Frequently Asked Questions
General
- Scalability: Outsourcing allows you to increase or decrease you workforce quickly without worrying about recruiting hassles, large severance packages, liability issues, etc.
- Direct Savings: Employing a Paragon agent typically reduces your cost by 50-70% compared to most developed markets
- Ancillary Savings: Costs associated with recruiting, HR, legal, taxes, and government mandates are all borne by Paragon
- Focus: Paragon assumes most if not all of the management duties and responsibilities for your extended team, allowing you to focus your time, energy, and resources on business strategy
- Flexibility: Your extended team is available to work in any time zone, 24/7/365
Our clients routinely save 50-70% compared to what they would pay for an equally skilled team in their home country. This is primarily due to the exceptionally low overhead and cost-of-living expenses afforded by our strategically selected offshore locations.
In addition, clients also save on the costs associated with maintaining and supporting their employees including infrastructure (floorspace, utilities, connectivity, equipment, and security), support services (payroll, benefits, continuous learning and coaching, and other HR functions), hours spent by legal teams on liability, compliance, and other issues, and recruiting expenses, among others.
These considerable savings have fueled the explosive growth of the outsourcing industry. A majority of the Global 500 have already migrated parts of their operations offshore, with thousands of smaller companies following suit.
Traditionally, it has been large multinationals that have taken advantage of outsourcing, but actually, outsourcing is ideally suited to small and medium-sized operations. The ability to scale your business quickly and efficiently, the significant cost savings involved, and the increased focus it allows you to have on your core business are universal benefits that apply to small and large companies alike. But for obvious reasons, the impact of such benefits is more keenly felt by smaller businesses.
Paragon’s clients include those who have outsourced entire teams as well as those who engage only one agent. Large or small, we at Paragon value every client and are dedicated to providing personalized attention and service to each of our partners.
Paragon specializes in providing elite, technically-fluent agents who are experts in areas such as ad operations, creative design, 3D visualizations, and technical support, just to name a few.
However, thanks to our reputation, clients also come to us seeking more traditional back-office support and call center services which we can easily accommodate. For a full list of the services we can offer, please see our Services page.
Depending on the skillsets you request, your offshore team could be ready for you in as little as 2 to 4 weeks.
How Extended Teams Work
No. Paragon agents work as an extension of your team, just as if you had hired them locally. They are 100% committed to your business. Paragon ensures this by discouraging our agents from freelancing or moonlighting for another company.
As a matter of course, Paragon handles every operational facet including:
- Facilities
- IT support
- Compliance
- Corrective Actions
- Coaching
- Recruitment
- HR (Payroll, Benefits, etc.)
- Team-building and morale boosters
When it comes to managing your team’s performance, Paragon can be as active or passive as you want. Some clients prefer to remotely-manage their teams entirely on their own while others delegate the entire task to us.
Most clients, however, choose a middle ground where Paragon designates a team coordinator who is responsible for 1) managing communications between you and your extended team, 2) coordinating the assignation of tasks, 3) monitoring KPIs, and 4) ensuring punctuality and attendance.
Because every business has its own preferred way of doing things, Paragon offers our clients the flexibility to be involved as little as or as much as they want.
Paragon is a 24/7/365 company with clients around the world. Our agents are available to work in any time zone. The standard work schedule is 8 hours per day, 5 days per week. However, overtime options are usually available.
Your extended team will, by default, use the same holiday schedule as your in-house teams. However, at your request, Paragon can easily arrange for any holiday schedule that better serves your needs.
Your agents will be legally employed by Paragon but will be contractually 100% dedicated for your use.
This allows you to manage the agents as if they were in-house employees yet gives you the freedom from the expenses and constraints associated with full-time staff including benefits, taxes, legal, HR, and so on.
The Recruiting Process
Paragon maintains a large pool of highly skilled agents specializing in various fields. And thanks to our reputation as an amazing place to work, we also have a huge pool of external candidates just waiting for an opportunity to work at Paragon.
When you request an extended team by Paragon, we will screen both our internal and external resources to present you with the very best candidates based on your requirements.
Paragon’s talent acquisition team identifies the most promising candidates from a pool of thousands of applicants and conducts interviews and tests to determine the candidates’ aptitude, communication skills, technical skills, and suitability to our business culture and expectations. Every agent goes through our rigorous screening process that includes:
- Resume Verification
- Initial Interview by HR
- Verbal Communications Evaluation
- Written Communications Evaluation
- Second Interview by management
- Subject Matter Evaluation
- Third Interview by subject matter experts
- Internal Discussion and Overall Assessment
- Background Check
Yes. In fact, we recommend that our clients interview every candidate, either in person or via video conferencing. We are helping you to build your own extended team, so your input and approval is the most critical element.
Paragon’s talent acquisition team works for you in the same capacity as your in-house recruiters. Once candidates have been qualified through our rigorous screening process, we will present you with the profiles of the most suitable candidates. At this point, you can opt to interview the candidates to further assess their qualifications, aptitude, and skills.
