I love caller ID. As you can imagine, my day is filled with incoming phone calls from vendors trying to sell me the latest, greatest products or services. Several times a week, in fact, technology outsourcing companies are dialing me up to offer me the use of their talented and dedicated technical staff who will solve all of my development and testing challenges.
There was a time – before caller ID – when I answered these calls. I even fell for one of their pitches. After repeated requests for meetings, lunches and phone conferences – all with promises of project nirvana – I took a chance at outsourcing a project.
We thought the assignment was basic enough: use a standard report writer to produce a purchase order print document from our supply chain system. The technician was given specs on the format and placement of data. We provided a sample purchase order based on a bogus medical device along with the product’s header and detail line. The detail line of this sample purchase order included the comment “Product must be frozen for 24 hours prior to use.”
Off to outsource land went the specs and the sample document. Six weeks later – which seemed forever for such a basic task – the developer sent it back without asking questions. Just “here it is.” Ok, I thought, let’s give it a quick test before releasing it to QA. I created a one line purchase order for 100 boxes of toilet paper. I printed the purchase order and looked at it. Much to my surprise (and outright laughter) the comment “Product must be frozen for 24 hours prior to use” was printed under the toilet paper line. Now that’s some cold toilet paper!
The comment was “hard wired” to the purchase order, creating a purchase order with 20 lines, all with the same comment!
I reviewed my specifications; it was not clear to the developer where the purchase order comments line should have originated. Since specifications are never 100% clear, no matter how detailed they are, the developer needs to make some assumptions related to the business processes. My developers would never make the same mistake because they understand the healthcare business, our application and the intent of the comment line on a purchase order. They would have coded it correctly so only the comments line associated with a particular purchase order printed.
This led me to perform some informal research – and do some internal reflection – about outsourcing. How effective could it be? Would there ever be a case when it is useful for us?
If you do a Google search for “software projects outsourcing success rate”, you’ll get thousands of hits. Read a few documents and see that numbers are all over the map. Some research articles claim that technical outsourcing offers only a 20% success rate while outsourcing companies claim 80% success rate.
Let’s take the middle road and assume a 50% success rate. If you were a baseball player batting 500, that puts you in the hall of fame. As an IT executive, a 50% success rate for projects gets you a job at a fast food restaurant flipping burgers.
So what’s the conclusion? IT is a people business. Software languages change, standards evolve and computers become smaller, faster and more sophisticated. However, the key components for successful project delivery are still people who understand development, business processes and software construction.
There are instances where outsourcing your IT or software projects is acceptable or even advantageous. But the concept doesn’t work for MediClick. Only a dedicated staff of developers, project specialists, QA folks and support personnel could offer the high-quality services that we – and our clients – expect.
In our case, if you take any member of our team out of the equation and replace him or her with someone in an outsourced role, you have a recipe for a failed project.
That’s because our on-site team benefits from things that an outsourced professional doesn’t have:
- Close Communication – I have found that communication is a critical factor in the success of an IT project. Whether you’re holding an impromptu meeting, having a conversation by the coffee maker or making a quick call to a colleague’s desk, you’re facilitating information transfer and building camaraderie. The ability to walk down the hall and talk to each member of my team outweighs any benefits I would derive from an outsource group thousands of miles away.
- Product Knowledge – Communication serves no purpose if the information transfer is obsolete or just plain wrong. Product knowledge is gained over years of experience with a complex software application. Personnel dedicated to a company’s success understand the business and culture of the company.
- Business Acumen – Understanding how a business works – whether you’re working with materials management in hospitals or the unique challenges of another industry – is vital to developing a software product that is actually usable and provides value to an organization.
- Size Counts – Yes, size does count. As a lean and mean, mid-sized SaaS provider, MediClick can turn on a dime. When changing market conditions require us to quickly focus resources on a new business objective, we’re ready. With key personnel working locally, making a change can be rapid and thorough. Try making this adjustment with outsource personnel.
That's why I always answer the phone when one of my team calls me. Better yet, when they call, I just tell them to stop by my desk on the way to the coffee maker.
