Who would be on your list of movements pulsating through the outsourcing world today? Here are the three that made my list.

REMEMBER WHEN?

You probably won’t be surprised to see that ACS’s acquisition of ExcellerateHRO from HP (announced earlier this week) made the list. But it’s not because of what it signifies in the human resources market for ACS. It’s because this is a classic specimen that should remind us of the need for ensuring an outsourcing contract is flexible (if not short-term) to allow for exiting a contract sooner than anticipated. That’s not to say that customers now shifted from HP to ACS as their provider are not getting a great deal. But some of the greatest value-creation aspects of outsourcing come from the relationship itself that develops over time. Connecting the dots, do you remember when ExcellerateHRO was formed in 2005 by Towers Perrin and EDS? That was only five years ago. And do you remember when HP acquired EDS and ExcellerateHRO? That was two years ago. And now HP has sold the HRO provider to ACS. It takes a while for relationships to develop, and when ownership changes occur, relationships have to start over. Even when some of the people already doing the work transfer to the new owner, changes often still occur because of the new owner’s business objectives.

SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW

Something old is the UAE.  Something new is its growth in data centers and willingness to outsource. In 2006, the UAE had only five data centers, according to consulting firm Broadgroup. It predicts the number will leap to 35 new data centers run by third-party outsourcing providers by 2012. The market for third-party data center operations is “potentially vast.” Now there’s an understatement, for sure.

MISSING THE BOAT

The Democratic battle in the current Senate race in Arkansas is focusing on claims regarding whether one of the candidates helped lead a company that outsourced jobs to an offshore service provider. But the crux of the accusations depends on how the two candidates are defining “outsourcing.”  Of course, they both mistakenly define it as “cutting jobs in America.” There’s not an inch of difference between their definitions, and neither is correct in the first place. But there’s a mile of difference between basing campaign speeches on this dispute versus real issues – what the politicians can do to solve some life-threatening problems of the state of Arkansas and the United States. So they’ve both missed the boat.

Since 1998, freelance writer Kathleen Goolsby has studied outsourcing relationships’ successes, failures, trends, and best practices. She has interviewed more than 860 executives at buyer and service provider companies and is the author of “Critical Requirements for Building and Sustaining a Successful Outsourcing Relationship,” a chapter in Global Outsourcing Strategies: An International Reference on Effective Outsourcing Relationships (December 2006, Gower Publishing). As a freelancer, she also currently serves as the Senior Writer for Outsourcing Center (whose parent company is outsourcing advisory firm, Alsbridge) and has authored dozens of articles as well as white papers. In a past role, she was editor of Outsourcing Venture (a former print publication). You can contact Kathleen at ksgoolsby@gmail.com.

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