Discussion: View Thread

Tony Nolan raises an interesting issue.

Many of the jobs currently being `offshored' to another country had
previously been `outsourced' within the host country; either from their
original location, or from the host company entirely.

When this process first gathered pace, a decade or so back, a few voices
questioned the critical evaluation that underpinned such decision-making;
though the market imperatives were overwhelming, even then.

Interestingly, two arguments raised back then prompted little discussion,
at the time, but saved a lot of heartache for those who listened:
A speaker at an academic conference on Yield Management asked the
audience `when you've all adopted the policies being recommended today,
you'll all be equally productive - what will you do then to get a
competitive edge ?', before suggesting that companies should cut out
the intermediary steps and go straight to the logical solutions [e.g.
offshoring] that their first step was actually committing them to -
something that would have met huge political / cultural barriers back
then.
Jarvis (1995) provided evidence that outsourcing a single activity could
end up committing a company to outsourcing everything, further down the
line; observing that each step was likely to be less beneficial than the
last.

As Tony notes, the approach currently being taken in the article does not
seem to be a real management plan - but, it does serve as a reminder that
we need to think-through the full implications of our decisions, including
the full impact of their logical conclusions.

Regards

Bryn Parry

Jarvis, P. (1995) ?Contracting Out Facilities and Services Affects Fixed
Asset Valuations?, Public Eye, 14, Oct-Dec, pp.2-3.






Charles Wankel <cxx@bellatlantic.net>@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> on 20/01/2004
11:42:43

Please respond to cxx@bellatlantic.net

Sent by: Management Education and Development Discussion
<MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU>


To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
cc:
Subject: Re: EXCERPT: great case on "Offshoring"


From: tony nolan [mailto:t.nolan@uts.edu.au]

What I find interesting about this article, is that in Australia they are
cutting IBM positions, losing whole programs and just sacking people left
right and center industry scuttle butt is that IBM is crashing as bad as
Macdonnalds is.

So from an outside US perspective, IBM is in the same corporate position as
Macdonnalds, lost of closures, consolidations, job retrenchments and loss
of market share.

So, i see this as stock market propaganda and not a real management plan.

Regards
Tony

At 04:32 AM 20/01/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>I recommend seeing your librarian about putting this on e-reserve for your
>students.
>Cybercollegially,
>Charles Wankel
>
>________________________________________
>
>William M. Bulkeley, "IBM Documents Give Rare Look At Sensitive Plans on
>'Offshoring': When Shifting Jobs Abroad, It's $12.50 vs. $56 in Pay, And
>'Sanitize' the Memos," Wall St. Journal, January 19, 2004, 1.
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107438649533319800,00.html

Off-shoring is a 'done deal' - this genie cannot be put back in the
bottle. Jobs *will* be lost to emerging economies - indeed many of these
economies have already 'emerged', and are surpassing what we like to
think of as the developed economies. As thought-leaders in management
development, should we perhaps be asking the question 'so what happens
next .. ?'

We have already gone through one very fast educational boom-and-bust - a
large fraction of the huge number of Indian youngsters who trained in
software skills during the late 1990s now find themselves having to take
low-grade call-centre jobs, due to the over-supply of their
once-highly-valued skills. Now we can expect a tidal wave of equally
well-educated young professionals, not only in the Indian subcontinent,
but also in the former E Europe, China, S America etc. Two big worries
follow ...

1. there *will* be a gross over-supply of highly educated talent in
economies outside of US/W Europe/Japan [China has announced that all of
their millions of school-leavers will be fluent in English within 5
years] ... which will do what, exactly, to both the productivity and
effectiveness of business in the old-economies? - and will do what,
exactly to the emerging competitiveness of business in these supposedly
'new' economies?

2. what is left for young professionals in those old economies? - since
they seem neither as well-educated, nor as motivated as their peers in
the emerging economies, could we find ourselves with a mountain of
relatively lazy and ill-equipped people, for whom we can find no
productive purpose?

If I were to put a personal bet on future business and economic success
right now - I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe.

Kim Warren



-----Original Message-----
From: Bryn Parry [mailto:Bryn.Parry@solent.ac.uk]
Sent: 20 January 2004 18:54
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"

Tony Nolan raises an interesting issue.

Many of the jobs currently being `offshored' to another country had
previously been `outsourced' within the host country; either from their
original location, or from the host company entirely.

When this process first gathered pace, a decade or so back, a few voices
questioned the critical evaluation that underpinned such
decision-making;
though the market imperatives were overwhelming, even then.

Interestingly, two arguments raised back then prompted little
discussion,
at the time, but saved a lot of heartache for those who listened:
A speaker at an academic conference on Yield Management asked the
audience `when you've all adopted the policies being recommended
today,
you'll all be equally productive - what will you do then to get a
competitive edge ?', before suggesting that companies should cut out
the intermediary steps and go straight to the logical solutions [e.g.
offshoring] that their first step was actually committing them to -
something that would have met huge political / cultural barriers back
then.
Jarvis (1995) provided evidence that outsourcing a single activity
could
end up committing a company to outsourcing everything, further down
the
line; observing that each step was likely to be less beneficial than
the
last.

As Tony notes, the approach currently being taken in the article does
not
seem to be a real management plan - but, it does serve as a reminder
that
we need to think-through the full implications of our decisions,
including
the full impact of their logical conclusions.

Regards

Bryn Parry

Jarvis, P. (1995) ?Contracting Out Facilities and Services Affects
Fixed
Asset Valuations?, Public Eye, 14, Oct-Dec,
pp.2-3.






