Outsourcing and Vendor Governance Predictions for 2010
Well, the end of 2009 is quickly approaching. Except for the yearend rush of outsourcing vendors trying to claim a final sign-on bonus or their potential clients trying to book severance into 2009’s blood-lined financials, there’s not much left to do, but prognosticate on what 2010 will hold for vendor management and outsourcing governance teams and their offshore and onshore vendors. So, please pardon me as I share my predictions for 2010. ... [Read More...]
Commitment Matters: Outsourcing Contracts Are Worthy of More Thought
Tim Cummins’ blog, Commitment Matters is full of fascinating ideas. What else could one expect from the founder of the International Association for Contract and Commercial Management and someone who has been in the trenches. Tim’s article on the complexity of contracting exactly relates to what I’ve seen in outsourcing: a basic legal framework with innumerable details memorialized in hundreds of pages of schedules. The schedules... [Read More...]
Offshore Outsourcing Vendor Governance Organizations
Does Your Offshore Outsourcing Governance Organization Design Support Your Organizational Objectives? So, I’ve definitely been stirring the pot over the last few weeks. I’ve exposed the errors in the much celebrated Black Book of Outsourcing, shown that the business of outsourcing certification is big business, and explained why vendor management organizations are a bad idea. This much skepticism could be a bit karmically unhealthy,... [Read More...]
The Business of Outsourcing Certifications
Outsourcing Education is a Big Business It is highly likely that you’ve sought professional development to improve your vendor management and outsourcing management skills. There are very, very few resources available to vendor management and outsourcing professionals. As a result, you’ve probably encountered a few companies out there that specialize in training for vendor management professions. Have you noticed the pricing? Developing... [Read More...]
The Black Book of Outsourcing – Invaluable Resource or Red Herring?
How useful is Datamonitor's 2009 Black Book of Outsourcing Report? During this short week, I took the opportunity to take a hard look at the 2009 Black Book of Outsourcing, the source of innumerable vendor press releases touting so-called market leadership based on rankings provided by Brown and Wilson. In Scott Wilson’s own words, “The Black Book is known as the leading independent unbiased ranking of vendors as it surveys qualified users... [Read More...]
Offshore Outsourcing RFPs: Are They Encouraging Copy and Paste?
Are your offshore vendors' proposals original? Recent blog articles from TheStrategicSourceror and SpendMatters challenge the need for traditional RFPs the cause suppliers hours and hours of formal proposal development, which, based on discussions we have had with suppliers, are enormous copy and paste exercises from other proposals. The gigantic responses can fill hundreds of pages, putting even the most astute evaluated into deep sleep. Are... [Read More...]
Another Tale from “When You Don’t Have Vendor Management Governance”
As related to us by a reader. Picture this: Your company has outsourced customer service for some products, but not all products. You have a single vendor with over 1,000 seats dedicated to your operation. These seats are located in several centers located in the USA (for reasons not important to this story). Your vendor management team is made-up of a single person. This person coordinates five different programs, handles contractual issues,... [Read More...]
In the Absence of Outsoucing Governance or Vendor Management
A funny story told to us by an employee of a major US company (which we’ll call XYZ) with thousands of outsourced call center seats (domestic and international): XYZ has two call center programs. One is a major inbound customer service program and the other is a small (about 45 agents) complex inbound/outbound marketing programs that focus on driving customer loyalty and create a significant revenue lift. XYZ’s marketing and customer... [Read More...]
Poll: How did you learn to be an effective vendor manager?
Vendor management is not a traditional discipline, like project management, software development, or operations management. Take a moment to share how you learned to be an effective vendor manager in this poll: Have incentives (bonuses for certain performance targets or milestones) in your vendor contracts improved vendor performance? Yes No My vendor contracts do not have incentives. Loading ... Read More →
Vendor Managers Can Satisfy Internal Stakeholders
Before outsourcing, internal operations teams usually spend significant effort appeasing senior management by explaining every reason why deviations from performance were outside their control. Marketing launched a new campaign. IT’s servers were slow. The telecommunication vendor’s T1 was hit by a backhoe. The competitor launched a misleading campaign. The weather shutdown deliveries in Chicago. Well, have you noticed the change in... [Read More...]
