Research & Insight

Transition

Award-Winning Outsourcing Relationships — Three Key Ingredients in their "Secret Sauce"

Linda Tuck Chapman, President, ONTALA Performance Solutions Ltd.

Behind each award-winning global outsourcing relationship is a fascinating story of extraordinary people, excellence in service delivery, lots of sweat equity, some painful bumps in the road, a mutual willingness to constructively solve problems, and trust earned. Contracts were awarded as a result of a competitive bid, so they started with a blank recipe card. …

BPO Study’s Surprising Findings on Value and Long-Term Intent in Outsourcing Relationships

Outsourcing Center, Kathleen Goolsby, Senior Writer

Buyers of outsourced services want their service providers to invest in technologies that bring continual improvement to the outsourced processes. Providers want to invest only where it is also beneficial to their margins in the long run. Therein lies a conflict. Are there reliable predictors of a buyer’s intent for a long-term, mutually beneficial relationship …

Small U.S.-Based Finance and Accounting Outsourcer Delivers Value of Large Providers

Outsourcing Center, Kathleen Goolsby, Senior Writer

The bulk of most companies’ operational costs are in manpower, says Ragu Bhargava, CEO of Global Upside, Inc., a finance and accounting (F&A) service provider. That’s one of the reasons companies in all industries are increasingly bucking the long-held practice of retaining full-time F&A staff in house. Mountain View, Calif,-based Global Upside, Inc. provides services …

Ten Pitfalls in Outsourcing Transitions

Outsourcing Center, Kathleen Goolsby, Senior Writer

There’s no shortage of methodologies and advisories on best practices and risk mitigation strategies for the transition phase of outsourcing relationships. Even so, many buyers encounter situations they didn’t foresee when structuring their arrangement, which cause costs to rise and delay time to value. Outsourcing Center studied these types of situations by surveying companies nominated …

Assessing Cultural Fit during the RFP Process – "No-Divorce" Outsourcing

Linda Tuck Chapman, President, ONTALA Performance Solutions Ltd.

A good cultural fit is one of the most important hallmarks between a successful and unsuccessful outsourcing relationship. Cultural fit assessment during the RFP process is far less structured than defined processes that help you quantitatively evaluate the service provider’s solution, capabilities and pricing. To decide whether your company and the service provider will have …

Level of Trust Impacts Effectiveness of Outsourcing Communication

Outsourcing Center, Kathleen Goolsby, Senior Writer

Ask 10 buyers of outsourcing services for their keys to success in communicating with their service providers, and you’ll hear 10 different answers because, of course, the effectiveness of outsourcing communication depends on the individuals involved. Some will also say it depends on whether they’re communicating about day-to-day operations, conflicts or opportunities. Others will comment …

Leveraging Agile’s Skills to Create Successful ADM Outsourcing

Brandi Moore, Business Writer

Jim Chiang, CEO of NeoContext, an Agile consultancy, says, “One of the biggest hurdles in outsourcing is getting over the collaboration hump. It’s too easy to put together a project plan and send it over the fence for implementation. We all know this is a preferred strategy, but it doesn’t work.” So how do applications …

Business Process as a Service – The Next Wave of BPO Delivery

Outsourcing Center, Bruce McCracken, Business Writer

Business process as a service (BPaaS) is emerging to be a BPO game-changer reminiscent of Software as a Service (SaaS) a decade ago. Specifically, BPaaS is adding arrows to organizations’ outsourcing quiver in how they approach their finance and accounting and other back-office functions. “Businesses that leverage traditional outsourcing deals are looking to move off …

Eight Biggest Areas of Risk for Buyers of Outsourcing Services

Outsourcing Center, Kathleen Goolsby, Senior Writer

New delivery models, new pricing models, service providers’ new marketing strategies, moving up the value chain to intellectual arbitrage, new technologies, real-time customer interaction, globalization, and new standards and regulations – these factors set the stage for risks for buyers of outsourcing services in the next two to five years. (Read Forces of Change Shaping …

Buyers Face Decisions around New Opportunities and Risks in Outsourced IT Solutions

Outsourcing Center, Kathleen Goolsby, Senior Writer

Buyers must face decisions around new risks and opportunities in outsourced IT solutions. Charlie Bess, HP Fellow, HP Enterprise Services, says the outsourcing industry is facing “a different kind of IT and support environment than what we had just a few short years ago.” Here’s how he describes this new environment: More sensors deployed in …

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