowledge of the freelancing industry, I signed up at all major freelancing sites, oDesk , Va4U , Elance and several others (that’s from a spectrum of 10 -15 sites). I was awed at the kind of talent pool just waiting to be harnessed at all these sites, and now I was one of them.

You might be familiar with the phrase “Performance Based Incentives”. Well, I got a first hand experience of this at oDesk , one of THE BEST freelancing site ( from my own spectrum), I have come across so far for the same aforementioned reason. To prevent overbidding by service providers ( and flooding the buyer’s inbox), every oDesk user starts off with 5 bids per week. However, he can increase his / her quota of bids by taking skill tests with oDesk , ie at the end of 5 skill tests; you have about 20 bids per week.Moreover, These skill tests also put the provider on the buyer’s radar when a matching job is posted.

Although, seasoned providers don’t actually use more than 20 bids in an entire month, this matters a lot to newcomers, especially when they have to “apply for as many jobs as possible”, to get their foothold. But this is just one of the many aspects at oDesk that impressed me. Providers who stay and Buyers who come back at oDesk are professional in every sense. Others signup on a whim and expect a plum job to be handled over in a platter. It has more to do with lack of conviction and the rest is meaningless noise.

All of this started with a quest to make a single blog post on freelancing at my personal blog. I admit, I never made that post in my personal blog. Instead I now have a blog completely dedicated to freelancing and an Orkut Community to this effect. Now, who would have imagined that…. ? … ? … ?.

I no longer hold my 9- 5job, and the pay-packet is certainly not as regular as it used to be. Yet it makes me happy about the work minus the burnt out feeling coupled with the guilt of not being able to attend to family at short notice. But, Let me remind you, before my first VA-Project , I too had interview calls, that never saw the light of the day… but hey!.. don’t these things happen in the non-freelancing/ Virtual genre as well ???

September 22, 2008October 11, 2018

P2W2 – Freelancing portal with a diffrence

As a freelancer, I make it a point to visit and get acclimatized to the various freelancing portals on the WWW. This helps me to see the “skills in demand”, and also gives me an insight to hone my existing skills in accordance with this dynamic market place. There is no doubt that VA’s are self motivated individuals who are willing to go “the extra mile” for a project, being well within the reasonable limit, But the work of the virtual assistant scales up tremendously if the buyer is unable to communicate his requirement
Attention Service Buyers – Is your Project Worth Bidding for ?

Freelance marketplaces bring Service Buyers and Service Providers together so that both can mutually benefit . But in order to get the best result from the Virtual Assistant , it is of foremost importance that the Service Buyer has a well defined goal and understanding of his project requirement and communicate it as well. Just as a good project description can bring the best out of a mediocre Virtual Assistant, an equally bad project description is undoubtedly suicidal for an expert VA. It is hard reality that some Service Buyers don’t have the faintest idea of putting forth their project requirement, and “good” VAs do not bother to bid for such projects.

Project Description plays an integral part of getting the VAs to bid for your project

I understand that not all are capable of putting their requirements into words. Some times I have observed that Service Buyers whose project description is bad (to) worse, communicate much effectively over a voice conference session and are able to articulate their requirement in a more effective manner. But most freelancers do not give a second chance to such buyers. A Freelancer’s mind set says ” If his project description is so lousy, how is he going to understand / appreciate the work I will be doing. I don’t have time to sit through tutorial and walk-through session”.

P2W2 – Freelancing Marketplace with a difference
Voice Based Project Description.

Imagine my surprise, when I came across a freelance portal, which does exactly the same without having to schedule a voice conference between the Bidder and the Buyer. P2W2 – People To Work With is one such freelance market place.

What makes P2W2 really stand out is their facility to add “Voice Based Project Description” for the buyers. This does not mean “text” is out. The buyer can record his requirement and also point out the most important aspect of the project as text while posting a project. I was awed during my discussion with Chaitanya , CEO of P2w2 while taking a look at this feature..

