Our growing outsourcing community has just started a new year. Hopefully a year full in challenges, new brilliant ideas and great opportunities. And we tend to set our objectives at the beginning of the year. But… At the end of the year we sometimes realize that the objectives have not been achieved. No time? No motivation? Inconvenient circumstances? Any other reason?
How many times have you…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on January 11, 2010 at 5:00am —
1 Comment
Small is not just beautiful but it also can be powerful. A small country with population amounting to around 16 millions inhabitants can be one of the largest world economies and able to have one of the highest GDP per capita. And below 4% unemployment rate at the same time. It is not cheap but it attracts investments. And (of course!) shared service centers among them. And… it is really worth fol…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on December 23, 2009 at 2:30am —
No Comments
An old dilemma: Offshore outsourcing vs. labor market. To be or not to be? – to outsource or not? The opposers are of the opinion that outsourcing produces unemployment. It is quite easy to say. In fact, outsourcing lets to improve the situation on labor market. Let’s analyze the findings of one of the latest studies.
A research team led by…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on November 8, 2009 at 4:52am —
No Comments
Offshore outsourcing has paid back. That has been shown by many Indian companies which have originally been established as local business organizations and now expand internationally, being global giants and creating jobs in these countries where they traditionally have been outsourced from. Infosys,…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on October 24, 2009 at 4:00pm —
No Comments
Managed services… You have already heard about this concept, haven’t you?
Just in one sentence: Good – cheap – fast: You can have two of them
Managed services is a concept implying a form of outsourcing without assets and/or personnel transfer. The value added (a service) is offered for money and the service provider bears the risk and is also responsible for managing of the service. Which means: The buyer does not have to do anything more…
“One size fits all”-mentality ca…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on October 11, 2009 at 4:57am —
No Comments
You know what? It really does not look well: Public opinion does not like outsourcing. That has also been confirmed by many surveys, e.g. the latest survey by Capgemini: A majority of executives (79%) recognize that outsourcing may have a poor public perception as the survey says
How do the execut…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on September 27, 2009 at 3:00am —
No Comments
The story begins in 1940 – that time Dick and Mack McDonald opened McDonald’s Bar-B-Que restaurant in San Bernardino, California. The food offered has to be: always fresh, always looking and tasting the same way and basic – burger, cheeseburger, fries, shakes… But: What does that all actually have to do with shared services?!
“Real good and still only 15¢”? I am not going to tell you that your service should start with 15 cent rate as that was in one of the first McDonald’s advertisement…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on September 15, 2009 at 12:41pm —
No Comments
Yes, the title sounds complicated, I know. But it is very simple as such: It is about the discussion “make or buy” and the proportion made/bought in a car. And it is for both parties: The “fans” of outsourcing and those who are sceptical about outsourcing as a business strategy. And it is not just for people liking cars… Let’s start then (and try to build a small car – or imagine how it can be built)
Focus on what gives your company its competitive edge,
…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on September 7, 2009 at 1:30am —
No Comments
Diversity is the key to success: the most brilliant and amazing ideas and discoveries are made at the border of two – sometimes being far away and contrasting – disciplines. And international teams achieve even 20% more productivity than those consisting of members of just one nation
You know it, don’t you: a German company acquires an Indian one – or vice versa. Or they build a facility together. Or representatives of many nations do a…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on August 30, 2009 at 7:00pm —
No Comments
Is outsourcing model something new for you? Do you have to deal with it – and think how to influence key employees? Or maybe you have problems with not clearly defined goals and objectives in an outsourcing engagement? Or… Maybe you like Murgh Dansek or Alu Channa Masala and want to extend your network…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on August 22, 2009 at 4:00pm —
2 Comments
Yes, that is as simple as described. If you want somebody to invest in your country, just make it attractive. Which means: Try to anticipate investors’ needs and prepare suitable conditions for them.
Location, location, location…
Centralizing business operations, companies decide to outsource or insource them. Establishing a shared service center (
SSC) or a…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on August 17, 2009 at 3:03am —
No Comments
The Japanese film "The Seven Samurai" co-written, edited and directed by Akira Kurosawa is a story about attack on a small village. After the desperate villagers have realized that they do not have enough money for weapons or for the warriors to wield them, they have decided to use services of seven unemployed samurai offering them three meals a day for protecting themselves.
This film taki…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on August 12, 2009 at 5:36am —
No Comments
Workflow software is one of the factors which – according to Thomas L. Friedman – have “flattened” the world and supported globalization and offshore outsourcing. It has also contributed to establishing of the paper-free-office concept and outsourcing digitalization and archiving services. The latest solution helps to cut costs even by 40%
We live in digital era. However, there are still many organizations as private companies and public institutions which prefer the traditional way of p…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on August 8, 2009 at 3:42am —
2 Comments
Myth 1.: Outsourcing is just about savings in expenses. Myth 2.: Shared services are just about labour and rental costs. In fact, much more is at stake in the global insourcing and outsourcing game – let’s discover it together …
India, China and Malaysia being on the top… India and Philippines controlling about 50 per cent of the global outsourcing market… India as a top BPO destination for o…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on August 1, 2009 at 2:00am —
No Comments
Well, we actually do not have presidential election in the US now. We could follow the US presidential battle a few months ago. And I am also not going to make a campaign here. I just want to tell you something (really!) important regarding both of them: Obama and Clinton. And let me tell you something about offshore outsourcing, too
How has it all begun?
We could read such headlines in the newspapers just a few months ago:
Will Obama really take back outsourced jobs?…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on July 25, 2009 at 3:30am —
No Comments
I have actually written this article by chance: searching for materials on Legal Process Outsourcing, I have met Total Attorneys, a legal service provider. Their recruitment strategy, based on activity in social networking media, seemed to be very interesting to me…
Total Attorneys is a company employing 215 professionals in Chicago and 12 professionals in India. Ed Scanlon, their founder, uses a very intere…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on July 19, 2009 at 3:00am —
1 Comment
While talking about outsourcing we tend to estimate the value of the outsourcing market, measuring the worth of services offered. Except of that, we can also measure the value of other resources the outsourcing industry has, as the value of popular websi…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on July 11, 2009 at 9:30pm —
No Comments
Flexibility? Cost reduction? Innovations? Risk avoidance? Quality improvements? Any of them? Or maybe all of them? What do companies expect making the decision about outsourcing operations?
A few days ago I visited an interesting conference organized by Computerwoche and held in Offenbach, Germany. Among others, the findings of a study dealing with the expectations and motivation for IT outsourcing and different customer profiles have been presented. This study has been undertaken by Pro…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on July 6, 2009 at 4:00am —
No Comments
The concept of shared service centers (also known as “factories of numbers” for the finance function) has been common used by multinational industrial groups for a few years now. While trying to cut costs, improve quality and focus on key business, it is more efficient to integrate the back-office functions into one entity, while the operative group subsidiaries can focus on their business. The traditional solution, in which each subsidiary has its own finance, payroll and IT department is qu…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on July 4, 2009 at 8:21pm —
No Comments
The list of 2009’s best outsourcing service providers – The Global Outsourcing 100™ has been published as in the past years. Accenture, IBM, Sodexo, Tata Consultancy Services and Wipro Technologies are once again on the top of the list.
2009 is the fourth year when the Global Outsourcing 100™ is published. The following characteristics have been used for ranking of the companies: size and growth, customer references, organizational competencies, and management capabilities.
75 leading c…
Continue
Added by Magdalena Szarafin on July 4, 2009 at 4:00am —
1 Comment
