I think some people have an ill-informed view of what offshore outsourcing can do to help any business and perhaps are jaded by a poorly executed call centre experience.
The days of only outsourcing the menial tasks are gone. The fact is that increasingly high end activities are being successfully offshored. Apart from helping you stay globally competitive it can be source of fresh thinking to gain an edge.
Offshoring R&D and innovation can have some amazing upside and some big companies such as Apple and Procter and Gamble are embracing it. Not only is it more cost effective but frequently there is greater opportunity to create and innovate from outside your company than from within it. The people on the outside are not necessarily bound by the thinking of long held ideas and dogmas of products, services, clients and markets. Furthermore different education systems and cultures create different approaches to problem solving which can lead to some major breakthroughs. The perspectives from offshore are very different and therein lies the ability to differentiate yourself from competitors.
From an internal management perspective any offshore team must be respected and treated 100% as equals to the team you have at home. They must have the same latitude to create, experiment, fail and develop ideas in a collaborative manner with the rest of the team no matter where they may be in the world. This little thing called the "Internet" makes this entirely possible.
The other aspect is that a failure of a concept developed offshore will cost you way less than the cost of a similar failure at home meaning you can afford to experiment and fail more and therefore learn more than your competitors can too!
At Depth Offshore we have some clients executing this aspect of their strategy well with a hybrid approach of team members both offshore and at home focusing and collaborating on new ideas. Currently most still keep their head of R&D at home and support this person with great people offshore but I can really see this changing as companies take a more global view of how they need to compete. For most industries you simply MUST MUST be thinking globally or pretty soon you will not be in the race.
I firmly believe that being open to external innovation is one of the keys to building a high performance business in this ever more competitive "us too" global economy.
Innovate, differentiate, get noticed or die!
All the best for a healthy, happy and prosperous 2014 and thanks for following, sharing and commenting on my blog.
+Brad Skelton
The days of only outsourcing the menial tasks are gone. The fact is that increasingly high end activities are being successfully offshored. Apart from helping you stay globally competitive it can be source of fresh thinking to gain an edge.
Offshoring R&D and innovation can have some amazing upside and some big companies such as Apple and Procter and Gamble are embracing it. Not only is it more cost effective but frequently there is greater opportunity to create and innovate from outside your company than from within it. The people on the outside are not necessarily bound by the thinking of long held ideas and dogmas of products, services, clients and markets. Furthermore different education systems and cultures create different approaches to problem solving which can lead to some major breakthroughs. The perspectives from offshore are very different and therein lies the ability to differentiate yourself from competitors.
From an internal management perspective any offshore team must be respected and treated 100% as equals to the team you have at home. They must have the same latitude to create, experiment, fail and develop ideas in a collaborative manner with the rest of the team no matter where they may be in the world. This little thing called the "Internet" makes this entirely possible.
The other aspect is that a failure of a concept developed offshore will cost you way less than the cost of a similar failure at home meaning you can afford to experiment and fail more and therefore learn more than your competitors can too!
At Depth Offshore we have some clients executing this aspect of their strategy well with a hybrid approach of team members both offshore and at home focusing and collaborating on new ideas. Currently most still keep their head of R&D at home and support this person with great people offshore but I can really see this changing as companies take a more global view of how they need to compete. For most industries you simply MUST MUST be thinking globally or pretty soon you will not be in the race.
I firmly believe that being open to external innovation is one of the keys to building a high performance business in this ever more competitive "us too" global economy.
Innovate, differentiate, get noticed or die!
All the best for a healthy, happy and prosperous 2014 and thanks for following, sharing and commenting on my blog.
+Brad Skelton
Some companies also outsource to help them expand and gain access to new customers, by taking the point of production or service delivery closer to their end users. Businesses that outsource research and development (R&D) overseas are more likely to innovate than those who outsource locally. Visit more here: Obp business process services
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