Growth rarely announces itself. For many Australian business owners, it arrives quietly, in the form of longer days, crowded inboxes, and a sense that everything now depends on them.
What begins as ambition turns, slowly, into a cluttered inbox, overwhelming diary and scattered brain capacity to make needle-moving business decisions that help scale the business. Decision overwhelm and mental exhaustion soon becomes a norm as business owners do their best to try and keep up with the increasing tasks and laborious conversations that all but seem repetitive.
Business growth is a great problem to have, but with so little room to think, it almost feels redundant. Julius Schoenfeld experienced many of these moments in his own businesses and senior positions held, including an e-commerce hat business, an NFT company, and a senior role held at a tapware business.
Outside of experiencing these issues, Julius Schoenfeld found himself listening to the same story again and again from other Founders. Founders who were wary of handing things over. Founders who had tried outsourcing before and walked away disappointed or burned.
“They weren’t against help,” Julius says. “But they were against poor performance, mostly due to past burnt experience.”
Experiencing outsourcing issues firsthand
Prior to founding Team Up Now Pty Ltd, Julius spent several years working in finance and in fractional CFO roles, where offshore support was utilised as a practical way to keep the business moving. On paper, the model worked. Tasks were being completed and hiring offshore decreased staffing costs. But in practice, something about the way of working felt consistently off.
What stood out to him was not a lack of technical capability but a lack of human connection. Offshore teams were collaborating well with the onshore teams, and the quality of work was incredible, but there was no continuity, no relationship, and no sense of who was on the other end of the work being delivered.
Inevitably, team members came and went, communication felt transactional, and trust never had the chance to fully form.
For offshore staff, particularly in the Philippines, the experience was often even more confronting. Low pay, short-term thinking from agencies, and high expectations without stability or security meant many were forced to juggle multiple roles just to stay afloat. It created a cycle of disengagement and churn that affected everyone involved.
“It didn’t feel ethical,” Julius says. “And it didn’t feel like something that would actually last.”
In launching Team Up Now, Julius wasn’t trying to reinvent an industry or disrupt a system for the sake of it. He was determined to solve a problem he had experienced repeatedly, in real time, one that affected both business owners and the people supporting them behind the scenes.
Where both sides were failing
On one side of the coin, Australian businesses were being stretched thin, including creative studios, healthcare practices, disability providers, and small businesses effectively doing the work of much larger organisations. They knew they needed support, but not at the cost of quality, culture, or control over how their business was run.
On the other side were Filipino professionals, highly capable and deeply motivated, yet often underpaid and disconnected from the businesses they were supporting. Many were treated as interchangeable resources rather than long-term team members, making it difficult to build trust, confidence, or continuity.
Team Up Now was built to sit in the middle of these two realities, where the business model involves a system and an ethical way of working designed to optimise the Australian workforce with highly skilled offshore talent.
“When you prioritise one side of the coin, the system breaks,” Julius says. “You have to respect both and treat both groups respectfully and ethically.”
The respect Julius references shows up in very practical ways, such as transparent margins, fair pay, proper benefits, long-term placements, and consistent communication, rather than a quick handover and a silent exit. It also shows up in what the company deliberately avoids: faceless handoffs, inflated promises, and a race to the lowest price that ultimately costs everyone more.
When being valued instils ownership and a strong work ethic
Earlier this year, a client came to Julius completely exhausted. She was a studio founder with ADHD, overwhelmed by operational detail, constant decision-making, and the mental load of trying to hold everything together at once. What she needed wasn’t just help with tasks, but space to think again.
Julius placed a virtual assistant named Bev. Initially, the work focused on creating order, managing follow-ups, and removing the small but relentless tasks that had been draining the founder’s energy. As trust grew, Bev began stepping in more proactively, eventually helping to plan and execute a Black Friday campaign that generated strong sales and eased the pressure on the business.
Months later, a typhoon tore through parts of the Philippines. Bev lost her roof and was forced to temporarily relocate to a local gymnasium, dealing with unstable power and unreliable internet. Despite the circumstances, she made sure she was back online and ready to work by Monday.
“Bev showed up not because of obligation, but because she took ownership of her role, and people don’t do that unless they feel genuinely valued,” says Julius.
The work that rarely gets noticed
Team Up Now does not operate like most outsourcing agencies, largely because many of the decisions made inside the business are not designed to look impressive on the surface. Julius is transparent about margins, typically sitting around 20 to 30 per cent, and prioritises paying staff above what many agencies offer. There is no push toward large office-based models. Instead, the focus is on remote-first roles that suit the individual, rather than forcing people into a system that doesn’t work for them.
Hiring goes beyond technical capability alone. Character, communication, and reliability are just as important, if not more so, because without those foundations, trust never has the chance to form. And once someone is placed, Julius and his Co-Founder, Eiza, do not step away. They stay involved through regular check-ins, open conversations when things feel off, and early intervention when issues arise.
“That part of the work is not glamorous,” he says, “but it’s where trust is built. It’s why our clients value us and why our teams respect us.”
An industry finding its footing
Outsourcing today looks very different from a decade ago, and Julius sees these noticeable shifts daily. What was once largely limited to administrative support now extends into marketing, finance, creative work, customer service, healthcare, and disability support, areas where accuracy, security, and alignment matter deeply.
Alongside this shift is the rise of a growing cohort of highly capable Filipino professionals, particularly women, stepping into more senior and specialised roles. In many cases, the technical skill has always been there and opportunities to step up have now become available to them.
“Often what’s missing isn’t ability,” Julius says. “It’s someone backing them.”
Team Up Now’s plans for 2026
Team Up Now has grown from a team of six to nearly 30, but growth is not treated as the end goal. Julius remains focused on hiring well, maintaining standards, and expanding into specialised sectors where offshore support can genuinely add value, rather than scaling for the sake of it.
Alongside this, he is developing consulting services for businesses that already have offshore teams but are struggling with structure, clarity, or trust within their setup, a new service line being offered in 2026. Internal education continues to sit at the centre of the work, through ongoing conversations, webinars, and a deliberate effort to reframe what ethical offshoring should look like in practice.“Long term,” Julius says, “I want us to be well-recognised as the outsourcing partner Founders know and trust, not just with their business, but with their people.”
In an industry often driven by cost and distance, Team Up Now is built on ethical decisions, consistency, and fairness, with the belief that when people are treated well, everything else follows, sometimes slowly, sometimes all at once.
