If I outsource my accounting processes, how talented will my team be?

The majority of my clients are first-time outsourcers who aren’t quite sure what to expect when they get started. One of the most frequent concerns I hear when speaking with them at the inception of our relationship is, “What is the quality of talent that will be assigned to my team?”

You might be considering outsourcing some of your accounting tasks, but are worried about the qualifications of offshore talent. I take great pride in building high-performing teams that exceed my clients’ expectations. In fact, I recently had a client in Dallas tell me that the quality of talent they found with us in Manila was actually better than what they could have found by themselves locally, but I know that’s difficult to believe without experiencing it first-hand. One of my favorite aspects of my job is finding exceptional offshore talent for my clients. For this reason, I want to do a series of short write-ups spotlighting several members of our Manila team to try to address some of these concerns. I’ll start with my Manila Operations Lead, Bryan Salvador.

By delivering seamless transitions and exceptional service, Bryan makes my life easy every single day. Like me, Bryan is a CPA, and like me, he started his career as an auditor. This taught him the importance of thoroughly understanding processes and making sure they work well, as well as the need for documentation and controls. According to Bryan,

“Having process models and embedded controls is very impspanortant in any accounting activity. Regardless if these are repetitive or not, having a process flow promotes improvements which include elimination of unnecessary steps, consolidating and standardizing similar functions and identification of potential loopholes in the process. This also allows others to easily understand the company’s accounting framework which makes it easier for the stakeholders to interpret information.

The activities, however, performed manually or automatically, carry some inherent risks that may expose a company to financial misrepresentations. Controls should be created, interpreted and operated to prevent these potential spills to avoid financial liability and maintain the company’s integrity.”

Bryan is also a Certified Greenbelt of Lean Six Sigma Methodology. Six Sigma is an information‐driven methodology and a procedure to abolish defects in any process. It’s used to control costs, improve outputs and contribute to better results. My clients love Bryan (several have asked to hire him) and the structured methodology he puts in place beginning with their transition and continuing throughout their service delivery.

Bryan came to us a year ago from DB Schenker. DB Schenker is a global leader in supply chain management and logistics solutions and is committed to delivering total customer satisfaction by providing value, world-class quality and differentiated service solutions. At DB Schenker, Bryan was a Central Process Lead for General Ledger and Fixed Assets. During his time there, Bryan was one of DB’s Shared Services pioneers. He helped establish the center by taking part in its very first migration and then contributed to its growth and success by leading its biggest transition projects for the US and Canada. Additionally, Bryan was a global standard process model expert, responsible for identifying and presenting process improvements to the Global Process Owners (GPO). Within this role, he performed fit-gap analysis for the end-to-end processes of General Ledger and Fixed Assets to determine if the processes were in compliance with the global process standard. If a gap was identified, he presented solutions to the CFO of the local organization, Service Delivery Head of Shared Service Center and the GPO. This experience has been a huge asset to our clients, as he knows what ‘best-in-class’ processes look like and how to identify gaps and formulate solutions to fill those gaps.

Prior to DB Schenker, Bryan spent eight years at Shell’s Shared Services Center in Manila, which is known within the outsourcing and shared services industry to be one of the best in the world. Bryan moved up the ranks at Shell, his last position being that of Team Manager (Integrated General Accounting, Fixed Assets, Internal and Group Reporting). At Shell, Bryan was responsible for the accurate and timely preparation and submission of financial statements in accordance to Group policies and procedures and in supporting the required external financial reporting standards under both US GAAP and IFRS. He also led the delivery of effective improvements to achieve and maintain performance levels for accuracy, completeness, and timeliness in line with defined process metrics.

Bryan is involved with every client’s transition – beginning with the very first kick-off call – and his comprehensive and thorough approach puts our clients’ minds at ease. His pride for his work and love for his team and our clients shines through in everything he does. He hand-picks every employee for our clients, making sure their experience is a good fit for our clients’ needs. With him at the helm in Manila, I have peace of mind that our overall operations are running smoothly, and our clients have peace of mind that their services are meeting or exceeding all of their required service levels. “I love being with Personiv as it provides an environment that permits ideas to flow which include creating a customized approach for our customers. I think Bryan captures what we both love about working for Personiv, developing partnerships with happy clients:

“I can never be tired of hearing customer’s delight of choosing Personiv when most of them are reluctant to outsource activities at first, but they are now building and growing their team with us!”

We’ve been helping connect clients to remote talent for over 35 years. If you’re ready to make the case for a virtual team at your company, start with our eBook: Ready to Outsource? A Workbook on Presenting Outsourcing to Your Leadership Team.