Well, outsourcing is a very common term in the business lingo and as experts say, it is much easier uttered than adopted. Over the decade, outsourcing has evolved to the extent that if you name any service you will end up finding multiple outsourcing agencies. A lot has already been spoken about the benefits of outsourcing and therefore, it is not something that the enterprises need to know all over again. What the evolving business ecosystem demands is that the enterprises are well aware of the different nuances of outsourcing. Some of the important parameters that decide the success of the strategic decision to outsource are the cost, type of service that needs to be outsourced, and of course the right partner. With changing times, the focus has shifted from finding just the cost effective solutions to finding the right outsourcing partner whose capacities map with the overall outsourcing goals of the enterprise.
Strategists and business veterans have testified this shift as a major change in the attitude towards outsourcing. Selecting an intelligent outsourcing partner has taken the center stage because logically, an efficient partner would not only understand his or her client’s requirements well but also would put his resources into understanding the specific business market and tailor solutions accordingly. Outsourcing is a strategic investment that aims to indirectly generate greater ROI by bringing in process optimization and tremendous operational efficiency. Therefore, it is important that an enterprise choose an outsourcing partner that has an impressive portfolio of projects and skilled resources to efficiently execute a particular process.
The first step towards finding an efficient outsourcing partner is to draft a smart RFP (Request for Proposal). This is because RFP acts as the foundation stone for any project. Now an RFP generally has two sections. One is the overview and other is the requirement. In the overview section, the company talks about their business line, products, services and the whole aim behind outsourcing. Herein, if an enterprise clearly mentions its outsourcing goals and expectations, it increases its chances of attracting the right partner. The second section, requirements, states all the criteria that need to be met in order to approach the enterprise. So, overall, a good RFP provides the outsourcing agencies important clues about the company’s business, service line and the areas where they can be hired to fill up the gaps. The second important step is to carefully scrutinize the responses received against the RFP based on the key factors such as:
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Statement of Work: This is a kind of the declaration of the work that outsourcing vendors create to enable enterprises understand the type of services that they provide. The functional teams of the enterprise generally scrutinize this statement of work and map the capabilities of the outsourcing vendor with the goals of the enterprise.
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Documentation and Reporting: It is very important to understand whether the vendor would document the work process and report the same to the enterprise. This is important to ensure a steady access to the important information.
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Problem Management: The entire service relationship depends upon how the vendor responds to challenges and situations. Innovative problem solving coupled with robust troubleshooting are very big differentiating factors.
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Tools expertise: Well, this is a very crucial aspect because in the domain of information technology, the use of relevant tools decides the success of any process. It is important to understand the kind of tools that would be required for a particular process and whether the outsourcing partners are aware of it. It is important to consider only those agencies whose teams are well versed with different business intelligence tools.
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Transition management: Note that detaching a particular process from the internal team and handing it over to an outsourcing partner calls for initial hand-holding and support to the outsourcing partner. lovehub An enterprise has to make sure that the vendor has capable resources that can help the managers and the staff of an organization to seamlessly manage the transition.
If you are IT company and you want to outsource to India, it is important that you keep the above thumb rules in mind and take care of each small aspect towards building a successful work relation.