By far, I believe this is the only portal that allows “Voice based Project description”. Now, this is what I call “Thinking out of the Box”. Not Stopping at “Voice Project Description”, P2W2 allows Voice recording for feedback and issue tracking. This is a busy world, and shows no sign of abatement. Thanks to technology. So instead of hurriedly typing some “not so meaningful” descriptions, buyers can now speak things out out. It is also noticed that, one tends to give more information while speaking, when compared to writing the same thoughts. As a bidder, I relish this feature. Once this feature kicks off with the freelancing community I am sure P2W2 is going to give other sites a run for their money.

P2w2 Blog

It was a lazy afternoon I was browsing through all my visitors who left me a comment.P2W2 blog is something I started off with an intention of a casual glance. But before I realised, I was reading away from their archives.

Most corporate blog tend to fall into the trap of “frequent updates” and do not give much needed attention to the quality of their content. But same could not be said for P2W2-blog. With an average of 4 posts per month, each post is a content to be relished. If you are in a hurry, read the headlines and comeback when you have time to pay attention. Never have I seen headlines that convey the gist in such an effective manner.

By reading no more than 2 blog posts, it becomes evident that this blog has “class”. The posts are informative and well researched. But the best part is the presentation is simple and devoid of any technical jargons

Some Interesting read are :-
1. How to Lock-in Your Clients – 1: Listen to them
2. Small business cash flow crisis: Psychology, not economics, is to blame
3. The changing rules of the game in a small business

These are my Top3 picks, tell me about yours.

September 4, 2008October 11, 2018

Visual CV – Take your resume to a new level

Finding a job was never an easy task, and the Resume / CV which is practically the jobseeker’s gate pass to connect to an organisation has undergone a great deal of change since the concept came into being. From word of mouth – to – hand written –to Neatly Typed –to printed format, the show-it-all resume is still undergoing changes to suit the new age trends.

With the penetration of internet, and Virtual Assistance gaining foray into the job-posting sites, many recruiters are finding it hard to keep track of submitted resumes and evaluating them. Moreover, for those who are keen on taking up virtual assistance as a career option (part time to begin with…), sending mails after mails with word / pdf attachments is a tedious process especially when you update a resume after it has been mailed to a prospective employer.. It is also a very pressing concern especially for those who want to work with Logos and banners and other graphic elements to send their creative files as attachments, for the fear of their graphic’s unauthorised usage ( People always find a way to work around © & Watermarks… isn’t exactly foolproof)

It was during one of my google-wanderings I came across Visual CV , the much needed resume – format for the virtual age. It doesn’t really matter if you aspire to be a virtual assistant or not. If you are planning to apply for a job, over the internet, then I would suggest that this is the best way to post / create your resume for your employers. Personally I would recommend this for the following reasons

It is online and its your resume. So you own the content , files, and other stuff in your portfolio
No more attachments, just a link in the mail.
You can update this as your career path progresses. So there is no more older versions
Allows a video resume upload. Make it more interactive, as compared to the b /w word documents
You can have option to have a certain public resume ( general info) , & a private resume (more detailed info) which can be shared with discretion.

Virtual Assistant or not, Visual CV is a great thing to have the resume put up. I am sure this will come across as a “Unique feature” among the hoards of resume a company gets for their job postings. Humand mind is a curious thing. The HR is no different, so cash on it, and make your resume truly stand out.

Oh!, I too have my Visual CV in place. Brief me on why you need my CV , I shall share it with you pronto!

August 8, 2008October 11, 2018

Outsourcing Disasters – 3 Major Conceptual Errors

This is something that outsourcing naysayers would love to rave about, the dreaded Outsourcing Disasters. They are more adept at providing statistical details regarding the number of outsourcing ventures that hit the dirt coupled with heated, critical arguments. So, I will leave the harangues to them.
For a change, why not take a look at this from the perspective of a business? It has been widely known and understood that being in business means to take calculative risks. Much like our first history lesson, “Man is a social being”, I would say , “Business is a social venture”. It is impossible to launch, thrive and flourish a business venture without any association with other businesses. Outsourcing is no different from this, and the businesses that seek outsourcing services are also bound to this principle.
However, listening to the success stories that came out of outsourcing, many enthusiastic business owners started to look at outsourcing as a miracle cure to cut costs and increase productivity. They failed to look deep into the same success stories focusing on the amount of preparation and governance model that was employed, which eventually lead to the success of an outsourcing deal. This eventually led to the germination of misguided outsourcing deals.

