How to set up your first offshore hire: a step-by-step checklist

Your first offshore hire works best when the setup is done before the person starts. Pick one role with a clear set of tasks, choose a country and an employment plan, sort out the laptop and logins, and write down what the first 30 days look like. Most businesses that struggle with offshoring skipped one of those steps, not the hire itself.

This checklist walks through each step in the order we see work for Australian small and mid-sized businesses.

1. Choose one role with clear, repeatable work

Start with the job that eats the most of your week and follows a process: bookkeeping, accounts payable, inbox and calendar management, or payroll. Write a list of the ten tasks you would hand over on day one. If you cannot write that list, the role is not ready yet.

Good first roles include an offshore bookkeeper, an accounts assistant or a virtual assistant. Senior roles such as a finance manager work well once you have a process to manage.

2. Pick a country

Sri Lanka and the Philippines both have strong English-speaking finance and admin talent. Sri Lanka is 4.5 hours behind AEST and has a deep pool of accounting graduates studying CA Sri Lanka, CIMA or ACCA. The Philippines is 2 hours behind AEST and is strong in customer-facing and phone-based work. Our fees are the same in both. Read more on Sri Lanka and the Philippines.

3. Choose how the person is employed

After recruitment you decide who runs employment. On SOR you employ and pay the person yourself. On EOR we run payroll and compliance for $350 a month. On Managed for You we also handle onboarding, HR guidance and ongoing support for $1,000 a month on a 12-month commitment. Our guide to SOR vs EOR vs MOR explains the trade-offs, and how invoicing works shows what lands on your invoice each month.

4. Sort out the laptop, logins and security

Decide before day one whether your new starter uses their own laptop, a laptop you buy, or a managed and secured device. Set up a company email, multi-factor authentication and a password manager so credentials are never sent by email. Our IT and security options cover all three approaches.

5. Write the first 30 days

• Week 1: tools access, walkthroughs of your processes, and small supervised tasks.

• Week 2: the same tasks done independently, with daily check-ins.

• Weeks 3 and 4: the full task list, with a weekly review.

Most offshore hires that fail do so in month three, not month one, usually because expectations were never written down. Our post on the onboarding gap covers how to avoid it.

6. Set a weekly rhythm

Book a 30-minute weekly call, keep a shared task list, and agree how urgent work is flagged. A predictable rhythm matters more than the tool you use.

How long does it take?

Around 3 to 4 weeks from sign-up to placement. We run a fresh job ad for every role and shortlist candidates who have passed a skills assessment and interviews. See how it works or book a free consultation to price your first role.