Charles Wankel <cxx@bellatlantic.net>@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> on
20/01/2004
11:42:43

Please respond to cxx@bellatlantic.net

Sent by: Management Education and Development Discussion
<MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU>


To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
cc:
Subject: Re: EXCERPT: great case on "Offshoring"


From: tony nolan [mailto:t.nolan@uts.edu.au]

What I find interesting about this article, is that in Australia they
are
cutting IBM positions, losing whole programs and just sacking people
left
right and center industry scuttle butt is that IBM is crashing as bad as
Macdonnalds is.

So from an outside US perspective, IBM is in the same corporate position
as
Macdonnalds, lost of closures, consolidations, job retrenchments and
loss
of market share.

So, i see this as stock market propaganda and not a real management
plan.

Regards
Tony

At 04:32 AM 20/01/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>I recommend seeing your librarian about putting this on e-reserve for
your
>students.
>Cybercollegially,
>Charles Wankel
>
>________________________________________
>
>William M. Bulkeley, "IBM Documents Give Rare Look At Sensitive Plans
on
>'Offshoring': When Shifting Jobs Abroad, It's $12.50 vs. $56 in Pay,
And
>'Sanitize' the Memos," Wall St. Journal, January 19, 2004, 1.
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107438649533319800,00.html

I do not share your vision on this.
Look at what Dell had to do to satisfy some of their customers -- bring the
call center back to the US. More than that it comes down to an understanding
of how to run and manage a call center so that it is value added for the
company as opposed to the expense -- but that is another story.
At this point, I would see more of these Dell Rebellions against offshoring
simply because just speaking English is no substitute for support that meets
or exceeds customer expectations.
To a certain extent, I very much object to having to deal with someone in
another country who puports to be in the US and who does not even use his or
her real name.
-rr

-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion
[mailto:MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU]On Behalf Of Kim Warren
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2004 2:52 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"


Off-shoring is a 'done deal' - this genie cannot be put back in the
bottle. Jobs *will* be lost to emerging economies - indeed many of these
economies have already 'emerged', and are surpassing what we like to
think of as the developed economies. As thought-leaders in management
development, should we perhaps be asking the question 'so what happens
next .. ?'

We have already gone through one very fast educational boom-and-bust - a
large fraction of the huge number of Indian youngsters who trained in
software skills during the late 1990s now find themselves having to take
low-grade call-centre jobs, due to the over-supply of their
once-highly-valued skills. Now we can expect a tidal wave of equally
well-educated young professionals, not only in the Indian subcontinent,
but also in the former E Europe, China, S America etc. Two big worries
follow ...

1. there *will* be a gross over-supply of highly educated talent in
economies outside of US/W Europe/Japan [China has announced that all of
their millions of school-leavers will be fluent in English within 5
years] ... which will do what, exactly, to both the productivity and
effectiveness of business in the old-economies? - and will do what,
exactly to the emerging competitiveness of business in these supposedly
'new' economies?

2. what is left for young professionals in those old economies? - since
they seem neither as well-educated, nor as motivated as their peers in
the emerging economies, could we find ourselves with a mountain of
relatively lazy and ill-equipped people, for whom we can find no
productive purpose?

If I were to put a personal bet on future business and economic success
right now - I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe.

Kim Warren



-----Original Message-----
From: Bryn Parry [mailto:Bryn.Parry@solent.ac.uk]
Sent: 20 January 2004 18:54
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"

Tony Nolan raises an interesting issue.

Many of the jobs currently being `offshored' to another country had
previously been `outsourced' within the host country; either from their
original location, or from the host company entirely.

When this process first gathered pace, a decade or so back, a few voices
questioned the critical evaluation that underpinned such
decision-making;
though the market imperatives were overwhelming, even then.

Interestingly, two arguments raised back then prompted little
discussion,
at the time, but saved a lot of heartache for those who listened:
A speaker at an academic conference on Yield Management asked the
audience `when you've all adopted the policies being recommended
today,
you'll all be equally productive - what will you do then to get a
competitive edge ?', before suggesting that companies should cut out
the intermediary steps and go straight to the logical solutions [e.g.
offshoring] that their first step was actually committing them to -
something that would have met huge political / cultural barriers back
then.
Jarvis (1995) provided evidence that outsourcing a single activity
could
end up committing a company to outsourcing everything, further down
the
line; observing that each step was likely to be less beneficial than
the
last.

As Tony notes, the approach currently being taken in the article does
not
seem to be a real management plan - but, it does serve as a reminder
that
we need to think-through the full implications of our decisions,
including
the full impact of their logical conclusions.

Regards

Bryn Parry

Jarvis, P. (1995) ?Contracting Out Facilities and Services Affects
Fixed
Asset Valuations?, Public Eye, 14, Oct-Dec,
pp.2-3.






Charles Wankel <cxx@bellatlantic.net>@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> on
20/01/2004
11:42:43

Please respond to cxx@bellatlantic.net

Sent by: Management Education and Development Discussion
<MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU>


To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
cc:
Subject: Re: EXCERPT: great case on "Offshoring"


From: tony nolan [mailto:t.nolan@uts.edu.au]

What I find interesting about this article, is that in Australia they
are
cutting IBM positions, losing whole programs and just sacking people
left
right and center industry scuttle butt is that IBM is crashing as bad as
Macdonnalds is.

So from an outside US perspective, IBM is in the same corporate position
as
Macdonnalds, lost of closures, consolidations, job retrenchments and
loss
of market share.