Bird’e Eye View :-
- Most buyers have only the bird’s eye view of the end result. This is fine when you are actively involved with the project. But when this is conveyed to a certain outsourcing partner, a ‘bird’s eye view’ of things is just not sufficient.
- Most failed ventures will reflect that the buyer has limited the communication to the ‘bird’s eye view’ of things without giving full details
- Failed ventures will also reveal that ‘multiple mails requesting information’ were looked down upon , and the outsourcing partner stands the risk of being labeled as ‘incompetent’.Beware, you really need an inside scoop to get this information.This reflect the arrogance of the buyer, and not the much hyped incompetence of the outsourcing partner
- Eventually creating a huge void in communication and leaving everything to assumption
- Assumptions lead to misguided project management, leading ultimately to the failed venture
The Aspirin Approach :-
- No one ever thinks twice before popping an aspirin. Same goes for the outlook towards outsourcing among the buyers who want to ‘get things done as fast as possible’.
- Buyers jump to the conclusion that outsourcing is a quick fix for all their financial problems. Somehow they fail to realize that cost cutting is only a by-product of outsourcing, while the actual objective is to get the process done elsewhere.
- This requires the buyers to shed the ‘aspirin approach’ to outsourcing and take up the ’surgical approach’ to things.
- Failed ventures will most certainly showcase haste in outsourcing their project without due the necessary preparation with respect to the governance model required to see the overseeing of the project’s progress.
- Pop-and-forget may work for aspirin, but attention to detail and extensive preparation is needed when a surgical procedure is being considered. The surgical approach is certainly lacking in failed outsourcing ventures.
Blame the Mailman :-
- Both parties are dissatisfied at the end of a venture that has failed terribly. The dissatisfied buyer ends up blaming cultural and geographical differences as the reason for failure.
- I wonder how come these differences did not surface when the deal was being finalized.… Both parties were well aware of the offshore working model. Both parties would have been communicating in the same language (I assume it is English). I am sure that both parties would have had a satisfactory time period before declaring a venture to be a failure.
- Just as the mailman cannot be blamed for delivering bad news, it is unfair for the buyer and the outsourcing parther to blame each other soley for the failure. Success is result of compatible team-work, but failure seems always to be the result of incompatible teaming with the buyer and the outsourcing partner.
- With lack of timely communication and information exchange, irrespective of an outsourcing deal or not, any business venture is sure to fail.
- I would further site ‘ego-centric’ communication within the buyer’s institution as a cause for failure, such as ‘ Since you (outsourcing partner) did not ask for a certain information, I did not think it was necessary to give you’. With this kind of approach, is it fair to blame the mailman ?

Everyone wants to succeed in their business. The buyers want an outsourcing deal to succeed because someone else can do it better for less, and the outsourcing partner wants to ‘be in business’, which is possible only if his client is satisfied with the performance. Both parties aspire for the project to succeed.
My request to the naysayers of outsourcing would be, to consider that every business venture starts out with an aspiration to succeed. It is no different for outsourcing deals. It would be prudent to only look into the actual cause that lead to a certain failure and not thrust the blame solely on the outsourcing partners. I am sure that you will agree that business involves making deals and taking calculative risks. Isn’t this the basic principle of running a business? With every business, there are some great deals and some disaster deals. Then why is it that everyone is coming down heavily on failed outsourcing deals?. Perhaps, that ’s because everyone loves to say “I told you so!”

January 15, 2007October 11, 2018

Your Testimonial Here

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It has been great working for you. I have always believed in keeping the lines of communication open for both of us. This helps us to see each others perspective and learn from experience.

So, please lend me few valuable moments of your time and share your thoughts about working with me. Criticisms motivate me to learn and appreciations motivate me to perform better. Feel free to speak what’s on your mind. It has been a great experience knowing you. I am looking forward towards a more fruitful relationship with you.

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Deepa