Forget Arbitrage: Just Take Labor Out of the Cost Equation
January 30th, 2012
By Dan Berthiaume
Labor arbitrage, or the moving of jobs from more expensive to less expensive locations, has long been seen as one of the chief potential benefits of BPO. And while reducing the cost of labor by shifting it overseas certainly remains an appealing option for many BPO customers, with the assistance of technology the BPO model is starting to evolve to a point where, in many cases, labor can be removed from the equation entirely.
Investment Data Reveals State of Interest in Latin America Locations
January 25th, 2012By Reshaad Durgahee
Lima, Peru: Surprisingly emerging.
In the period 2003 through 2010, Europe and Asia were the largest recipient regions of foreign investment projects in shared services and BPO activities, accounting for 46% and 29% respectively. Meanwhile, interest in Latin America has clearly been growing. The number of shared services and BPO foreign investment projects in Latin America rose year on year until 2010, when the total number of projects entering the region decreased by 15%.
Staff Reduction: How to Make the Most of a Painful Situation
January 24th, 2012
By Daniel Berthiaume
A crucial aspect of many IT outsourcing and BPO initiatives is internal staff reduction. Despite the cost savings and more efficient operations that might result, few managers look forward to determining who stays and who goes when a department outsources certain functions. But properly evaluating employees in the event jobs need to be terminated is absolutely critical to BPO success.
Nearshore’s 2012 Outlook: Time for Industry to ‘Stand on Its Own’
January 18th, 2012
By Patrick Haller
With 2012 in full-swing, a critical look at what lies ahead for Nearshoring is in order. With a shaky global economy, and some forecasts calling for a sluggish year in IT and BPO sourcing, this is no time to be complacent. Whether it’s building solid skill sets, creating sufficient scale, matching client’s expectations, managing expansion, or doing business amidst social change and myopic political theater, providers have a lot to confront. We tapped some of the leading experts in the Nearshoring space for their answer to the burning question: What is the single biggest challenge you think the Nearshore outsourcing industry faces in 2012?
Sheltered Services Offers ‘Goldilocks’ Option
January 17th, 2012By Luke Bujarski
Sheltered services is an approach that has long been standard practice in the manufacturing industry, but now it’s becoming more of an option for customers of IT and BPO services too. Because of time zone alignment, the sheltered model can be particularly effective for customers of Nearshore providers – especially for North American customers of providers based in Mexico.
Cloud Will Mix with Older Models to Disrupt BPO
January 10th, 2012
By Bill Huber
Forecasts for cloud computing range from predictions that it will be the great destroyer of outsourcing as we know it to calmer expectations that it will simply be another means of providing access to tools and data. Bill Huber of TPI recently interviewed Ramesh Gudalur, head of global BPO for Cognizant, and Paul Roehrig, director of strategy for Cloud Business Solutions for Cognizant, to get their assessment of the potential effects of the cloud on BPO solutions, and to find out how the cloud is affecting services today.
In Software Testing, the Nearshore “Advantage” Starts to Really Shine
January 4th, 2012
Cliff Schertz: More maturity would help
By Dan Berthiaume
Latin America may not be the first region that comes to most people’s minds when they think of software testing, but Nearshore software development service providers are starting to offer a more sophisticated level of testing services. Cliff Schertz, CEO of Tiempo, a provider of software development and BPO services to US companies with development centers in Mexico, compares the maturity level of the testing market in Mexico to that of a “teenager.”
“Mexico’s software testing market is more mature than that in some developing areas like Vietnam, but is not on par with that in the more mature software development markets,” said Schertz. “For a lot of countries, the first initiative is to develop core software engineering talent. Behind that, they realize there is a big gap in testing capabilities.”
Creating Effective SLAs: Pay Attention to Productivity and Data Accuracy
December 21st, 2011
By Marc Tanowitz
As outsourcing buyers use service levels to measure the performance of a provider, service level agreements (SLAs) are one of the buyer’s fundamental vendor-performance management activities. An SLA’s agreed-upon quantitative provider requirements establish the baseline performance levels and define the monetary credits or other remedies associated with a provider’s failure to meet the standards. The principal role of an SLA is to align buyer and provider objectives.
COUNTRY PROFILE: Belize Gets Serious about Becoming a BPO Player
December 20th, 2011
By Clay Browne
Once a sleepy backwater of Central America, and known more for its beautiful beaches than the strength of its economy, English-speaking Belize is beginning to spring to life as a 21st century outsourcing destination.
Belize’s economy has long been dependent on agriculture, but tourism has grown significantly over the last couple of decades to become the largest foreign exchange earner in the country. The BPO industry in Belize is still quite young. Yet there are clear signs that private industry and public agencies are seriously examining how to create the right ecosystem to foster long term growth.
Sourcing F&A: One Crucial Step that Too Many Customers Miss
December 19th, 2011By Tony Mataya
Tony Mataya
Of all the business processes to source, those in finance and accounting often raise the highest level of concern within organizations. Some firms refuse to consider F&A outsourcing (FAO) based on fears and doubts, and an overall risk-averse approach to outsourcing.
But how is the market for FAO doing? In a 2011 survey of buyers of outsourcing services by HfS Research and the London School of Economics, demand for outsourcing core general and administrative services is reaching unprecedented levels.
