Outsourcing?
17th March 2018
Doug Kimball thinks it may be a Bad Thing.
From the employee’s perspective, this is not a positive trend. Mobility within an outsourced position is limited. You are hired to work in a specific company at a specific job, often reporting up to an employee of the company who has no authority or inclination to help your job trajectory. Outsourced staff are transformed into hyper-specialized clerks and workers and stuck in those positions with little leverage. There is no longer advancement or mobility as you are not an employee. It is not the traditional American “up or out” system. It has been replaced with the “do or done” system.
The old American idea of advancement from the mailroom to a window office is becoming impossible. Ambitious people now must migrate to rise as opportunities within companies have been eroded substantially by outsourcing trends. That’s probably ok as the half-life of corporations these days, where mergers, acquisitions, downsizings, reorganizations, consolidations, divestitures, and old-fashioned bankruptcies are as common as the holiday sale, is measured in dog years.
Since this is St Paddy’s day, I’ll quote a proverb much beloved by my Grandma Brennan: ‘God never closes a door but he opens a window.’ This trend may be bad news for ‘traditional’ employees, but it provides multiple opportunities for entrepreneurs to start up their own outsourcing services. It is quite common in tech fields for employees to think “These guys have their heads up their asses. It’s all corporate politics. I can do it for them and save them money.” And off they go. For a company to be working in an area and not appreciate what’s going on is legendary; think of Xerox PARC. Sure, it doesn’t provide an opportunity for employees who’d rather remain employees than go into business for themselves (Me! Me!) but they can Go Along With their colleagues who are striking out. This has the potential to bring the Startup Disruption Mindset to more areas than just tech. Let’s see how it works out.