Johnson and Johnson: Fully Engaged in Latin America
July 6th, 2011Julia Santos, Head of Worldwide Strategic Outsourcing, has a lot to say about staying ‘close’ to Latin America and getting a grip on what’s really going on – especially in education.
Let Data Drive Decisions Not Wrong Perceptions, Says J&J Sourcing Chief
October 12th, 2010
Santos: "I believe that most false perceptions are due to lack of awareness or exposure"
Q/A With Julia Santos, Director, Worldwide Strategic Outsourcing Johnson & Johnson
There is a reason why Fortune 50 companies like Johnson and Johnson have embraced nearshoring – it serves a larger strategic purpose. Julia Santos, who is global strategy chief of outsourcing at the company, is passionate about the important role Latin America plays in supporting the company’s offshore R&D services and has become one of the better known and respected customers of nearshore services over the last several years. We caught up with her last week:
In your role at J&J, how has your understanding and awareness of Latin America culture and particularly the business environment evolved?
Julia: Johnson & Johnson has been in Latin America for decades. We started operations in Brazil in 1933 and now have one of the largest J&J plants in the world. Our products are sold in practically ever Latin American country. We have seen the Latin American consumer in a better place financially today than a decade ago. Economic growth is a certainty for the region and with growth comes a better way of life.
How to Stop Culture from Killing Your Offshore Deals
October 20th, 2009Steve Rudderham, VP, Client Engagement, Capgemini: “Problems culminate when customers and providers don’t spend enough time with each other”
Julia Santos, Director, Worldwide Strategic Outsourcing, Johnson & Johnson: “My way of communication and dealing with providers in India and LatAm is different. Because of the culture in Asia – it’s hard to just say no.”
Maurizio Velasquez, Commercial and BDVP Teledatos S.A., based in Colombia: “From a Latin perspective –we like to have the human approach.”
When people talk about “culture” in offshoring, what are they really getting at? It’s a question I’ve been thinking a lot about lately as I listen to people talk about culture as a fundamentally critical issue that has to be managed, watched over and in the most direct way – overcome.
Culture can, let’s face it, really screw up an offshoring deal. When I lived in Japan several years ago, I had my own taste of cultural “adjustment” learning quickly that if you’re out on the street and lost – people would rather give you bad directions than deliver the embarrassing news that the place you were trying to get to is far, far away.
Take that example, enlarge it and install it into a business environment, where both providers and customers may rely on increasingly sophisticated processes and modern technology tools to conduct business, but the sum result of that collaboration is intended to be something the client values and the provider understands thoroughly.
How Widespread are Cultural Breakdowns?
Research released recently by Boston-based Vantage Partners shows that culture is an issue that has to be reckoned with head on. The expanding gap between client expectation and provider service delivery – often referred to as “scope creep” – is at the heart of many deals that go bad.