So, i see this as stock market propaganda and not a real management
plan.

Regards
Tony

At 04:32 AM 20/01/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>I recommend seeing your librarian about putting this on e-reserve for
your
>students.
>Cybercollegially,
>Charles Wankel
>
>________________________________________
>
>William M. Bulkeley, "IBM Documents Give Rare Look At Sensitive Plans
on
>'Offshoring': When Shifting Jobs Abroad, It's $12.50 vs. $56 in Pay,
And
>'Sanitize' the Memos," Wall St. Journal, January 19, 2004, 1.
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107438649533319800,00.html

Why do you care who or where the person is, as long as you get the service/information you require?
Edryce

rusty rae <rustyrae@comcast.net> wrote:
I do not share your vision on this.
Look at what Dell had to do to satisfy some of their customers -- bring the
call center back to the US. More than that it comes down to an understanding
of how to run and manage a call center so that it is value added for the
company as opposed to the expense -- but that is another story.
At this point, I would see more of these Dell Rebellions against offshoring
simply because just speaking English is no substitute for support that meets
or exceeds customer expectations.
To a certain extent, I very much object to having to deal with someone in
another country who puports to be in the US and who does not even use his or
her real name.
-rr

-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion
[mailto:MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU]On Behalf Of Kim Warren
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2004 2:52 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"


Off-shoring is a 'done deal' - this genie cannot be put back in the
bottle. Jobs *will* be lost to emerging economies - indeed many of these
economies have already 'emerged', and are surpassing what we like to
think of as the developed economies. As thought-leaders in management
development, should we perhaps be asking the question 'so what happens
next .. ?'

We have already gone through one very fast educational boom-and-bust - a
large fraction of the huge number of Indian youngsters who trained in
software skills during the late 1990s now find themselves having to take
low-grade call-centre jobs, due to the over-supply of their
once-highly-valued skills. Now we can expect a tidal wave of equally
well-educated young professionals, not only in the Indian subcontinent,
but also in the former E Europe, China, S America etc. Two big worries
follow ...

1. there *will* be a gross over-supply of highly educated talent in
economies outside of US/W Europe/Japan [China has announced that all of
their millions of school-leavers will be fluent in English within 5
years] ... which will do what, exactly, to both the productivity and
effectiveness of business in the old-economies? - and will do what,
exactly to the emerging competitiveness of business in these supposedly
'new' economies?

2. what is left for young professionals in those old economies? - since
they seem neither as well-educated, nor as motivated as their peers in
the emerging economies, could we find ourselves with a mountain of
relatively lazy and ill-equipped people, for whom we can find no
productive purpose?

If I were to put a personal bet on future business and economic success
right now - I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe.

Kim Warren



-----Original Message-----
From: Bryn Parry [mailto:Bryn.Parry@solent.ac.uk]
Sent: 20 January 2004 18:54
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"

Tony Nolan raises an interesting issue.

Many of the jobs currently being `offshored' to another country had
previously been `outsourced' within the host country; either from their
original location, or from the host company entirely.

When this process first gathered pace, a decade or so back, a few voices
questioned the critical evaluation that underpinned such
decision-making;
though the market imperatives were overwhelming, even then.

Interestingly, two arguments raised back then prompted little
discussion,
at the time, but saved a lot of heartache for those who listened:
A speaker at an academic conference on Yield Management asked the
audience `when you've all adopted the policies being recommended
today,
you'll all be equally productive - what will you do then to get a
competitive edge ?', before suggesting that companies should cut out
the intermediary steps and go straight to the logical solutions [e.g.
offshoring] that their first step was actually committing them to -
something that would have met huge political / cultural barriers back
then.
Jarvis (1995) provided evidence that outsourcing a single activity
could
end up committing a company to outsourcing everything, further down
the
line; observing that each step was likely to be less beneficial than
the
last.

As Tony notes, the approach currently being taken in the article does
not
seem to be a real management plan - but, it does serve as a reminder
that
we need to think-through the full implications of our decisions,
including
the full impact of their logical conclusions.

Regards

Bryn Parry

Jarvis, P. (1995) ?Contracting Out Facilities and Services Affects
Fixed
Asset Valuations?, Public Eye, 14, Oct-Dec,
pp.2-3.






Charles Wankel @MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> on
20/01/2004
11:42:43

Please respond to cxx@bellatlantic.net

Sent by: Management Education and Development Discussion



To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
cc:
Subject: Re: EXCERPT: great case on "Offshoring"


From: tony nolan [mailto:t.nolan@uts.edu.au]

What I find interesting about this article, is that in Australia they
are
cutting IBM positions, losing whole programs and just sacking people
left
right and center industry scuttle butt is that IBM is crashing as bad as
Macdonnalds is.

So from an outside US perspective, IBM is in the same corporate position
as
Macdonnalds, lost of closures, consolidations, job retrenchments and
loss
of market share.

So, i see this as stock market propaganda and not a real management
plan.

