The Outsourcing Option: Some Things to Consider

Michael R. Wood is a Business Process Improvement & IT Strategist Independent Consultant. He is creator of the business process-improvement methodology called HELIX and founder of The Natural Intelligence Group, a strategy, process improvement and technology consulting company. He is also a CPA, has served as an Adjunct Professor in Pepperdine's Management MBA program, an Associate Professor at California Lutheran University, and on the boards of numerous professional organizations. Mr. Wood is a sought after presenter of HELIX workshops and seminars in both the U.S. and Europe.

  Outsourcing   Resource Management  

Like all complicated issues, outsourcing has valid pros and cons; thus there is no universal right way, only tradeoffs that must be weighed and balanced in context to an organization’s own needs and circumstances.

All too often, outsourcing is equated to offshoring, a specific type of outsourcing. However, outsourcing spans a much broader spectrum and includes any work or service performed by third parties for an organization. So when an organization decides to engage a project manager to manage a project, they are outsourcing that role.

The question is whether or not an organization is better off using inside resources to manage projects or to use outside resources instead. The answer may be found by exploring the issues and tradeoffs that should be considered in that decision process. In doing so, a framework can be developed that you might find useful in evaluating the extent to which outsourcing your organization’s PM needs is the right choice.

Generically speaking, outsourcing includes the following benefits:

• More visible costs: Payments to outsiders are always more visible and more easily linked to specific initiatives than costs that could be buried deep within operational budgets.
• Pay only for what you need: Since outsourcing is typically based on …

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