IT outsourcing has become increasingly integral to building and operating the enterprise IT environment, but many IT services customers remain frustrated with their results.
Part of the problem may be a lack of understanding by the outsourcing customer about their actual level of maturity in IT outsourcing, says Wolfgang Benkel, principal analyst in Forrester's IT sourcing and vendor management practice.
More than 40 percent of companies expect that their CFOs will have more influence over IT services spending over the next 12 months--a five percent increase over the previous year's data, according to new survey results from Forrester Research.
As companies have gotten better at detecting and preventing online fraud in recent years, would-be criminals have redirected their efforts to the corporate call centre.
Financial services companies and retailers, for example, are reporting a rise in call centre fraud, says Shirley Inscoe, a senior analyst with Aite Group, covering fraud and data security, in large part because "fraudsters tend to take the path of least resistance."
"Faster, better, cheaper," the old adage goes. "Pick two." Indeed, in many areas of IT outsourcing, IT leaders have been pushing for faster everything -- RFP processes, transition phases, time to ROI -- in an effort to cut costs quickly.
But that, says Edward Hansen, partner in the outsourcing practice of Baker & McKenzie, is leading to what he calls the "over-commoditisation" of IT services. IT leaders say they want more than just lower costs from their IT outsourcing relationships, yet they treat the process no differently than if they were trying to get the best deal on a gross of number two pencils--with disastrous consequences.
Many factors can impact the financial case for IT outsourcing, from general market conditions to specific IT service provider strategies. CIOs can control only a few of them. Yet, too often those issues that the IT organisation does has influence over are glossed over or ignored when building the outsourcing business case and negotiating the deal.
Using a little-known tech firm can produce big benefits, but it requires doing your homework.
There's little doubt that multi-sourcing enterprise IT services. The average US IT shop is working with 13.5 service providers overall, according to Gartner. But managing multiple providers remains a challenge for most IT organizations.
IT service providers and their customers have gotten better at building arrangements likely to work for both parties over the long haul, but sometimes relationships fall apart. Here are 10 ways to know your outsourcing provider wants to break up with you.
Today's savvy IT leaders go into outsourcing decisions thinking about the business value of a potential deal--from scope to service levels to price. But they're overlooking the value of the contract terms that can make or break an outsourcing engagement, says Brad Peterson, partner in the outsourcing practice of law firm Mayer Brown.
IT outsourcing has always been a double-edged sword for CIOs. What starts out as a cure for IT's ills always seems to cause more headaches down the road.
1. Smaller Deals. A decade-long decline in the size of IT services contracts continues. While the number of mega-deals and midrange contracts awarded each year has remained fairly stable since 2002, the number of those worth $100 million or less has more than tripled, according to outsourcing consultancy Information Services Group (formerly TPI).
Outsourcing contracts typically include detailed termination and transition assistance provisions that outline the provider's responsibilities regarding data return. Indeed, in many outsourcing contracts, the vendor agrees to provide the data promptly whenever the customer ask for it in the format that the customer requests-and the provider often covers the cost of doing so.
Watson - IBM's Jeopardy!-playing supercomputer - handily defeated two of the game show's strongest contestants, but can it beat cancer?
The hard work of putting together an effective IT outsourcing request for proposals (RFP) is behind you. You gathered requirements. You baselined your service costs. You set the rules for the process. You put in place your required contract terms. You outlined a detailed negotiation schedule. Now it's time to sit back and watch the RFP responses roll in.
IT governance has always been a challenge for corporate technology organizations and best practice frameworks such as the process-focused COBIT or service level-oriented ITIL can deliver much-needed operational rigor.