Regards
Tony

At 04:32 AM 20/01/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>I recommend seeing your librarian about putting this on e-reserve for
your
>students.
>Cybercollegially,
>Charles Wankel
>
>________________________________________
>
>William M. Bulkeley, "IBM Documents Give Rare Look At Sensitive Plans
on
>'Offshoring': When Shifting Jobs Abroad, It's $12.50 vs. $56 in Pay,
And
>'Sanitize' the Memos," Wall St. Journal, January 19, 2004, 1.
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107438649533319800,00.html

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes

I don't care necessarily -- but the fact of the matter is that I do not get
the service that I want from these folks. Like one of the complaints from a
Dell owner noted "These people are sponge listeners that do not do
anything."
I also do not like to be lied to with respect to who these folks are and
where they are are and their scripted responses to questions. This creates a
really poor experience for the end user -- though I am not sure what the end
user should expect when the computer has been totally commoditized and the
price is $600.
Perhaps a part of the solution is to break the support out of the package
and further commoditize the support. You can call india for $20 or America
for $40 or something like that and let the end user make the decision.
BTW, here is a link to an AP report on the Dell scenario.
pax,
-rr
http://www.dfw.com/mld/dfw/business/7345427.htm



-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion
[mailto:MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU]On Behalf Of Edryce Reynolds
Sent: Wednesday, January 21, 2004 8:59 AM
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"


Why do you care who or where the person is, as long as you get the
service/information you require?
Edryce

rusty rae <rustyrae@comcast.net> wrote:
I do not share your vision on this.
Look at what Dell had to do to satisfy some of their customers -- bring the
call center back to the US. More than that it comes down to an understanding
of how to run and manage a call center so that it is value added for the
company as opposed to the expense -- but that is another story.
At this point, I would see more of these Dell Rebellions against offshoring
simply because just speaking English is no substitute for support that meets
or exceeds customer expectations.
To a certain extent, I very much object to having to deal with someone in
another country who puports to be in the US and who does not even use his or
her real name.
-rr

-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion
[mailto:MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU]On Behalf Of Kim Warren
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2004 2:52 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"


Off-shoring is a 'done deal' - this genie cannot be put back in the
bottle. Jobs *will* be lost to emerging economies - indeed many of these
economies have already 'emerged', and are surpassing what we like to
think of as the developed economies. As thought-leaders in management
development, should we perhaps be asking the question 'so what happens
next .. ?'

We have already gone through one very fast educational boom-and-bust - a
large fraction of the huge number of Indian youngsters who trained in
software skills during the late 1990s now find themselves having to take
low-grade call-centre jobs, due to the over-supply of their
once-highly-valued skills. Now we can expect a tidal wave of equally
well-educated young professionals, not only in the Indian subcontinent,
but also in the former E Europe, China, S America etc. Two big worries
follow ...

1. there *will* be a gross over-supply of highly educated talent in
economies outside of US/W Europe/Japan [China has announced that all of
their millions of school-leavers will be fluent in English within 5
years] ... which will do what, exactly, to both the productivity and
effectiveness of business in the old-economies? - and will do what,
exactly to the emerging competitiveness of business in these supposedly
'new' economies?

2. what is left for young professionals in those old economies? - since
they seem neither as well-educated, nor as motivated as their peers in
the emerging economies, could we find ourselves with a mountain of
relatively lazy and ill-equipped people, for whom we can find no
productive purpose?

If I were to put a personal bet on future business and economic success
right now - I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe.

Kim Warren



-----Original Message-----
From: Bryn Parry [mailto:Bryn.Parry@solent.ac.uk]
Sent: 20 January 2004 18:54
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"

Tony Nolan raises an interesting issue.

Many of the jobs currently being `offshored' to another country had
previously been `outsourced' within the host country; either from their
original location, or from the host company entirely.

When this process first gathered pace, a decade or so back, a few voices
questioned the critical evaluation that underpinned such
decision-making;
though the market imperatives were overwhelming, even then.

Interestingly, two arguments raised back then prompted little
discussion,
at the time, but saved a lot of heartache for those who listened:
A speaker at an academic conference on Yield Management asked the
audience `when you've all adopted the policies being recommended
today,
you'll all be equally productive - what will you do then to get a
competitive edge ?', before suggesting that companies should cut out
the intermediary steps and go straight to the logical solutions [e.g.
offshoring] that their first step was actually committing them to -
something that would have met huge political / cultural barriers back
then.
Jarvis (1995) provided evidence that outsourcing a single activity
could
end up committing a company to outsourcing everything, further down
the
line; observing that each step was likely to be less beneficial than
the
last.

As Tony notes, the approach currently being taken in the article does
not
seem to be a real management plan - but, it does serve as a reminder
that
we need to think-through the full implications of our decisions,
including
the full impact of their logical conclusions.

Regards

Bryn Parry

Jarvis, P. (1995) ?Contracting Out Facilities and Services Affects
Fixed
Asset Valuations?, Public Eye, 14, Oct-Dec,
pp.2-3.






Charles Wankel @MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> on
20/01/2004
11:42:43

Please respond to cxx@bellatlantic.net

Sent by: Management Education and Development Discussion



To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
cc:
Subject: Re: EXCERPT: great case on "Offshoring"


From: tony nolan [mailto:t.nolan@uts.edu.au]

What I find interesting about this article, is that in Australia they
are
cutting IBM positions, losing whole programs and just sacking people
left
right and center industry scuttle butt is that IBM is crashing as bad as
Macdonnalds is.

So from an outside US perspective, IBM is in the same corporate position
as
Macdonnalds, lost of closures, consolidations, job retrenchments and
loss
of market share.

So, i see this as stock market propaganda and not a real management
plan.

