20 Steps to Successful Outsourcing

Objectives

The following 20-Step Program will provide you with a guide that would help you achieve the following:

* properly organize your team; * achieve necessary management commitment; * properly define your own corporate needs, objectives, and priorities; * identify appropriate alternatives; * identify and evaluated your risks and benefits; * select the best alternative for each specified service area; * developed and negotiated an appropriate and effective outsourcing agreement; and * provide the mechanisms to administer, maintain, and monitor the contract and to resolve the inevitable problems.

20-Step Program

1. Organize a top management Steering Committee assigned in planning, monitoring, overseeing and searching for your transition to outsourcing. These includes members from your internal information systems division, key user groups, and executive management including marketing and/or strategic management. It is essential to factor the changing needs, markets, distribution channels from the beginning resulting to minimal surprises in the succeeding phases. Management also needs to be informed and be part of the process to make sure that there is due diligence being performed and to provide appropriate stewardship up over these key corporate information assets. This is to minimize the loss of important information resources, losing effectiveness, or leaving the company vulnerable to competition due to a screw up in an outsourcing deal which could lead to legal suits in the future.

2. Identify and engage an expert team to be able to guide you and the organization during the decision, selection, and contracting processes for your outsourcing needs. The team should include a small group of independent experts with specialization in outsourcing such as an information technology consulting professional who understands both you and your outsourcer in your needs and who is by far capable in helping you administer the contract over time, assuring a smooth transition to the systems, and resolve problems when the contract is signed. Then, an attorney with specific contracting, business, and outsourcing expertise to help develop and negotiate and outsourcing that would be beneficial to both parties and make the relationship work. Lastly, an organization development/merger and acquisition professional to make sure that the transition of staff and relationships works well.

This team is also warranted and needed to make tough decisions because perceived or actual weaknesses in your current IS team may have caused the failure of IS within your company in the first place. Also, engaging with independent experts to assist your IS managers will be wise because they themselves would probably be most directly affected by moving to outsourcing and the resulting contracts that goes with it.

3. Identify critical internal resources, such as a particularly competent data processing director or chief information officer, who will stay on your company's staff internally assigned in managing and administering the relationship between the outsourcer and your company. Determine which staff, and software and hardware licenses and resources should/must go to the outsourcer for the relationship to be mutually successful.

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