The Outsourcing Enterprise: From Cost Management to Collaborative Innovation

The Outsourcing Enterprise distills 20 years of research into over 1500 outsourcing arrangements. It provides evidence-based answers to the vital managerial question: under what conditions does outsourcing become an effective approach to achieving organizational objectives? The internationally acclaimed authors assess the evolution of outsourcing, pinpoint the practices that work, and show how each organization can get to the next stage in leveraging the ever-expanding services market for significant business advantage. The common denominator finding is that outsourcing itself is not a quick fix but represents a different way of managing. The requisite practices are described in detail, together with multiple case examples and guidelines. Much depends on experiential learning and sheer hard work. Executives must conquer a significant learning curve and build key in-house capabilities in order to successfully exploit outsourcing opportunities. They need to accept that outsourcing is not about giving up management but managing in a different way.

Suppliers also need to work on their strategies and capabilities if they are to sustain the more collaborative relationships that clients increasingly demand, and deliver meaningfully on an innovation as well as a cost and service agenda. The book details the practices suppliers need to adopt.

Written to influence executives, focused on the new opportunities, while learning from the past, this book shows how to: develop a dynamic strategy linking business, sourcing and IT objectives and actions; leverage suppliers through collaboration to look for innovation as well as cost reduction opportunities; reduce the pressure through more BPO and offshoring; and, crucially, how to maintain effective flexibility and control in present and future outsourcing arrangements. In practice, The Outsourcing Enterprise is a must read for any practitioner, student, or scholar concerned with global sourcing in the next ten years.

Leslie Willcocks is Professor in Technology Work and Globalization and Director of the Outsourcing Unit at the London School of Economics and Political Science. He has coauthored 33 books and over 190 refereed journal papers on the management of outsourcing and of information and communications technologies and their impacts on organizations. He is joint Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Information Technology and of the newly published JIT Teaching Cases and is internationally recognized for his academic research and advisory work for major corporations and government agencies.
Dr Sara Cullen is the Managing Director of The Cullen Group (www.cullengroup.com.au) and is a former national partner at Deloitte (Australia). She has a leading international profile in outsourcing and is one of Asia Pacific's most experienced advisors. She has consulted to 130 organizations, spanning 51 countries, in 150 different projects. She has written over 110 publications, conducted seven government reviews, and presented in more than 300 major conferences. Sara runs a number of training programs covering sourcing, negotiation, and contract management, for over 400 participants per year. She regularly lectures at many international universities and has performed regular research with various universities since 1994.
Andrew Craig heads the IT leadership and governance stream of Carig Ltd and is also a director of Board Coaching Ltd. He is a Visiting Senior Research Fellow at the London School of Economics and Political Science. In his professional Army Career, as Brigadier, he commanded engineering operations worldwide, including the first Gulf War and Bosnia, and led the UK's planned military response to nuclear, biological, and chemical terrorism. He was awarded an OBE in 1992.