Regards
Tony

At 04:32 AM 20/01/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>I recommend seeing your librarian about putting this on e-reserve for
your
>students.
>Cybercollegially,
>Charles Wankel
>
>________________________________________
>
>William M. Bulkeley, "IBM Documents Give Rare Look At Sensitive Plans
on
>'Offshoring': When Shifting Jobs Abroad, It's $12.50 vs. $56 in Pay,
And
>'Sanitize' the Memos," Wall St. Journal, January 19, 2004, 1.
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107438649533319800,00.html

---------------------------------
Do you Yahoo!?
Yahoo! Hotjobs: Enter the "Signing Bonus" Sweepstakes

Many years ago (during my undergraduate days, so it had to be many years ago) I recall my labor relations prof (the wonderful Prof. William Torrence at the University of Nebraska) telling the following story.

Henry Ford II was taking Walter Reuther (UAW chief) for a tour of a new very automated factory. Newly- developed robots with swinging arms were now doing most of the welds. A this point in the tour Ford turns to Reuther, beaming "Hey, try to organize them.". Reuther replies, "Hey, try to sell 'em cars".

Thirty-forty years ago the tension was about "technological unemployment"*. We survived that scare, but I think we'd agree there were (still are?) some painful adjustments. The same reality seems to apply again. I won't (can't) get to prescriptive here. "Off-shoring" clearly creates winners and losers. We (the United States just for starters) will need macro and micro approaches to ensure that as a nation we develop opportunities that creates winners (or "beneficiaries" if you prefer). When we hear that Indian and Chinese programmers are nowing writing code formerly done by Americans, we might ask ourselves, "What code are they writing?" "For what purpose?" "Who buys the code, the system, the project and why?". It is in our national interest to pursue a strategy that keeps us at the top of the value-added chain. I hope/trust there will be some discussion of this issue during our election year.

Bill Smith
Towson University


*one more funny aside. Woody Allen once said he came home one day and found his father had been technologically unemployed, replaced by a much smaller device that could do everything his father could only much better. So his mother went out and bought one.

-----Original Message-----
From: rusty rae [mailto:rustyrae@comcast.net]
Sent: Tue 1/20/2004 7:38 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Cc:
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"



I do not share your vision on this.
Look at what Dell had to do to satisfy some of their customers -- bring the
call center back to the US. More than that it comes down to an understanding
of how to run and manage a call center so that it is value added for the
company as opposed to the expense -- but that is another story.
At this point, I would see more of these Dell Rebellions against offshoring
simply because just speaking English is no substitute for support that meets
or exceeds customer expectations.
To a certain extent, I very much object to having to deal with someone in
another country who puports to be in the US and who does not even use his or
her real name.
-rr

-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion
[mailto:MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU]On Behalf Of Kim Warren
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2004 2:52 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"


Off-shoring is a 'done deal' - this genie cannot be put back in the
bottle. Jobs *will* be lost to emerging economies - indeed many of these
economies have already 'emerged', and are surpassing what we like to
think of as the developed economies. As thought-leaders in management
development, should we perhaps be asking the question 'so what happens
next .. ?'

We have already gone through one very fast educational boom-and-bust - a
large fraction of the huge number of Indian youngsters who trained in
software skills during the late 1990s now find themselves having to take
low-grade call-centre jobs, due to the over-supply of their
once-highly-valued skills. Now we can expect a tidal wave of equally
well-educated young professionals, not only in the Indian subcontinent,
but also in the former E Europe, China, S America etc. Two big worries
follow ...

1. there *will* be a gross over-supply of highly educated talent in
economies outside of US/W Europe/Japan [China has announced that all of
their millions of school-leavers will be fluent in English within 5
years] ... which will do what, exactly, to both the productivity and
effectiveness of business in the old-economies? - and will do what,
exactly to the emerging competitiveness of business in these supposedly
'new' economies?

2. what is left for young professionals in those old economies? - since
they seem neither as well-educated, nor as motivated as their peers in
the emerging economies, could we find ourselves with a mountain of
relatively lazy and ill-equipped people, for whom we can find no
productive purpose?

If I were to put a personal bet on future business and economic success
right now - I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe.

Kim Warren



-----Original Message-----
From: Bryn Parry [mailto:Bryn.Parry@solent.ac.uk]
Sent: 20 January 2004 18:54
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"

Tony Nolan raises an interesting issue.

Many of the jobs currently being `offshored' to another country had
previously been `outsourced' within the host country; either from their
original location, or from the host company entirely.

When this process first gathered pace, a decade or so back, a few voices
questioned the critical evaluation that underpinned such
decision-making;
though the market imperatives were overwhelming, even then.

Interestingly, two arguments raised back then prompted little
discussion,
at the time, but saved a lot of heartache for those who listened:
A speaker at an academic conference on Yield Management asked the
audience `when you've all adopted the policies being recommended
today,
you'll all be equally productive - what will you do then to get a
competitive edge ?', before suggesting that companies should cut out
the intermediary steps and go straight to the logical solutions [e.g.
offshoring] that their first step was actually committing them to -
something that would have met huge political / cultural barriers back
then.
Jarvis (1995) provided evidence that outsourcing a single activity
could
end up committing a company to outsourcing everything, further down
the
line; observing that each step was likely to be less beneficial than
the
last.

As Tony notes, the approach currently being taken in the article does
not
seem to be a real management plan - but, it does serve as a reminder
that
we need to think-through the full implications of our decisions,
including
the full impact of their logical conclusions.

Regards

Bryn Parry

Jarvis, P. (1995) ?Contracting Out Facilities and Services Affects
Fixed
Asset Valuations?, Public Eye, 14, Oct-Dec,
pp.2-3.






