Outsourcing Heart Strings

I didn't get a chance to read last month's Fast Company until yesterday. The cover story was called "Look Into Their Eyes". It was a profile of people who directly lost jobs to overseas outsourcing. I feel for the individuals; I've been laid off twice. But Fast Company seems a little dishonest with this type of reporting. Forget the facts and they'll just make you cry. Actually, I can think of better arguments against outsourcing than what I've seen.

One issue I have is security. This article from Computerworld is an excellent example of the risks of giving security to a foreign company:

A woman in Pakistan recently struck fear among IT executives who outsource. She had obtained sensitive patient documents from the University of California, San Francisco, Medical Center through a medical transcription subcontractor that she worked for, and she threatened to post the files on the Internet unless she was paid more money.

Is there anybody who didn't think this type of thing was going to happen? Common sense tells you that when you send work overseas, there are risks. How the hell did a foreign contractor have access to patient records? Sure security is complicated, expensive, and time consuming, but it's supposed to be inconvenient. What shape would banks be in if they didn't want to force tellers to use those pesky little safe combinations. It's all about assessing risk. It only takes one unsavory individual to spill your company's guts. Who do you sue if your data is compromised? If you're a large enough company, you can threaten to take your business to another dirt-cheap foreign company; you may even be able to involve the State Department. But let's face it, some of these countries are not our allies, despite their own rhetoric. The worst case scenario is that a foreign company could take your data, hold it for ransom, and you can only yell obscenities from across the border. Try documenting the risks involved with foreign development before sending your work over there.

Another issue I have with foreign outsourcing is quality control. Recently, a company I work with sent software development work to Pakistan because it was cheap. The Pakistani company the received requirements and began to revise the project. When asked to explain why the code was different than the requirements, the project manager there would respond with, "This is how we interpret the requirements." This is not isolated--I've heard similar stories from others. Keep the work local and when you feel the need to reach across the table and throttle the crap out of somebody, you can.

Let's also not forget the language and cultural barrier. Ever since Dell outsourced their customer service to India, nobody likes dealing with Dell. In fact, Dell was forced by its business customers to bring customer service back to the U.S. Unfortunately, home consumers are still talking to some guy with an accent calling himself Carl. I'm on to Dell's little scam; I think Carl with an accent is not from here. I have figured out that if you start yelling and swearing on the phone, you'll get Gene with an accent and then Bob with an accent. Finally, they will transfer you to Doug in good old Austin, Texas. At least Dell was smart enough to know that their escalation process should include an American.

See, there are other reasons not to outsource. You don't have to portray Americans as victims of cold corporations. When reporting about outsourcing, I'd like to see more articles regarding security risks, quality, and customer service. These are the issues that companies will care about because those will affect the bottom line. Trust me, companies will not change just because some of their employees have hurt feelings.

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