Outsourcing Requirements (Book Excerpts)

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Curious about outsourcing’s stance on requirements? Our book, “Outsourcing Through RentACoder” explains it all. Below are a few selected snippets that describe its importance and why you, as an outsourcer, should care.

For details, head on over to this page and order the book.

Outsourcing Through RentACoder is a 418 page step-by-step user guide for entrepreneurs who want to reduce their workload and increase productivity at the same time.

Excerpts:

• Roughly 25% of RentACoder’s contractors are American. That’s 61,708 out of 238,670 potential candidates. Only 1% (987) of them are “Top Coders” – contractors that meet specific work performance requirements. (page 30)
• Most if not all disgruntled users fall victim to their emotions, and as a result, they break the website’s rules regarding professional behavior, they neglect to respond in a timely manner, they fail to provide important facts surrounding a complaint, or they simply lie to cover a misinterpretation or some failure to supply a requirement. (page 46)
• Hire an employee and you hire on anti-discriminatory laws, minimum wage requirements, health care, pension plans, bonuses, profit sharing, paid vacations, paid sick leave, late days, and missed days. (page 55)
• Fortunately, you can assert your own requirements by amending the site’s default contract. So you might want to consider placing a cap on what and how much ($) you’re liable for. (page 93)
• In a nutshell, “The Boss” needs to know that RentACoder (vWorker) provides prompt customer service, a fair arbitration process, a Buyer Requirements Wizard that eliminates misunderstandings, and an Expert Guarantee Deposit for buyers who want to attract the most committed coders. (page 115)
• One might think those simple requirements would be enough to create an amicable outsourcing environment. But the truth is the outsourcing industry can bring out some rather unattractive behavior for any number of reasons. (page 123)
• With an accessible, privatized forum and calendar, you’ll additionally need a platform to create and store important materials such as weekly status reports and agendas. For this requirement, we recommend Google Docs. (page 131)
• After taking a look at all the issues every outsourcing contract has to address, you can’t help but appreciate the way RentACoder (vWorker) confronts those issues and instantly supplies legally binding text through its bid request (or Buyer Requirements) wizard. (page 161)
• A non-specific bid request includes the request for code or a service that (1) doesn’t clearly describe work requirements, (2) doesn’t require any labor, (3) doesn’t specify a distinct deadline, and/or implies that a deadline is not applicable, or (4) can’t be brought to arbitration. (page 178)
• Before setting out on a coder scavenger hunt, it’s best to draft out your requirements first. In doing so, you won’t make the mistake of attracting bids that don’t address your needs. (page 181)
• RentACoder gives experienced buyers the option of bypassing the Requirements Interview with the “Other” option, but we don’t recommend skipping this step at all. (page 191)
• Once RentACoder (vWorker) approves your bid request and makes it public on the site, interested coders will find your NDA requirement attached to the approved proposal. (page 205)
• At best, it will meet all your requirements, demonstrate first-class competency, come with excellent references, and most importantly, correspond with your outsourcing goals. (page 217)
• So if recordkeeping is an absolute requirement, you can access important records not only from this section, but from other sections as well. (page 312)

Order Outsourcing Through RentACoder:

Outsourcing Through RentACoder is a 418 page, 7.44″ x 9.68″ paperback book, fully illustrated and filled with everything you could possibly need to successfully outsource your tasks the first time.

Inside, you’ll find a slew of outsourcing know-how, over a dozen online checklists, worksheets, and more. It also introduces an outsourcing roadmap exclusive to the RentACoder (vWorker) website.

Order it here.