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I recently published an article on the famous Dutch IT magazine ‘Computable<\/a>‘. In response to this article, I received some questions from\u00a0Reza Sarshar<\/a>\u00a0of\u00a0interaccess<\/a>. The questions are interesting and I want to address all of them in this article.<\/p>\n1. What is the utility of offshoring?<\/strong><\/p>\n There are many benefits for companies engaging offshore resources. The extent to which each applies to your company depends on whether you set up your own offshore office, work with a supplier based on fixed price\/SLA, hire dedicated people from a supplier or work with freelancers. In general the benefits are (and please add to this if I missed something):<\/p>\n Onlangs publiceerde ik een artikel over het beroemde Nederlandse \u00a0IT – tijdschrift \u00a0\u2018Computable<\/a>\u2018. \u00a0In reactie op dit artikel ontving ik enkele vragen van Reza Sarshar<\/a> \u00a0van interaccess<\/a>. \u00a0De vragen zijn interessant en ik wil ze allemaal beantwoorden \u00a0in dit artikel.<\/p>\n 1. Wat is het nut van offshoring?<\/strong> Jag publicerade nyligen en artikel i k\u00e4nda holl\u00e4ndska IT-magasinet \u201dComputable<\/a><\/strong>\u201d. Som respons p\u00e5 denna artikel fick jag n\u00e5gra fr\u00e5gor fr\u00e5n Reza Sarshar<\/a><\/strong> p\u00e5 interaccess<\/a><\/strong>. Fr\u00e5gorna var intressanta och jag skulle vilja addressera dem i denna artikel.<\/p>\n 1. Vad \u00e4r nyttan av outsourcing?<\/p>\n Det finns m\u00e5nga f\u00f6rdelar f\u00f6r f\u00f6retag som utnyttjar resurser offshore. Omfattningen av dessa f\u00f6rdelar beror av om du etablerar ditt eget kontor offshore, arbetar mot en leverant\u00f6r till fastpris\/SLA, anlitar dedikerad personal fr\u00e5n en leverant\u00f6r eller arbeta med frilansare. Generellt best\u00e5r nyttan i (och l\u00e4gg g\u00e4rna till om jag missat n\u00e5gonting):<\/p>\n 1. What is the utility of offshoring?<\/strong><\/p>\n There are many benefits for companies engaging offshore resources. The extent to which each applies to your company depends on whether you set up your own offshore office, work with a supplier based on fixed price\/SLA, hire dedicated people from a supplier or work with freelancers. In general the benefits are (and please add to this if I missed something):\u00a0a. Engaging talented people (access to a big\u00a0labor\u00a0pool) 2. How to approach offshoring?<\/strong><\/p>\n This question is hard to answer in a short article. I believe the first fundamental choice is whether you want to set up your own office or work with a supplier. In my experience, setting up your own office works for big companies and takes too much focus away from the core business for SME’s. Working with a supplier that has the right people and gives you guidance in how to manage people on a distance gives you a fast track to\u00a0success<\/a>.<\/p>\n Once you have decided on the basic setup, there are\u00a05 key success factors<\/a>:<\/p>\n a.\u00a0People<\/strong>: The most important factor in building an offshore cooperation is to select the right people. 3. What is the effect of offshoring on your business model?<\/strong><\/p>\n I will answer this question from the perspective of my own typical customer: a web or software company. The impact on a few parts of the business model: 4. What are the pitfalls of offshoring?<\/strong><\/p>\n In my experience all pitfalls can be grouped into 2: 5. What is the influence of the cloud on offshoring?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.bridge-global.com\/blog\/\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/04\/outsourcing-offshoring-business-150x150.jpg\" "\\"outsourcing-offshoring-business\\"")
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\nEr zijn veel voordelen voor bedrijven die offshore middelen aanwerven. In hoeverre uw bedrijf deze voordelen geniet is afhankelijk van of u een eigen offshore kantoor opzet, werkt met een leverancier op basis van vaste prijzen\/SLA, \u00a0toegewijde mensen inhuurt van een leverancier of dat u werkt met freelancers. \u00a0Over het algemeen zijn de voordelen ( mocht ik iets missen vul me svp aan):<\/p>\n<\/a><\/p>\n<\/a>I recently published an article on the famous Dutch IT magazine ‘Computable<\/a>‘. In response to this article, I received some questions from\u00a0Reza Sarshar<\/a>\u00a0of\u00a0interaccess<\/a>. The questions are interesting and I want to address all of them in this article.<\/p>\n
\nb. Flexibility in scaling up and down (no long term employment contracts)
\nc. Ability to grow your company and (software) products faster
\nd. Lower costs
\ne. Flexible cost structure
\nf. \u00a0Focus on core activities<\/p>\n
\nb.\u00a0Process<\/strong>: \u00a0All people need to have a common understanding of \u2018how we work\u2019
\nc.\u00a0Preparation: T<\/strong>ake the time to prepare everything well and don’t rush into it
\n<\/strong>d. \u00a0Profit:<\/strong>\u00a0<\/strong>Monitor continuously whether the cooperation is delivering results
\n<\/strong>e.\u00a0<\/strong>Performance: \u00a0<\/strong>Regular evaluations of the team members on aspects like productivity, quality<\/p>\n
\na.\u00a0The way of working:<\/strong>\u00a0people need to create a structure, process and way of communicating that supports working with people on a distance. You need more structure than with people in one location. And this has a positive spin off on the whole company. An example is one of our new customers, an internet project company from Holland. They were used to do all communication through email. Right now, a need to feel in ‘control’ of the progress of a project (which they usually did by talking in the corridor) arises. For this purpose, they will start using an online issue tracker. If this works well, they plan to use this in all their projects and maybe even give their clients access to the system. This improves their added value towards their clients.
\nb.\u00a0Speed of delivery<\/strong>: you can engage more people to your projects when needed, so products and projects get launched faster
\nc.\u00a0Cost structure<\/strong>: the costs of programming go down, leading to more profit or a lower price for the end customer
\nd.\u00a0Flexibility<\/strong>: engaging more or less people in the production, which also impacts your cost structure. Employees keep receiving a salary. External contracts can be stopped when needed.
\ne.\u00a0Beyond technology<\/strong>: my own company employs some marketeers from India, does part of the lead creation\/sales process from India, invoices are sent from India. Once you have the technologists in place, you can further change your business model. You also get access to the local markets where you may be able to sell your products or services.<\/p>\n
\na.\u00a0Hiring the wrong people<\/strong>. I believe many companies make the mistake of looking at offshoring from a company perspective: they send a big\u00a0RFP\u00a0<\/a>asking how many people work in the office, what technologies they know, etc. Although you do need to know this, eventually your work gets done by\u00a0people<\/a>. And you want to hire the best possible people, so you want to have a voice in who’s working on your project and you want to communicate directly with them.
\nb.\u00a0Miscommunication<\/strong>. Assumed that the people working for you are the right ones, things may still go wrong if\u00a0communication\u00a0<\/a>contains flaws. Software development in itself is already hard, essentially because it is hard to know upfront what needs to be developed. And if one person knows what needs to be built, the next person may understand this in another way. Add to these complexity different locations, time zones, language and cultures and you’ve got a mix of factors that\u00a0affect communication<\/a>. I have written an\u00a0article\u00a0<\/a>about this earlier.<\/p>\n
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