{"id":1276,"date":"2013-03-17T21:03:00","date_gmt":"2013-03-17T21:03:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/localhost\/projects\/horsesforsources\/ousourcing_performance_2013_031713\/"},"modified":"2013-03-17T21:03:00","modified_gmt":"2013-03-17T21:03:00","slug":"ousourcing_performance_2013_031713","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.horsesforsources.com\/ousourcing_performance_2013_031713\/","title":{"rendered":"Cheap and cheerful: Is this really as good as it gets for IT Outsourcing?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Newsflash… Enterprises reduce costs by outsourcing, but struggle to achieve little else of value. \u00a0Well, on the surface, this would still<\/em> appear to be\u00a0largely\u00a0true, but when you rummage even deeper under the covers, you’ll soon discover it’s more the legacy IT outsourcing deals which are still all about low-cost bums on seats, while we are actually seeing a few chinks of light with BPO that could resemble what we’ve been searching for since we started this damn blog… value beyond cost<\/em> (gasp!).<\/p>\n

So industry has spoken: \u00a0399\u00a0enterprises, (two-thirds of which have revenues over $3bn) recently took part in our 2013 State of Outsourcing Study<\/em>, conducted with the support of KPMG. \u00a0And one chart, above all others, again illustrates the familiar frustrations\u00a0outsourcing brings, better than any others:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Click to Enlarge<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

So what do we read into this data?<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Outsourcing\u00a0achieves\u00a0its table-stakes goals and makes some progress providing value.<\/strong> On the strong\u00a0positives,\u00a0enterprises are achieving success when it comes to meeting their cost targets, globalizing their operations and even\u00a0standardizing\u00a0processes. \u00a0In fact, barely one-in-seven can claim to be actually dissatisfied<\/em> with their\u00a0meeting\u00a0these goals to-date. \u00a0Also quite encouraging, is the fact that the majority of enterprises are achieving positive outcomes with higher-value areas, namely accessing capable talent and transforming processes, even though these are largely modest results for most enterprises. \u00a0Considering most buyers venture into outsourcing seeking these initial “table-stakes” goals<\/a> of cost-reduction, global scalability and process standardization, you have to give a healthy thumbs up to those providers and buyers for achieving these\u00a0initial objectives. \u00a0However, can today’s ambitious enterprises really turn around and claim they are happy with basic, operational success in today’s economy, or do they want to seek to move beyond<\/em> ordinary?<\/p>\n

Outsourcing is falling short when it comes to innovation and analytical value. \u00a0<\/strong>With all the puff and bluster about “Big Data” and analytics, and the pivotal need for today’s enterprises to get better at managing, understanding, an\u00a0interpreting\u00a0their internal and external data, it’s vital that outsourcing engagements support this capability for buyers. \u00a0I would go as far as\u00a0declaring\u00a0a provider’s capability to create collaborative analytical partnerships with clients is critical to the future success and growth of outsourcing. \u00a0If we only focus on these “table-stakes”, we will eventually arrive at the dreaded lowest common-denominator of outsourcing… where the provider with the cheapest labor and a basic ability to deliver average performance, wins.<\/p>\n

So let’s drill a little deeper to discover where these engagements are falling short, by comparing where both ITO and BPO engagements are delivering real effectiveness<\/em> for buyers:<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Click to Enlarge<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

We can see here that BPO engagements are clearly outperforming ITO engagements, not only in many key tactical<\/em> areas which clients care about (i.e. cost and process standardization), but also across strategic<\/em> measures, namely proving greater analytical capability and innovation. \u00a0So what does this mean to the future direction of outsourcing?<\/em><\/p>\n

ITO has become a utility service for most enterprises, whereas BPO offers enterprises the potential to achieve value beyond merely cost<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Clients pay for – and receive – “cheap and cheerful” ITO. \u00a0<\/strong>When you consider that most major enterprises began outsourcing administrative IT in the 90’s (and some even earlier), you have to draw the line that if these are the results of two decades of engagements, it probably isn’t going to get much better. However, this is probably because most ITO buyers are pretty much getting what they have set out to achieve: \u00a0“utility” IT services in areas such an help desk ticketing, infrastructure support, application\u00a0maintenance\u00a0and development. \u00a0Clients wanted cheap and cheerful…. they got cheap and cheerful. \u00a0And there are many providers, today specializing in the cheap and cheerful, who are really damned good at it. \u00a0Some of them even openly discuss with analysts and advisors that their main strategy is to target HP (EDS) and IBM renewals and undercut them by 30%.<\/p>\n

