Advances in communication technology and a growing acceptance of the concept have spurred a rapid growth in the number of virtual companies and businesses with a significant percentage of their employees working remotely in virtual offices.

Particularly for small businesses, eliminating the high overhead costs associated with establishing, maintaining and expanding physical office space makes operating virtually an attractive financial decision.

However, running a successful virtual company requires more than just a willingness to work from home; it requires careful planning, the right employees and a strategic mix of technology tools to ensure communication and collaboration aren’t sacrificed in the quest for a lower operating budget.

The concept of virtual offices certainly isn’t new. However, the emergence of hosted telecommunications services and online collaboration tools, the prevalence of high-speed bandwidth – which today is found in nearly 70 percent of U.S. homes and 90 percent of U.S. businesses – and lower prices have created a surge in the number of companies either launching as virtual organizations or adding remote employees to their workforce.

Although not ideal for every type of business, those that can be classified as information service businesses – consulting firms, software developers, travel agents, real estate brokers, accounting firms, non-profit organizations, etc. – are particularly well-suited for virtual operations.

Further, companies with a highly mobile workforce, such as sales organizations, can realize significant benefits from setting up their employees to work virtually. And considering a recent Yankee Group finding that nearly 40 percent of all U.S. workers, or 50 million employees, are mobile, it’s happening more often than many people realize – in large part because technology makes the actual workspace transparent to anyone on the outside.

Telecommunication Tools
Successfully running a virtual company requires a carefully planned strategy that relies heavily on technology to keep employees connected with each other and with customers, regardless of their location.

One of the first – and perhaps most important – decisions to make when establishing a virtual company is which type of communications system to deploy. For any small business, a telecommunication system should present a “big business” feel to clients and prospects through such features as auto attendant, individual extensions, voice mail, conferencing, call forwarding/transfer, etc.

For virtual companies, the telecommunication decision is further complicated by the fact that employees can be scattered across the city or across the country. As such, the ideal system should connect everyone without the added expense of adding phone lines in every remote office.

While many these objectives can achieved with a PBX system, traditional systems are out of financial reach for small businesses, requiring an upfront investment of $5,000-$10,000 or more. Further, a company can quickly outgrow its PBX system, which will require additional investments in equipment upgrades or replacement costs – not to mention the costs incurred should it become necessary to move the system to a new location.

A better alternative is a “virtual” PBX service, which lays on top of existing land, mobile or VoIP lines and provides businesses with all the features of a traditional PBX without the upfront hardware investment or the need to install new phone lines.

These virtual communications services are hosted on the provider’s network and, for a flat monthly fee (typically in the $10-50 per month range), assign a toll-free number and a set number of extensions to each business customer. When a call is placed to that number, the system answers, plays the company’s customized greeting and directs the caller according to the configuration specified by the company.

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