From the dWb website

Organising for Outsourcing

What should the outsourced organisation look like?

What skills and experience should be retained?

How will the retained organisation interact within the outsource environment?

Who owns the IS strategy?

Who owns the IT roadmaps?

When is it right to use standard solutions?

When is it appropriate have a non-standard solution?

 Feature Article

Organising for Outsourcing

When deciding to outsource the focus is on Cost, Service Levels, Governance and Contract. The area that is not fully considered is one of the KPIs - organisation.

• What should the outsourced organisation look like?
• What skills and experience should be retained?
• How will the retained organisation interact within the outsource environment?

These are very important questions as they define the roles and responsibilities of the new virtual organisation to be able to answer the following:

• Who owns the IS strategy?
• Who owns the IT roadmaps?
• When is it right to use standard solutions?
• When is it appropriate have a non-standard solution?
• How is innovation introduced?

It is important that the outsourced company creates a retained organisation that can work together with the outsourcing organisation to identify the business and system requirements. The roles and responsibilities should be focused on the areas of expertise. The retained organisation know about the business and what services are needed and the measurements to ensure maximum benefit. The outsourcing organisation know about technology and associated timelines.

The system requirements are translated into a system roadmap and aligned with the corresponding IT technology roadmap.

With such an organisation it is possible to see how the business and technology innovation can be brought together for maximum effect. It is important that there is a retained organisation to make the business decisions allowing the outsourcing organisation to make the product and technology decisions. Crossing these lines normally leads to at best confusion and worst case problems.

The clearer the roles and responsibilities the better the working relationships.