Global

TBM: from measurement to a core business function

Posted: 07/09/2016 - 09:53
Author: Nigel Hughes

IT reaches far and wide within organisations, particularly in the case of large enterprises, but it can be difficult to understand exactly what it does and how it is having an impact, especially when it comes to measuring return on investment. Enter Technology Business Management (TBM).

Simply, TBM provides an end-to-end view of the delivery of IT, capturing how both resource and cost are being consumed by the business. This facilitates more informed conversations around IT spend and helps demonstrate IT’s strategic value to the rest of the business.

Brexit: a complex future for UK procurement and the supply chain

Posted: 07/08/2016 - 02:19
Author: Milan Panchmatia

The result of the EU referendum will undoubtedly have a profound and long-lasting impact on the entire UK population and is likely to be something that is truly generational. Whether we voted for Remain or for Leave, however, Brits now have to assess where we are and how we maintain our position in the global economy.

A tale of two outsources: good versus bad

Posted: 07/07/2016 - 03:02
Author: Nancy Van Elsacker

More and more facilities and IT organisations are outsourcing their services. They may have a lot to gain; for example, outsourcing these services can lead to leaner organisations less bogged down by technical pursuits. Unfortunately, outsourcing does not always improve efficiency, and when done badly can have a negative effect on services. The following are two examples that help explain how IT and facilities organisations handle outsourcing, and what this can mean…

Outsourcing services gone wrong

How to transform your business through embedded analytics

Posted: 07/01/2016 - 19:59
Author: Tom Cahill

Data and analytics are fundamentally redefining applications today. In our daily lives, we use technology to help us make virtually every decision. And when you look at consumer applications—the Amazons, Netflixes, and Facebooks of the world—they’re all centred on data. You might not think of them as analytics applications that serve up a wealth of data to inform decisions, because the information is wrapped up in really slick user experiences. But in fact, they provide analytics information to you where you need it most.

OPINION: Look away, look away, look away, Euroland!

Posted: 07/01/2016 - 19:57
Author: Simon Boardman

Maybe Daniel Decatur Emmett will forgive me for “borrowing” some lyrics from his iconic 1850s American folk song, ‘Dixie’. I do this to encourage British business to look further afield for IT outsourcing services, as encouraged by Brexit. The USA and its domestic or onshoring companies represent a great but seldom considered alternative.

Q&A: Joe Musacchio, PeopleTicker

Posted: 07/01/2016 - 19:52
Author: Joe Musacchio

Outsource: Joe, thank you very much for joining Outsource today. We always begin interviews by asking for a little bit of an introduction to yourself and your organisation for our readers – so, over to you…

Joe Musacchio: I am the CEO of PeopleTicker. PeopleTicker is a rate and benchmarking tool, we cover salary and contingent labour benchmarking. We basically help companies that want to know how much somebody costs, for projects, individuals, recruitment, sourcing, and procurement.

Is there really such a thing as a bad deal?

Posted: 07/01/2016 - 19:50
Author: Thom Mead

I can recall being on vacation in Hong Kong with my wife as we were walking through the famous shopping district in Mongkok. Here you can buy Class A imitation goods of leading brands at far lower prices than the real brand and few would ever know the difference. Or, if you are like me, you will negotiate (aka: haggle) for an even better price. As I plied my finely honed negotiating skills on the unsuspecting merchants, the price kept getting lower and lower. My wife would say, “Stop, stop already” and she would eventually walk away in embarrassment.

Embrace ambiguity: building a case for business value

Posted: 06/28/2016 - 20:03
Author: Bill Huber

Sourcing executives today are all about innovation and adding business value: buying smarter to drive business benefits such as increased customer satisfaction, reduced error rates and insights into product design. In other words, procurement operational strategy aspires to demonstrate alignment with factors driving the success of the business, which is more than just cost takeout.

Who could argue with that?

Shoring up the boardroom

Posted: 06/22/2016 - 20:06
Author: Bob Judson

Crisis is now an everyday occurrence, and is a risk that can be mitigated but never truly eliminated. In a world that seems to be increasingly prone to crises of every conceivable type, a recent survey from Deloitte – A Crisis of Confidence – finds a broad “vulnerability gap” between the awareness of threats and the preparations to actually handle them.

Looking at outsourcing through a crystal ball

Posted: 06/21/2016 - 20:10
Author: Christopher Stancombe

Throughout the last ten years of my career as part of Capgemini’s BPO unit I have seen digital innovation transform our personal lives exponentially in terms of smartphones, streaming services and access to real-time information updates. The natural consequence is that we now expect the same level of responsiveness, quality and dynamic interaction in our professional lives as we’ve become accustomed to outside of work. This has resulted in a plethora of changes in terms of what is expected from outsourced services

Hybrid management for hybrid clouds

Posted: 06/15/2016 - 01:56
Author: David Grimes

The hybrid cloud model is here to stay for the foreseeable future. While a full public cloud infrastructure has worked well for some pure-play digital companies such as Netflix, most enterprises are finding that in spite of the benefit, not all workloads should move to the cloud. In fact, not all workloads can.

Q&A: Kate Vitasek, University of Tennessee & Vested (Part 1)

Posted: 06/13/2016 - 20:22
Author: Kate Vitasek

One of the most famous figures in the global outsourcing arena, Kate Vitasek is also – not coincidentally – one of Outsource’s most popular contributors, having graced our pages with both her regular column (examining lessons to be learnt by the sourcing and outsourcing community from renowned academics and thought leaders from elsewhere in business) and standalone articles for over five years.

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