What is a virtual employee?

A remote employee, or a virtual employee, typically works on a real-time remote basis for your company. Most of the time, they are full-time employees. Most people confuse virtual employees with freelancers but they’re very different. Freelancers are self-employed individuals who work for multiple people or clients at the same time. As an employer, you don’t have much control over when the freelancer completes their work, who they work for, or the money they charge for their work. However, contrary to this, virtual employees work for a single employer, which gives them more control of various aspects of their job such as the work they complete, when they complete it, and how much they’ll be paid for it. You can assign them specific tasks for a specific fee. You can even hire virtual assistants, graphics designers, and even marketing specialists. They are exactly like a regular employee, except they’re not in your office.

Pros and cons of hiring virtual employees

As with anything, there are pros and cons to hiring virtual employees. Let’s firstly look at some benefits:

1. You can quickly scale your business

Scaling your business means more hiring more employees which means you’ll eventually need more office space. This of course means greater business costs. Using virtual employee means there are lower business costs, allowing you to scale at higher levels.

2. You can enhance diversity

Hiring remotely means you can hire people from another city, or even another country! This allows you to take advantage of global talent and hire people from all over the world.