Once you have identified the candidates you want, Paragon will on-board the agents and make sure that they are prepared and equipped for your project.
Management and Training
Unless you ask for an untrained agent, Paragon will present only those agents with experience in the systems and processes that will be used by your extended team.
Regarding knowledge specific to your company such as policies, services, best practices, internal CRMs and other systems, etc., you can either train your team directly (either in person or remotely), indirectly (manuals, online channels, etc.) or by proxy using one of our trainers who can then instruct, monitor, and develop your extended team in the requisite capabilities.
You can be involved in the management of your team as much or as little as you want. Most clients choose to let Paragon handle the day-to-day management details and check in with their teams or team coordinators once a week. However, some clients prefer to micromanage their teams, even down to hourly tracking, while others prefer to be totally hands-off and simply review the performance reports.
Our flexibility allows us to tailor the management process and reporting structure to whatever you are most comfortable with.
Terms of Engagement
At your convenience, we will schedule a call to determine your needs and requirements which we call the Discovery Session. We will then prepare a Solution Brief that will outline our proposal including number of agents, scope of work, sample employee profiles, and pricing. This is often accompanied by a Solution Brief Call to give you an opportunity to meet with some of our specialists and ask further questions. Once you decide to move forward, we will request a refundable recruitment fee to begin searching for the most suitable candidates.
You will then review the agents, decide which ones you want to hire, and transfer a security deposit to reserve your extended team. We will then send you a first month’s invoice to be paid before the start date of your team.
Unlike most BPOs, Paragon tries to minimize the start-up expenses as much as possible. The only start-up fees you will incur with Paragon are the recruitment fees and a security deposit.
Recruitment Fee: This refundable fee is USD 100 per position to be filled. It covers the time and effort it takes to match you with the ideal candidates and discourages less serious inquiries. Should we not be able to provide you with a satisfactory agent, this fee will be refunded in full. If we do find a satisfactory agent for you, the fee will be applied towards your first invoice.
Security Deposit: The security deposit is equal to one month’s invoice and is required to reserve your agents until the start date. Until the deposit is made, Paragon cannot guarantee the availability of any agents presented to you. Adding additional agents in the future will require a commensurate increase of the security deposit.
Yes. At your request, we can provide you with a Trial Period Agreement. The trial period lasts for one month and does not require a security deposit. The invoice will still need to be paid before work commences, but the engagement will only last for one month, at the end of which you can decide whether to proceed with a full contract.
Yes, this is one of the key benefits of using an extended team. Paragon will present additional candidates using our same rigorous screening process and submit them for your review. Adding additional team members will not necessitate a recruitment fee.
If you wish to downsize an underperforming agent, all we request is a 30-day notice to allow us to re-assign the agent. If the agent is performing as expected but you just change your mind, there is a government-mandated 30-day severance fee that goes directly to the agent.
All of our agents have signed a non-compete agreement which limits their ability to be directly employed by you or any of your competitors.
This protects both our clients and Paragon. However, should you already have someone in mind outside of Paragon, we can certainly hire that person on your behalf.
One of the things that sets Paragon apart is the lack of hidden fees. The price you see on the quotation is what you will see on the invoice. There will be no charges that have not been explicitly agreed to in writing.
BPO clients often see their bills padded with extra charges for employee events and activities, bonuses, shelfware/bloatware, extra taxes or government fees, transition or realignment costs, etc. The creative ways by which many BPOs inflate invoices are endless. Paragon believes in being totally transparent. You will never be hit with unexpected charges.
Privacy and Security
Paragon takes the data security of our clients very seriously, implementing multiple levels of security to deliver peace of mind when sharing your data with your extended team. These measures include the following:
- All computers are installed with a stringent monitoring program which blocks access to any unauthorized website
- PCI-compliant rooms are available upon request
- Paperless offices are also available upon request
- Any software that can be used for recording purposes is strictly prohibited
- All computers are within a secured server and do not have access to external storage devices
- Each of our clients are assigned their own VLAN
- We can also physically partition off parts of our network if needed
- We have state-of-the-art firewalls and the constantly updated anti-virus safeguards
- Access to the building is controlled both by 24/7 security guards and biometrics
- CCTV coverage over every room
- We can implement any additional safeguards you want to put in place
Facilities and Infrastructure
Yes. We have plenty of bandwidth with a 24/7 IT team monitoring connectivity across all of our lines with load balancing and failover, workstations with the latest technologies, CCTV, biometrics, training rooms, and conference rooms. Some clients require dedicated lines or specialized, upgraded PCs which Paragon is happy to provide at cost.
Our infrastructure is so robust that other outsourcing companies regularly lease individual workstations and even entire rooms from us.
Paragon prides itself on maintaining one of the most professional but also fun offices in the region. We believe that a top-notch environment is a critical component of team morale, not to mention its positive impact on recruiting and attrition.
We consistently receive high marks from other BPOs that lease workstations from us and from our own agents who often spend their off-hours enjoying our facilities.
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