Offshoring: does it ever work?
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Offshoring: does it ever work?
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Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#2I can't speak from experience, but my perspective is that offshoring works great when what you're offshoring is the building of machine tools, toys, furniture, computer components and even whole computers, cars, etc.
I'm sure apple, for instance, spends a lot of time making sure that foxconn builds the iPhone right. But Apple is not offshoring the software or the design of the iPhone.
For whatever reason, software development is a competitive advantage that the US has.... for the time being.
I've worked with people from india, pakistan, and former soviet block countries as programmers. They can be great programmers, but the best results seem to be when they come here and work with american teams.
Which is why we need to get visa reform and let american businesses hire the people they need.
I think that the offshoring of this work is driven more by not being able to import sufficient engineers than by anything else.
Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#3As someone who managed off-shore projects, I think this model can be made to work only if the coding part is offshore. The design part would have to be done on-shore in a majority of cases. The problem with outsourcing design is that you may not have people who understand the business or the dynamics of the environment they are designing for.
Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#4Yes. If you know what you want, can explain it simply, and it can be done simply and repeatedly, offshoring works quite well. It's far cheaper than doing it in-house.
However, if you miss any of the above, it's going to be a nightmare. The 'repeatedly' part is the key to making it cheap. 1-off solutions are cheaper in-house because of all the design work. Things that can be done repeatedly (like webscraping different sites) can be off-shored with great success, especially if you do the first couple in-house and create a good framework, and then just ask the offshore-company to repeat your success with like tasks.
Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#5It works very well if you establish a true partnership.
Our local employees do the design, strategy, and thought leadership. An on-site team from our partner sit face-to-face with us to be sure we have mutual understandings and good communication. The offshore teams do a variety of work, from coding, to system administration, to basic tech support.
I would not try to offshore just one project, or just one task. It took a couple years to smooth out how we work together... in the end, it works well for us.
Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#6Its depend; sometime it works and sometime it won't.
In 2009-2010 India has done somewhere around $75 billion business with 18% growth and these numbers say it works for some people.
There are certain downsize of offshore development like communication, cultural differences etc.
Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#7From my personal experience, hard as hell (read: failed). Though companies can successfully do it, absolutely. I met one company that was 1 block away that had really impressive operations. They were supposed to be the offshore branch for a European company but the European company essentially disappeared and they were running the entire thing offshore with a couple marketing staff left in Europe. All the knowledge and experience ended up transferring entirely to the offshore operation. A few of the top managers moved over and they are recognized as one of the top companies in their industry. I wish I had more time there to learn what they did and how they managed it, sadly, I didn't.
Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#8If your perception of offshoring is "lets hire developers in country X and save 40% because developers make 40% less there." Then the answer is NO. Even if you can find the perfect employees that will do great work for 40% less it is only a matter of time before they will find better paying jobs, and that turnover will kill your 40% savings.
Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#9(much lower day rate)
IMHO This is a key wrong assumption here. After many yrs in this business i am still surprised how many ppl fail to realize this simple fact. Project is doomed when they hire Indian Developers for $5/hour
Good developers charge premium anywhere! Local market of talents! Great developers are always busy and if you are happy to find someone cheap and available right now you are under serious risk. Of course there is cost of living factor but its not x5-x10 times savings! In fact cost of living in some parts of US is already lower than somewhere in Europe.
So lack of talent and high demand in one place will always continue to drive outsourcing to other places (both off- and inside US). Yes, it works
Re: Offshoring: does it ever work?
#10Wow, I posted that question on SO two years ago. Didn't expect to see it near the top of HN.
FWIW I still think effective offshoring is really hard.