ITO has founds its rhythm – low-end work is outsourced, high-end is retained.<\/strong> \u00a0Many CIOs and IT governance leads we talk to like having the grunt work outsourced so they can focus on the higher-value work inhouse. \u00a0As we once revealed here, two-thirds of ERP development work is still run onshore<\/a>. \u00a0Ambitious CIOs these days like to focus their time on ecommerce,\u00a0mobility, “Big Data” \u00a0and\u00a0Cloud strategies, and will engage IT\u00a0consultants with projects\u00a0when they need some high-end help, but most aren’t expecting their outsourcer to do that kind of work for them. \u00a0India created an amazing factory for taking on the specific routine work than can support large\u00a0enterprise\u00a0IT\u00a0operations – but that is what it\u00a0largely\u00a0is – routine work than can be conducted efficiently at lower price-points.<\/p>\n

Managed business services, enabled by IT, are where the future value lies with outsourcing.<\/strong> \u00a0We – at HfS – passionately believe the only way for these providers to move up the value-chain with clients is to create business services that can meet defined business outcomes. \u00a0Simply put, IT provides a supporting utility to help achieve these business outcomes that clients want to buy, which would ideally be accessible in the cloud where business users can access their services wherever they want. \u00a0The focus then shifts from providing widgets, to the actual provision of value, where providers start working with their clients to achieve business results, as opposed to creating simply\u00a0a low-cost environment. \u00a0ITO has become a supporting utility<\/em>, with the real transformation happening at the business<\/em> end. For example, when you buy a new car, how much time do you spend deliberating what grade of fuel to put in it?<\/p>\n

Like ITO, BPO has it’s “bread and butter” needs: \u00a0processing invoices, paychecks, insurance claims, ICD-10 conversions, and so on. \u00a0There’s a plethora of providers today which can perform said tasks on many different scales, across many geographies and industries, and can flex the pricing if they really want the business. \u00a0However, unlike ITO, there’s not a whole lot of value with outsourcing business operations if you’re simply getting the same work done for less<\/em>. \u00a0ITO is already standardized, to some extent: you need 10 ABAP coders, you pay for 10 ABAP coders. \u00a0With BPO, buyers’ \u00a0current processes are rarely standardized and solutions not nearly as easy to industrialize. \u00a0Clients often need to undergo one helluva “transformation”, simply to transition the stuff to a provider in the first place. \u00a0Moreover, with BPO, we are dealing with business functions that are critically dependent on analytics to perform their tasks, whether they be marketing, customer service, finance, procurement, workforce management, and so on. \u00a0As McKinsey recently revealed<\/a>, it’s this creation of analytical environments which is becoming (or will soon become) the overwhelming onus for so many enterprises, with its assumption that by 2020, we’ll have a surplus of 300,000 office workers and an annual deficit of 200,000 data scientists in the US alone.<\/p>\n

The Bottom-line: \u00a0ITO maybe a commodity business, but a new wave of collaborative business services is beginning to show the way<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

When you consider that most of these “enterprise BPO” engagements have barely been around for a decade, the results are quite encouraging – 90% of buyers are meeting their transactional goals, and a good proportion are already getting some value from key areas such as accessing talent and improving analytical capability. \u00a0Yes, there is a long way to go, but at least BPO is moving in the right direction. \u00a0It’s because clients need much more help with their business operations than simply bums on seats at cheaper prices… they are far more dependent on their provider to help create an environment for themselves to become more analytical, more process-savvy and more focused on actual results, than mere inputs. \u00a0Welcome to the new phase of outsourcing, which is about partnerships what are not only cheap and cheerful, but also collaborative.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Newsflash… Enterprises reduce costs by outsourcing, but struggle to achieve little else of value. \u00a0Well, on the surface, this would…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[48,51,55,835,76,78,79,832,97,837],"tags":[303],"organization":[],"ppma_author":[19],"class_list":["post-1276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-process-outsourcing-bpo","category-cloud-computing","category-crm-and-marketing","category-f-a","category-hfs-surveys-state-of-the-outsourcing-2013","category-hfsresearch-com-homepage","category-hr-outsourcing","category-sourcing-best-practises","category-talent-in-sourcing","category-the-industry-speaks","tag-enterprise-irregulars"],"yoast_head":"\nCheap and cheerful: Is this really as good as it gets for IT Outsourcing? - Horses for Sources | No Boundaries<\/title>\n<meta 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