Re: Book on Offshore Outsourcing

On 1 Sep 2006 07:44:59 -0700, "Chuck Whealton" <chuck_whealton_at_yahoo.com> wrote:

>
>Gill Bentry wrote:
>> b2bhandshake_at_yahoo.com wrote:
>>
>> I'll tell you how to manage an offshore project: Don't send your
>> project offshore. 3rd and 4th world programmers bungle, bloat, and
>> mangle code. Any cost "savings" will be quickly lost in performance
>> penalties and lost business.
>
>I'd have to agree.
>
>The unfortunate part is that upper management still just doesn't seem
>to get it.
>
>Even when a company is getting material sent back to them that's not
>documented in readable English, that doesn't work, and that is so wrong
>it's faster to rewrite it from the ground up than to correct it, they
>STILL continue this trend that in most cases serves no other purpose
>than to lower quality while ultimately not saving a single red cent
>(save for stupid accounting tricks).
>
>Part of the problem is that we simply can't compete against an exchange
>rate, and the other part is that you can't fight an upper management
>that has no concept of quality. For all the talent we are told about
>that exists in other countries, and I'm sure there is PLENTY of high
>quality talent in these countries, I don't believe those talented
>people are being used in most offshore projects.
>
>The stories posted by one of the other people in the group about
>projects being backsourced are absolutely encouraging. Unfortunately,
>it takes a long time for corporate America to learn lessons and
>implement change.
>
>Charles R. Whealton
>Charles Whealton @ pleasedontspam.com

Apart from that during outsourcing (ie not necessarily offshoring) informal, undocumented knowledge isn't transferred at all, let alone informal networks of developers and administrators. I know of one particular case where administrators were outsourced to a big company, but the developers remained in house.
The outsourcing project was a complete disaster. The activities are costing now way more than in the in-house phase.

Secondly, America may now be learning, but in Europe we are still offshoring, and heading for disaster soon.

--
Sybrand Bakker, Senior Oracle DBA