Francois Zielemans's Page

A while ago I was asked to give my opinion on the proposition “when outsourcing is benchmarking required to prevent a failure” by an editor of an IT magazine. My first thought was: of course it is, as including a benchmark clause in a contract was standard practice when I drafted a contract. But then I thought again and come to a less back-and-white conclusion.



Benchmarking before or during the contract period is common good and big business for companies like Gartner, Alsbridge and… Continue

A while ago I wrote a blog on sustainability and how it might provide BPO vendors a competitive advantage. I see a lot of activities within Europe and U.S. in that area and thus wanted to share some of my observations. Especially on how technology will increasingly be an enabler of increased energy efficiency. A topic which is also becoming of increased importance to offshore BPO vendors with…

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Car manufacturers started in the seventies with optimizing their value chain by outsourcing activities and has since then progressed into almost every aspect of our economy. Think of Indians analyzing x-ray pictures for European/American hospitals, South Africans administering mortgage requests and Philippine’s doing the salary administration. The main drivers behind this wave of outsourcing are technological advances and the breaking down of national trade barriers.



The same… Continue

Getting outsourcing contracts to comply with Solvency II is not rocket science, but requires a certain amount of attention. Here are some practical guidelines.



Where within banks the Basel II implementation projects come to an end, are insurers burning the midnight oil to get Solvency II implemented before the end of 2012. The Solvency II legislation is aimed at improving risk management practices within insurance companies and providing better protection for policyholders. For this… Continue