Charles Wankel <cxx@bellatlantic.net>@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> on
20/01/2004
11:42:43

Please respond to cxx@bellatlantic.net

Sent by: Management Education and Development Discussion
<MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU>


To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
cc:
Subject: Re: EXCERPT: great case on "Offshoring"


From: tony nolan [mailto:t.nolan@uts.edu.au]

What I find interesting about this article, is that in Australia they
are
cutting IBM positions, losing whole programs and just sacking people
left
right and center industry scuttle butt is that IBM is crashing as bad as
Macdonnalds is.

So from an outside US perspective, IBM is in the same corporate position
as
Macdonnalds, lost of closures, consolidations, job retrenchments and
loss
of market share.

So, i see this as stock market propaganda and not a real management
plan.

Regards
Tony

At 04:32 AM 20/01/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>I recommend seeing your librarian about putting this on e-reserve for
your
>students.
>Cybercollegially,
>Charles Wankel
>
>________________________________________
>
>William M. Bulkeley, "IBM Documents Give Rare Look At Sensitive Plans
on
>'Offshoring': When Shifting Jobs Abroad, It's $12.50 vs. $56 in Pay,
And
>'Sanitize' the Memos," Wall St. Journal, January 19, 2004, 1.
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107438649533319800,00.html

From: Christie Mason [mailto:cmason@managersforum.com]

I thought these links might be interesting. I previously posted them to a
different training forum but I think they also apply to this discussion.

This is an article about IT that addresses what type of IT people will be
successful in an outsourced world. I find it interesting how they've defined
new roles.
http://archive.infoworld.com/article/03/12/31/01OPreality_1.html

If your role is a commodity function that makes more business sense being
outsourced, then you'd better either develop a new role within your current
organization, or look for a new job with those that are receiving the
outsourced functions.
http://archive.infoworld.com/article/03/12/31/01OPreality_1.html

Making Courageous Choices. If a child fell through thin ice, would you
"engage in endless discussions about the thickness of the ice and the best
method for traversing it while the child drowns"?
http://www.infoworld.com/article/03/12/31/01OPconnection_1.html?business

Christie Mason

In a message dated 1/20/2004 6:08:23 PM Eastern Standard Time, Kim Warren of
Kim@strategydynamics.com writes:

<<If I were to put a personal bet on future business and economic success
right now - I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe.>>

So, Kim, what do you propose. Could you possibly be on the same track as I
am, recommending that MED step outside the box and look at practical
alternatives to emphasis on teaching theories? Did you read some of my previous posts?
If not, I will gladly send the core to you, off-line, and to anyone else who
might be on the same wavelength.

Erwin (Rausch) didacticra@aol.com

Kim Warren wrote

I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe


As far as I can see Kim, they are omnivorously learning the kinds of things
you rightly pour scorn on in your earlier email about strategic management.
I think that our main hope is that they will believe all this nonsense and
mess up without us having to do anything - possibly the only contribution
the strategic management literature has made to western competitiveness?

Cheers

Steven

Yo yo yo Steve

Steady on the single hermeneutic negative ('I think that our main hope
is that they will believe all this nonsense and mess up without us
having to do anything' ) and consider carefully Kim's double hermeneutic
positive....which suggests that the omnivore's of Mgt Entertainment tend
to be the western students and not those from 'emerging' economies....as
Kim notes the 'they' have arrived, are moving on & are more than able to
localise, reject and progress beyond current US_European management
science dogmas- which I believe Kim rightly refers to as 'old'....

....re offshoring software and related technological cusps: I refer to
cases studies on the different approaches to textiles adopted by
British & Italian textile houses at the turn of the 19th Century as the
'New World' came on stream...more likely than not we will have similar
responses 200 years later as the New Order comes on line....

Ed



-----Original Message-----
From: Steven Henderson [mailto:Steven.Henderson@solent.ac.uk]
Sent: 21 January 2004 14:39
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: [MG-ED-DV] "Offshoring"


Kim Warren wrote

I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe


As far as I can see Kim, they are omnivorously learning the kinds of
things you rightly pour scorn on in your earlier email about strategic
management. I think that our main hope is that they will believe all
this nonsense and mess up without us having to do anything - possibly
the only contribution the strategic management literature has made to
western competitiveness?

Cheers

Steven

Good point - though I hear of some research on call-centres for
financial services companies that suggests service quality is actually
*better* from India than in US/European centres.

It's probably a case of what is most fit-for-purpose - your Dell
experience is surely not unusual (though we've had dreadful experience
with UK support centres too) ... but this is not just about
call-centres - not only is financial administration now being moved out,
but I also hear that one of the investment banks is moving Equity
Research to India? ... if so, even MBA jobs will be under threat !!

To back up my concern about the relatively poor levels of motivation and
learning in the West, I recall an ad. in a US paper, placed by an
educational pressure group, pointing out that if US rankings in the
Olympics were at the same level as its international rankings in
educational levels (somewhere below 20th in the world, from memory),
there would be a national outcry ... and I don't think we are in a much
better ranking here in the UK.

This may seem to have strayed away from the Mgt Ed focus of this
discussion, though as educators, should we be concerned about the
quality of the 'raw material' we have to work with?

