Basman | Explore: IT Outsourcing

Petter Gottschalk’s new book Business Dynamics in Information Technology will be published in early November. From the synopsis:

Emerging business models, value configurations, and information technologies interact over time to create competitive advantage. Modern information technology has to be studied, understood, and applied along the time dimension of months and years, where changes are the rule. Such changes created by interactions between business elements and resources are very well suited for system dynamics modeling. “Business Dynamics in Information Technology” presents business-technology alignment processes, interaction processes, and decision processes, helping the reader study information technology from a dynamic, rather than a static, perspective. By introducing two simple tools from system dynamic modeling - causal loops and reference modes - the dynamic perspective will become important to both students and practitioners in the future.

Petter was also the author of Managing Successful IT Outsourcing Relationships, a standard reference book for IT outsourcing.

In Bangalore Tiger, author Steve Hamm examines the rise of India as a destabilizing force in the $650 billion worldwide tech services industry. He focuses on Wipro Ltd., one of the most successful of the Indian upstarts from Bangalore, and on its remarkable leader, Azim Premji. This excerpt chronicles how Premji transformed a peanut oil company in poverty-ridden India into a tech powerhouse. Read more >

neoIT Previews New Book on How Successful Globalizers Realize Superior Returns Compared to their Peers 
 
neoIT, a leading services globalizationSM consulting firm, is providing a sneak-peak of its upcoming book on services globalization. The new book will be published in early 2007 and separates truth from fiction when it comes to successful services globalization programs.

As a follow-on to neoIT founder and CEO Atul Vashistha’s well-received book The Offshore Nation which was published in 2005, Mr. Vashistha and neoIT COO Eugene Kublanov will soon release their next book: Seven Secrets of Highly Successful Globalizers. The new book makes public for the first time the global practices that highly successful firms have in common.

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Pieter Ribbers from the Dept. of Information Systems and Accountancy, Tilburg University, Netherlands, and his collegues Erik Beulen and Jan Roos have published recently a book about Managing IT Outsourcing (January 2006, 288 pages, English, ISBN: 0415365996). From the synopsis of the book:

The business landscape is changing. Outsourcing is now a growing phenomenon (about 10 per cent per year globally) in which specific functions are subcontracted to specialist companies, often elsewhere in the world. IT represents a particular case for outsourcing, both in terms of benefits and potential inter-organizational problems. Deciding whether to keep IT in-house or to whether outsource it is a key management responsibility. Once a decision for outsourcing has been made, relationships with external provider(s) have to be established and managed. Here, Pieter Ribbers combines both research and practical examples to explore how this can be done successfully. Uniquely, Ribbers provides a governance model for such partnerships, exploring the risks and responsibilities involved for both parties. Drawing on the theories of interfirm networks and the boundaries of the firm, here, he provides an accessible and cutting-edge perspective. Incorporating industry examples from a global network of companies (including four case specific chapters), this book investigates partnerships in industrial sectors and IT functions. An invaluable resource for those involved in IT and new technology management as well as strategic business management and planning, this book presents all the necessary theory with an indispensable practical perspective.

In these days unfortunately I’ve got no time to read books, because I’m involved in so many IT outsourcing projects, deals and mergers. And I’m sorry, I won’t be able to write any review about books, too …

Two books I ordered a couple of days ago arrived today in two different shipments. That was really fast from the United States. In the next days I'll write some reviews about these two:

• Atul Vashistha and Avinash Vashistha: The Offshore Nation
• Thomas L. Friedman: The World Is Flat

At infocrossing you can download a 22-page workbook in PDF-format called "Refining IT Through Outsourcing" by Tim Murtha. "It is a practical guide for turning a move toward Outsourcing into a self-improvement plan" as it describes itself.

I find the booklet very inspiring and useful. After registrating yourself you can download it for free here >

Praktikerleitfaden zum Outsourcing

Seit Veröffentlichung der Erstauflage des GDD-Leitfadens zum Outsourcing im Jahr 1996 ist die Thematik wesentlich fassettenreicher geworden. Dies liegt zum einen daran, dass das Outsourcing zunehmend - in einer globalisierten Welt auch grenzüberschreitend - betrieben wird. Zum anderen ist die maßgebliche Vorschrift des § 11 BDSG im Zuge der Umsetzung der EG-Datenschutzrichtlinie fortgeschrieben worden und auch sonstige datenschutzrechtliche Rahmenbedingungen der Auftragsdatenverarbeitung haben sich verändert.

Vor dem Hintergrund dieser Entwicklungen wurde der Leitfaden mit der nunmehr vorliegenden zweiten Auflage auf den aktuellen Stand gebracht. Dabei wurde der Charakter des Leitfadens als Praxishilfe für Unternehmen und insbesondere deren Datenschutzbeauftragte beibehalten. Neben der zwischenzeitlich ergangenen Rechtsprechung wurden die neuere Datenschutz-Literatur sowie die von der Datenschutzaufsicht gegebenen Empfehlungen berücksichtigt. Der Anhang enthält neben den für das Outsourcing relevanten Hinweisen des Innenministeriums Baden-Württemberg u.a. einschlägige Vertragsmuster. Weiterführende Informationen aus Praxis und Wissenschaft sind über die ebenfalls angefügte Link- bzw. Literaturliste zu finden.

Die Broschüre kann zum Preis von je € 10,- zzgl. Versandkosten bei der Geschäftstelle der GDD oder hier per Kontaktformular angefordert werden.

Petter Gottschalk and Hans Solli-Sæther, both of the Norwegian School of Management, have written an excellent book about best practices in outsourcing: “Managing Successful IT Outsourcing Relationships”. The book is well structured and gives at the end some insightful conclusions. Gottschalk and Solli-Sæther are describing their work as:

Managing Successful IT Outsourcing Relationships is a comprehensive guide on all the aspects of IT outsourcing, and is highly commendable for practitioners, researchers, policy makers and consultants alike. This book uses well-known theoretical perspectives and experiences learned from several business cases to develop models and guidelines for the complex IT outsourcing process and emerging relationships. It focuses on the important issues of strategy, structure, and management of IT outsourcing relationships and answers the what, where, when and how to outsource and manage outsourcing contracts.

This could be a standard in the outsourcing literature. I recommend it as a very good intro in the topic.

Gartner introduces a book about a new approach to Outsourcing:

Gartner sourcing experts Linda Cohen and Allie Young argue that yesterday's ad-hoc sourcing approaches are ineffective in today's complex terrain. Based on extensive, multiyear research, this book unveils a new operational model—Multisourcing—in which internally and externally delivered services are blended seamlessly, governed closely, and evaluated continuously for effectiveness and efficiency.