Offshore IT outsourcing suppliers have been
ranked worse than larger inshore ones when it comes to delivering
projects on time.
A Forrester IT services survey of European IT decision-makers
found that 46% of respondents believed offshore outsourcers were
worse at project delivery, compared with only 23% who said they
felt inshore providers were better.
The survey also revealed that users found offshore providers
lacking industry-specific and domain expertise when handling their
requirements and that the value for money they offered was
negligible.
“Renegotiating with outsourcing suppliers and strengthening
supplier management capabilities was ranked top of our respondents’
agendas,” said Sonoko Takahashi, associate analyst at Forrester
Research.
Takahashi said that the sole focus on price had lead to some
companies pursuing offshore strategies without even considering
inshore possibilities.
Forrester said it knew of an example in the automotive industry
where the service provider for
application management was selected on price “only,” under
procurement pressure.
“IT outsourcing is primarily about relationships between
people.To increase client satisfaction, offshore suppliers need to
put more effort in to maintaining a relationship and a key part of
this is building more flexibility into contracts from the start,”
said Takahashi.
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