Kim

-----Original Message-----
From: rusty rae [mailto:rustyrae@comcast.net]
Sent: 21 January 2004 00:38
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"

I do not share your vision on this.
Look at what Dell had to do to satisfy some of their customers -- bring
the
call center back to the US. More than that it comes down to an
understanding
of how to run and manage a call center so that it is value added for the
company as opposed to the expense -- but that is another story.
At this point, I would see more of these Dell Rebellions against
offshoring
simply because just speaking English is no substitute for support that
meets
or exceeds customer expectations.
To a certain extent, I very much object to having to deal with someone
in
another country who puports to be in the US and who does not even use
his or
her real name.
-rr

-----Original Message-----
From: Management Education and Development Discussion
[mailto:MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU]On Behalf Of Kim Warren
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2004 2:52 PM
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"


Off-shoring is a 'done deal' - this genie cannot be put back in the
bottle. Jobs *will* be lost to emerging economies - indeed many of these
economies have already 'emerged', and are surpassing what we like to
think of as the developed economies. As thought-leaders in management
development, should we perhaps be asking the question 'so what happens
next .. ?'

We have already gone through one very fast educational boom-and-bust - a
large fraction of the huge number of Indian youngsters who trained in
software skills during the late 1990s now find themselves having to take
low-grade call-centre jobs, due to the over-supply of their
once-highly-valued skills. Now we can expect a tidal wave of equally
well-educated young professionals, not only in the Indian subcontinent,
but also in the former E Europe, China, S America etc. Two big worries
follow ...

1. there *will* be a gross over-supply of highly educated talent in
economies outside of US/W Europe/Japan [China has announced that all of
their millions of school-leavers will be fluent in English within 5
years] ... which will do what, exactly, to both the productivity and
effectiveness of business in the old-economies? - and will do what,
exactly to the emerging competitiveness of business in these supposedly
'new' economies?

2. what is left for young professionals in those old economies? - since
they seem neither as well-educated, nor as motivated as their peers in
the emerging economies, could we find ourselves with a mountain of
relatively lazy and ill-equipped people, for whom we can find no
productive purpose?

If I were to put a personal bet on future business and economic success
right now - I'd back Indian, Chinese and E European firms to win - and
to pull this off, they will certainly take management education and
development seriously, not the 'management entertainment' that passes
for much MED in the US and W Europe.

Kim Warren



-----Original Message-----
From: Bryn Parry [mailto:Bryn.Parry@solent.ac.uk]
Sent: 20 January 2004 18:54
To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
Subject: Re: "Offshoring"

Tony Nolan raises an interesting issue.

Many of the jobs currently being `offshored' to another country had
previously been `outsourced' within the host country; either from their
original location, or from the host company entirely.

When this process first gathered pace, a decade or so back, a few voices
questioned the critical evaluation that underpinned such
decision-making;
though the market imperatives were overwhelming, even then.

Interestingly, two arguments raised back then prompted little
discussion,
at the time, but saved a lot of heartache for those who listened:
A speaker at an academic conference on Yield Management asked the
audience `when you've all adopted the policies being recommended
today,
you'll all be equally productive - what will you do then to get a
competitive edge ?', before suggesting that companies should cut out
the intermediary steps and go straight to the logical solutions [e.g.
offshoring] that their first step was actually committing them to -
something that would have met huge political / cultural barriers back
then.
Jarvis (1995) provided evidence that outsourcing a single activity
could
end up committing a company to outsourcing everything, further down
the
line; observing that each step was likely to be less beneficial than
the
last.

As Tony notes, the approach currently being taken in the article does
not
seem to be a real management plan - but, it does serve as a reminder
that
we need to think-through the full implications of our decisions,
including
the full impact of their logical conclusions.

Regards

Bryn Parry

Jarvis, P. (1995) ?Contracting Out Facilities and Services Affects
Fixed
Asset Valuations?, Public Eye, 14, Oct-Dec,
pp.2-3.






Charles Wankel <cxx@bellatlantic.net>@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU> on
20/01/2004
11:42:43

Please respond to cxx@bellatlantic.net

Sent by: Management Education and Development Discussion
<MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU>


To: MG-ED-DV@MAELSTROM.STJOHNS.EDU
cc:
Subject: Re: EXCERPT: great case on "Offshoring"


From: tony nolan [mailto:t.nolan@uts.edu.au]

What I find interesting about this article, is that in Australia they
are
cutting IBM positions, losing whole programs and just sacking people
left
right and center industry scuttle butt is that IBM is crashing as bad as
Macdonnalds is.

So from an outside US perspective, IBM is in the same corporate position
as
Macdonnalds, lost of closures, consolidations, job retrenchments and
loss
of market share.

So, i see this as stock market propaganda and not a real management
plan.

Regards
Tony

At 04:32 AM 20/01/2004 -0500, you wrote:
>I recommend seeing your librarian about putting this on e-reserve for
your
>students.
>Cybercollegially,
>Charles Wankel
>
>________________________________________
>
>William M. Bulkeley, "IBM Documents Give Rare Look At Sensitive Plans
on
>'Offshoring': When Shifting Jobs Abroad, It's $12.50 vs. $56 in Pay,
And
>'Sanitize' the Memos," Wall St. Journal, January 19, 2004, 1.
>http://online.wsj.com/article/0,,SB107438649533319800,00.html

I'm forwarding this with Tom Rodenhauser's permission. I think it adds to
the offshoring discussion.

-----Original Message-----
From: Tom Rodenhauser [mailto:tom.rodenhauser@consultinginfo.com]
Sent: Tuesday, January 20, 2004 3:42 PM
To: tom.rodenhauser@consultinginfo.com
Subject: Inside Consulting (1-20-04)


INSIDE CONSULTING
(1-20-04)

WHEN SHORES COLLIDE
James Cameron�s under-appreciated 1989 movie �The Abyss� contains a
climactic scene that parallels a current consulting trend. In the movie,
100-ft tidal waves stand suspended above the world�s coastlines ready to
wipe out humanity as mysterious underwater aliens ponder mankind�s
existence.

