Gartner Analyst: Stop Outsourcing Now

[Robert Oak]

It's time to stop outsourcing.

That's a pretty strong statement coming from most anyone in the industry. But it takes on even more weight when it's coming from Gartner's chief of research for outsourcing.

''What we're doing is compulsive outsourcing,''

Gartner research suggests that 50 percent of all outsourcing contracts signed during the last three years will fail to meet expectations.

http://itmanagement.earthweb.com/article.php/3559661

This is a fairly amazing statement for it's coming from the folks who come up with "IT management" "techniques",i.e. "insiders".

[FloridaPat]

1. Suprise suprise. Actually, computer programming has always

been an area that has lots of overruns and lots of ideas on how to improve programming. When main frames were big, very few projects got done on time. A lot spent a lot of money and time and just folded up. A certain consulting company has been know for getting big bucks to do nice paperwork but not being able to get things done to the satisfaction of the actual client. Several businesses have gone under because they spent millions for sofware and nothing worked right. Other consulting firms are not much better. The trend for the last 10 years is to bring in these big US consulting firms and pay big bucks. Things still didn't get done on time, if at all, but it was very expensive. So now they have cheap labor doing all this stuff. I heard things are not going well. Since I've been out of work 16 of the last 24 months, it makes my day. Computer programming is all about logic, but very little logic is used to get things done in an IT shop.

[fedsron2us]

2. Interesting article

Obviously Gartner and all the other consultancies feel that they may have milked all the money they can from the outsourcing and offshoring scam. Presumably, they are setting up the marks in senior management for the next big business con.

[sendero]

4. I don't think..

.... it takes a Gartner to lead execs to want to outsource.

I worked in as a programmer for about 20 years. During that time, I got used to the fact that management HATES software development projects because THEY DON'T KNOW HOW TO MANAGE THEM.

Teams that don't have a clue can snow-job management for years and deliver nothing. Of course, teams offshore can do the same thing as I'm sure all too many companies are finding to their dismay.

It isn't impossible to manage software development, but few have the discipline to really do it. Then they are all surprised when their pet system is a total piece of crap.

Hard for me to muster any sympathy - software development was and probably still is the most mismanaged economic activity in the country - and I have no particular reason to think that is a problem the Indians or the Russians are actually going to solve.

[Robert Oak]

6. true true

They throw engineers at it. Give a hazing ritual called an interview
for 8 hours or so and feel that determines located a quality person.
Hardly. Program managers spend more time with Microsoft project
than actually having a clue on design and what's involved. They won't pay for good QA to save your soul, which is probably 80%...
and of course they outsourced QA like it was a blow off job.

Integration usually consists of blaming the other team. :)

[sendero]

7. Managers..

... want software development to work like any other manufacturing process. They want to believe that they can plug any warm body into any position and get a similar result.

Then they wonder why every single project turns into a nightmare :)

I had the luxury of working for a time at a company that was run by people who really understood what it took to develop a solid piece of software. Even there, as they started to grow, they started falling into the traps that most companies do.

As for outsourcing, it's kind of a race to the bottom isn't it? I've read many reports that its not working out all that well in terms of results (and who is surprised, over half of developing a good program is COMMUNICATION) but everyone is afraid that the other guy will have a competitive advantage getting cheap labor so they cannot pass it up.

No matter how cheap the hourly rate, if you wind up with nothing it was expensive.

I have no regrets about leaving the industry :)

[Robert Oak]

9. I don't blame you

It is insane and we've all seen it, "management" that has more
to do with saving your own ass and sucking up and little to do
with engineering architecture.

It's frightening. Just yesterday I was thinking of the history of engineering in the US and all of those people who built up the industry must be rolling in their graves at what is going on.

For example, I still have an HP calculator...it's still great, a scientific calculator.

I cannot imagine a quality product like that, which works every time,
to be designed in today's "management" mentality.

[sendero]

10. Look no further than NASA..

... to see everything that is wrong with applied science and engineering in America :)

[fedsron2us]

8. Management has always considered workers

an unnecessary expense. Software developers in the past few years are just experiencing some of the crap that his been dished out to other groups of employees over more than two decades. Although executives like to think of themselves as hard nose businessmen driven by the bottom line, in reality they are just as fashion driven as the most febrile and insecure teenager. This makes them easy prey for the snake oil salesmen from the consulting companies. David Craig in his book "Rip-Off !. The Scandalous Inside Story Of The Management Money Making Machine" shows how these organisations have a vested interest in creating a virtual Maoist state of permanent revolution inside businesses in order to maintain their flow of profits. They can not allow the pace of change to slacken because it would cut off the major source of their fees. Indeed, since outsourcing and off-shoring have now become the accepted wisdom among company managements it is probably getting harder for people like Gartner to generate income from these processes. The consultancies therefore need a new "magic bullet" that they can sell to businesses as a cure all for their problems. They know that there is a large army of disgruntled employees in western companies who fear and loath outsourcing and off-shoring. This represents a huge reservoir of discontent that the consultants can co-opt as allies and unleash on company managements when they come to articulate their latest scam.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/Columnists/Column/0,5673,1509968,00.html

nb - Reading some of the consultancy blogs and message boards I detect an almost hysterical loathing of David Craig. It seems many of his former colleagues regard him as a 'Judas' or the Great Betrayer. This makes me think his account must be pretty close to the truth.

[SPIKE KATZ]

3. Hi Robert

[Robert Oak]

5. hi n/t