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PEOPLE: The Make or Break of Offshoring or Outsourcing

Presentation: PEOPLE: The Make or Break of Offshoring or Outsourcing   Learn More…
Deborah Kops
October 2, 2012
Archive

Creating a Perfect Storm–How Do You Manage Change in a Global Implementation

Presentation: Creating a Perfect Storm–How Do You Manage Change in a Global Implementation?   Learn More…
Deborah Kops
Archive

The Change Up — Can We Achieve Innovation Through Shared Services?

Presentation: the change up–can we achieve innovation through shared services   Learn More…
Deborah Kops
Archive

Think Marketing to Accelerate Shared Services and BPO Growth

Think Marketing to Accelerate Shared Services or BPO Growth No one gets on the bandwagon without scale. So you’ve dragged your organization kicking and screaming through a few transitions to a shared services and/or outsourced business model, and now it’s time to spread the wealth to the rest of the organization.  You and your team […]
Deborah Kops
September 17, 2012
Archive

The Lonely Planet Guide: Succeeding in the Role of Transformation Leader

It may be the loneliest — and toughest — job on the planet. Abused by providers, repudiated by the business lines, asked by management to scale mountains in nanoseconds equipped with very few resources. Only the bravest and thickest-skinned need apply. How can these agents of change thrive, and survive, the almost impossible job of […]
Deborah Kops
September 11, 2012
Archive

The Rise of the Good Global Services Customer

In most nascent marketplaces, the first provider of a service or product enjoys initial market supremacy — that period of time when product offering, terms of purchase, pricing and quality are dictated by the offer. Call it first-mover advantage, market maker or innovation premium — the market naturally takes some time to respond, embrace, accept […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Don’t be Afraid of the Dark Side

Those of us who have been around the services industry from its infancy speak in code…both in acronyms (BPO, BTO, BTO, PPE), and in highly connotative shorthand — the cowboys, the Indians, nearshore, offshore, onshore, smartsource, resource, eSource, etc. One of the most telling codes is how we differentiate between the unholy trinity in this […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

The Crime of the Century

Companies impose budget and return rigor when managing a range of corporate assets. Yet when it comes to managing portfolios of business services, all discipline seems to be absent. Companies manage a range of assets comprehensively as a portfolio — capital, cash flow, human resources, fixed assets…but forget about the management of what is becoming […]
Deborah Kops
Archive Models

If the Shoe Fits, Wear it

Is there a predictive fit between such characteristics as culture, measurement systems, ways of working, procurement strategy and the type of global services solutions specific companies should implement? Deborah Kops seems to think so Now here’s an analogy — watching women  buy shoes has similarities to observing sourcing sweepstakes for global services. Some shoes are […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

It’s Greek to Me

One company’s multitower contract is another’s bundled deal. Are process and functional outsourcing synonymous? What’s the difference between shared services and captives? Why can’t the industry use the same terminology? Are we destined to cope with a veritable Tower of (global services) Babel? I live and breathe the outsourcing industry, and yet even I am […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Fast, Clean And Cheap

Third-party and internal providers try to spin the particular benefits of their approach to transitioning work into a global services model. However, when all is said and done, moving work from point A to B merely requires a simple, speedy and focused approach, and work plan, not invention and artistry. The title of this article […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Chutes and Ladders

Remember the childhood game Chutes and Ladders? Roll the dice and you move around the board. If you are lucky, you climb ladders and get to the finish line first. If luck runs out, your tile slides back to the starting point. Is there a parable here for effective stakeholder management when sourcing globally? Gambling […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Who’s Satisfied?

There are no industry standards for measuring customer satisfaction in the global services industry. In their absence, supposed discontent can take on epic proportions and all feedback can appear negative. Kops discusses elements of an approach that customers should aspire to implement According to an oft-quoted industry statistic of indeterminant attribution, approximately 80% of all […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Scaling the Heights: The Imperative to Grow Shared Services and Outsourcing

So you dragged your organization kicking and screaming through a few transitions to a shared services and/or outsourced business model, and now it’s time to spread the wealth to the rest of the organization.  You and your team might think that the next logical step is to focus inward, building up more process skills, identify opportunities […]
Deborah Kops
August 21, 2012
Archive

By the Clock

When is the right time for sourcing of services? Is it when you are at the nadir of corporate fortunes or when profits are robust? Is it when your industry’s margins are squeezed, or when there are fundamental changes to your industry structure? Is there a clock to help us find direction? As a child […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Everything I Learned About Outsourcing I Learned in Kindergarten…but Forgot

The rules we grow up intuitively understanding eventually fade away into distant memories. The same principle applies to managing outsourcing deals Outsourcing successfully should be relatively straightforward if one follows a few simple rules. Wading through the marketing hype and the thrill of the deal, the pressures to demonstrate cost reduction and quality enhancement, one […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Fear of Unintended Consequences

Ever wonder why your CEO charters an exhaustive study of enterprise-wide sourcing potential, corralling resources to develop a business case that encompasses virtually every business function? Spends hours reviewing and posing questions? Gives you the kudos you rightfully deserve for pulling together a cogent assessment and compelling plan that saves the company millions of dollars/pounds/Euros […]
Deborah Kops
July 31, 2012
Archive

How do you get them to eat sushi?

Lots of my friends think sushi is the ne plus ultra of nosh. Now I must confess I am not a big sushi fan, but I appreciate the presentation, and individually, I’ll eat most of the ingredients. It’s just the seaweed wrapper that’s a bit hard to swallow. Grappling with the sale of shared services […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Imperfect Arbitrage

The implications of generational shift resulting from the globalization of work by Deborah Kops The problem goes something like this. A young man from a country noted for outsourcing business processes is sitting with a veteran accounts payable accountant, putting the accountant’s tasks in a template in order to achieve so- called “knowledge transfer,” which is […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Where the boys are

Looking at any outsourcing provider or advisor’s website brings to mind the title of a 1950s song by Connie Francis. Click on “About Us,” then “Management Team,” and a bevy of good looking thirty- and forty-something guys in sharp suits will peer back at you. Occasionally, you’ll see the anomalous face of someone of the […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

No Fun for the Soon Forgotten

Lest you think you’ve missed something in the title–the plot of Irish playwright Eugene O’Neill’s final play, A Moon for the Misbegotten, has no relationship whatsoever to outsourcing or offshoring; the plot revolves around a washed up actor, and a scheme to buy land below market. The protagonists have much in common yet with a […]
Deborah Kops
Archive

Changing to Innovate

  When the outsourcing industry pundits blithely tosses out the term “innovation,” we tend to think they are delusional. Since everyone agrees that outsourcing is geared to deliver positive changes in efficiency, productivity, cost and quality, what is “innovative” about outsourcing? Are we using a puffed-up word to pretend we’re getting or delivering more value? […]
Deborah Kops
July 18, 2012
Archive

Manage Outsourcing Change by Communicating Remorse

By Deborah Kops  Most of us have been down on our knees praying that the relationship does not blow up over an error. Perhaps the cutover was delayed because the provider did not conduct sufficient user acceptance tests, or an employee committed fraud within a client account because controls were inadequate, or the client did […]
Deborah Kops
January 18, 2011
Archive

Make No Little Plans

After slogging through six years of architectural school, I took away several lessons for life, not the least of which came from Daniel Burnham. In 1909, Burnham, one of the most notable of American architects, published “The Plan of Chicago,” which laid out a strategy for the city’s long term development. He is famous for […]
Deborah Kops
January 14, 2011

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