Switch scenarios to the IT services and consulting industry and offshoring
appears equally poised to crush the existing order (see CIS Research note
below). Recent articles in the New York Times, Business Week and the Wall
Street Journal chronicle massive labor shifts as companies recognize extreme
cost savings with offshore options.

As clients warm to the efficiencies, offshoring�s effect on consulting
services portends a similar re-balancing of labor. Already programming and
code-writing jobs have been transported to low-cost economies. If clients
continue to show a willingness to sacrifice face-to-face interactions for
cost-savings, will we see the more sophisticated analytical work move
offshore as well?

Consulting is an industry that gets paid for the process of solving a
problem. So spreadsheet-spinning and scenario-planning are bread-and-butter
businesses for consultants. These activities also solidify client
relationships and lead directly to repeat business.

Unfortunately, it�s expensive to recruit, train feed and nurture stables of
industry-specific analysts. IBM and Accenture have made headlines with their
offshore programming initiatives. These big IT service firms are committed
to decreasing their cost structures by replacing �expensive� expertise with
cheaper (but experientially equal) alternatives. They�re competing by moving
down the value chain.

Wipro and Infosys � the offshore giants � are making ink with their onshore
recruitment and acquisition forays. These companies need the sales and
client relationships to maximize their low-cost labor. Cross-cultural
integration is the only thing stopping them from moving up the value chain.

In Cameron�s movie, the human race is saved when Ed Harris professes his
undying love to his estranged wife. The aliens surmise that such blind
devotion warrants our species� redemption.

Business is not so forgiving. Offshoring not only threatens to widen the
estrangement between client and consultant, but the growing rift among
consulting providers themselves. A simple �I love you� will not close the
gap.

Research Alert: Our new report, �Offshore Consulting: Benchmarking Future
Success,� is part of CIS Roundtable, a quarterly research report service for
buyers and sellers of consulting services. The 80-page report analyzes the
offshoring trend and profiles 26 leading consultancies and IT service
companies. The report costs $3,000 and is available in spiral-bound hard
copy and Adobe pdf versions. CIS Roundtable costs $10,000 per year and
entitles members to four reports annually. For more information on the
Offshore Consulting report or CIS Roundtable, visit www.consultinginfo.com.

**********************************************************************

Inside Consulting is written by Tom Rodenhauser, president of Consulting
Information Services, LLC. Past columns are archived at
www.consultinginfo.com.

Tom is also an advisor with the Hocquet Group (www.hocquetgroup.com), an
executive recruiting firm serving consultancies. To be considered for senior
positions in the industry, send your credentials to
tbourgeois@hocquetgroup.com.

Copyright 2004, Consulting Information Services, LLC. Reproduction is
prohibited.

(Reposted with permission)

From professor in Kiwiland,

Relative to the offshoring list is a book I just finished re-
reading that addresses an awful lot of this from a higher perspective -
and it's by an "authority" (Secretary of Labor under Clinton, now I
believe a Yale Professor of Law...), Robert Reich. You might enjoy this
book, even if not only within this context. Published in 1991 & 1992, it's
"The Work of Nations" - an obvious update to Adam Smith's "The
Wealth of Nations."

I found my copy in a used bookshop in San Francisco a couple of
months ago. I'm sure there are some on Amazon as well.

Happy reading
Kiwiprof

When I first saw the message below I sat down and started reading my copy of
Reich's book. I bought it years ago when it first came out but focused on
only one section back then because my main interest was in his treatment of
what he calls "symbolic analysts." Reich's book is extremely relevant to
the off-shoring discussion and gives a good accounting of why it is
happening. It also gives a good accounting of a great many other things,
including the widening gap between the haves and have nots, the great
"leveling" that is going on in the standard of living throughout the world
(including the U.S.), and the increasingly international dispersion of
ownership in what used to be national corporations. In that respect, he
continues the work begun by Thorstein Veblen in The Theory of Business
Enterprise (1904) and Berle and Means in The Modern Corporation and Private
Property (1933). This being a list where many professors of management can
be found, some of you might recall a remarkably prescient comment by Berle
and Means in the course of their review of the separation of ownership and
control in publicly held corporations; namely, that the separation of
ownership and control made it possible for the men who control large
corporations to operate them in their own interests and that any pretense
they were serving the needs of the stockholders would be pretense indeed.
In any event, thanks to the "professor in Kiwiland" for prompting me to read
Reich's book in its entirety. It's been a dozen years since it was first
published yet it is as fresh and relevant as the day it first appeared. It
also leads me to pose a question to this list.

If I wanted to investigate the ownership of the Fortune 500, how could I go
about that?

Regards,

Fred Nickols
nickols@att.net
www.nickols.us


> -----Original Message-----
> Sent: Friday, January 23, 2004 12:39 AM
> Subject: Re: "Offshoring"
>
> From professor in Kiwiland,
>
> Relative to the offshoring list is a book I just finished re-
> reading that addresses an awful lot of this from a higher perspective -
> and it's by an "authority" (Secretary of Labor under Clinton, now I
> believe a Yale Professor of Law...), Robert Reich. You might enjoy this
> book, even if not only within this context. Published in 1991 & 1992, it's
> "The Work of Nations" - an obvious update to Adam Smith's "The
> Wealth of Nations."
>
> I found my copy in a used bookshop in San Francisco a couple of
> months ago. I'm sure there are some on Amazon as well.
>
> Happy reading
> Kiwiprof