Category Archives: Confusing Outsourcing Information

So… are these the world’s best outsourcing advisors?

May 8th, 2013

The IAOP has announced it’s 2013 “best outsourcing advisors”, and kudos to my former employer, Deloitte, for coming top. Credit has to go out to Peter Lowes and his Outsourcing Advisory Services group for their achievement. In addition, KPMG’s Shared Services and Advisory Group, led my Cliff Justice, finished in second place – a strong showing and justification of their 2011 acquisition of EquaTerra. The biggest surprises, however, are the absences of ISG, the largest transaction advisor of outsourcing contracts, and PwC…

31 Comments

So if the rockstars have gone, what’s left in the analyst industry?

April 28th, 2013

Most of the big analyst personalities have seemingly fled the analyst industry… many for the riches on offer from their vendor clients, clearly seeing more ROI from employing them, as opposed to purchasing their firm’s services. However, this hasn’t prevented the remaining legacy purveyors of analyst services from making a living.

8 Comments

Shock, horror! Some vendors have bought the right to ”edit” analysts’ research…

October 7th, 2012

Ventana Research CEO, Mark Smith, convincingly blogs that some major vendors actually have contracts with some analyst firms that give them rights to review, edit and approve research written about them.

7 Comments

Caught in the xeno-bamia crossfire, these are dangerous times for the “outsourcing” industry

July 15th, 2012

The industry currently known as “outsourcing” is currently under its greatest-ever attack. President Obama has made attacking Bain Capital’s promotion of itself once as a “one stop outsourcing shop”, the focal point of his re-election campaign. And this is a serious attack – he has $512m in campaign money left to burn, and only $25m a month is currently being spent on attack-ads from both parties – the worst is yet to come. So how should the “outsourcing” industry deal with this?

24 Comments

The great outsourcing sham redux

March 29th, 2012

So we managed to whip up a tidal wave of emotion and opinion when we made the call that the “outsourcing industry”, in its current state is, quite frankly, a sham. When over 30,000 people read something, there’s a reason why… so let’s drill down into what this all means

10 Comments

Is the outsourcing industry really still that clueless about cultural issues? Or high time to change that record…

August 12th, 2011

In Brandi Moore’s “painful” interpretation of the joint research we did with Softek about Latin America as a sourcing destination, she manages to disparage an entire industry, ignore the facts, offer tired examples as brilliant self-aggrandizement, and demonstrate a poor understanding of her supposed field of expertise (culture). We often take a tongue-in-cheek approach to our coverage here, but we take the accuracy of our research and reporting very seriously.

16 Comments

So… on which side of the fence sits Gideon Gartner?

July 5th, 2011

So the Grandaddy of great big research, and (arguably) the founding father of today’s IT industry analyst business, Gideon Gartner, picked up on our recent post “Will the industry analyst business be dead in five years?”

1 Comment

Why I wrote that piece…

June 22nd, 2011

So when I received many notes, emails, calls and comments after my weekend “rant” about the analyst business, I suddenly realized this thing was going “viral”. How had I managed to hit such a raw nerve?

4 Comments

Will the industry analyst business be dead in five years?

June 19th, 2011

Love them or loathe them, analyst firms and their unique individuals stoke the emotions of many who come in regular contact with them. But are thee days of the traditional industry analyst numbered?

52 Comments

HP’s strategy: is it plotting, or losing the plot?

April 20th, 2011

Unless HP is plotting a radical move to buy SAP, or some other ERP business, HP seems to be letting itself down badly – the firm needs new thinkers who can drive innovation and a new direction into the business, because right now, most industry observers are left scratching their heads trying to figure out what the game-plan is.

17 Comments

“Cloud BPO”? C’mon… stop talking cobblers

February 13th, 2011

“Cloud BPO” is, simply put, a load of nonsense. The core fulcrum processes of BPO are the toughest to move into the Cloud, and only the small-to-medium business sector is going to enjoy any modicum of success of moving genuine “BPO” processes, such as finance and HR, into the Cloud in the near-term.

14 Comments

Is TPI’s Index reflecting the real BPO industry picture?

December 16th, 2010

As a result of TPI’s recent Q3 outlook, several industry colleagues expressed concern that TPI wasn’t reflecting market reality, with particular reference to their claim that the BPO industry had taken a 15% nose-dive in 2010. New HfS Research data that encompasses all current Finance & Accounting (F&A) BPO engagements, reveals two key factors that cause us to question the reliability of the latest TPI Index’s BPO outlook.

11 Comments

And here are… HfS’ 2011 Outsourcing Predictions… on demand

December 9th, 2010

nd here we are, like clockwork, jumping on the tackiest, lamest marketing exercise every analyst, consultant, CEO, and wannabe thought-leader always persists in doing… because you are supposed to gasp “Wow – they are predicting the future!”

19 Comments

“Honestly, history tells us the act of outsourcing doesn’t save money…” Gartner Group

November 15th, 2010

This morning I nearly choked on my cornflakes to the incredible revelation in CIO.com from analyst firm, Gartner Group, that outsourcing doesn’t save money.

20 Comments

BPO, SaaS and Cloud: Too many people aren’t seeing the bigger picture

April 13th, 2010

Too many technical folks fail to view the bigger picture when it comes to Cloud. At a tactical level, when you look at solely hardware capacity solutions, it’s hard to see beyond how it can impact businesses beyond creaking ITO-only deals. However, you really need to look at the convergence of BPO, SaaS and Cloud in a broader outsourcing context to start to visialize how these three pillars of business delivery can – and are – coming together in a blended outsourcing model.

9 Comments