Outsourcing: not just for corporations anymore.
Quote:
"Rajesh Shah, the 27-year-old president of Global Solutions, tells his clients to call him anytime, even on his cellphone at 3 a.m."
Isn't that insane? What kind of job would merit that?
How long can you live like that?
"Some labor experts are skeptical that this kind of outsourcing will ever go beyond a small group of enthusiasts. One issue is being able to trust a worker thousands of miles away with projects of a personal nature."
How's that different from trusting a worker five miles away?
Final commented:
"Eolake, I'd suggest that your DOMAI business is probably something that can be reliably outsourced. I'm sure there are regular daily or weekly chores that are quite repetitive, including billing and collections, and rotating images on the site."
This is something I've looked at occasionally for a few years. You'd think so. But interestingly, I'm unable to see very much which could be outsourced. Billing is already outsourced to CCBill, and I have very little paperwork. I do, and want to do, very little to the images themselves. I like them to look real, not Playboy-airbrushed. The biggest "labor" is the near daily selecting of the images to put on the members' site. And... I may be kidding myself, but I think only I can do it. I feel there are many, many things to judge images on, and it has taken me years to be able to do it quickly and reliably. There are subtle qualities which I doubt any other editor would be able to pick up on, like exactly how much "sexiness" one can leave in a set without ruining the innocence/happiness which makes the site special.
The difference is, that someone five miles away might at least speak English. Or at least speak it without such a heavy accent that it can barely be understood as English.
ReplyDeleteA person living in the same community will have a couple of things in their favour.
ReplyDeleteFor one, they will be probably more in tune with your social context. Imagine if Eolake outsourced web page design to Malaysia - we'd end up with retouched photos with no nipples if the work got done at all.
For two, a local contractor relies on local reputation. Each street he does a bad job in is probably two lost streets of trade. On a global perspective, you can piss off a lot more customers before you get a bad reputation.
A local contractor you can go after. Sure the law will protect you a long way around the world, but at what cost? As a final step you can always picket, lobby someone five miles away. c.f. Lemon Cars.
A friend in LA is going to contract me for some firmware, I'm in SF, we trust each other, but we both see how being geographically closer would be better for the relationship.
"Imagine if Eolake outsourced web page design to Malaysia - we'd end up with retouched photos with no nipples if the work got done at all."
ReplyDeleteROTFWL! So true. :-D
And I imagine if he outsourced it to Saudi Arabia...
There's a scene like that in Persepolis: the all-female art class is to draw a nude (female, of course)... who's all wrapped up in a Abaya!
"I can't see anything of her on this profile view except for her big ugly nose poking out."
I can see two sides to this.
ReplyDeleteFirst, a large portion of the new trend in outsourcing is likely part of the "Four Hour Work Week" phenomenon going on among Americans who get on the bandwagon of each new business-guru trend. Many of the plans in that book (which I approve of highly, and do recommend, more for the attitude it espouses rather than any specific solutions it recommends) rely heavily on outsourcing to "virtual assistants" in nations where the exchange rate is beneficial to Westerners. So I think the recent upswing in use of Indian assistants is part of that.
If I'd known about this possibility, I might have outsourced some of the more drudgery-related projects that I had to do in my last job. I was getting snowed under -- more because the management style was simply, "Since he's smart he can do it, give him more more more" (then they fired me for getting too far behind) -- and if I'd known there were some way to briefly get my head above water, just long enough not to drown and instead get caught by a life guard, I might have tried it.
On the other hand, ya gotta wonder about a workplace that is so irrational that it requires its employees to PAY SOMEONE ELSE to actually get their jobs done on time. I wouldn't want to contribute to that sort of arrangement, especially not as a longer-term solution, much at all.
I think you might be able to use this type of arrangement "secretly" as a viable way to really shine in a given position, if you knew how to manage it, and you worked out the details. I can see that some work which you end up not ever doing, just because it becomes a "big thing that you don't want to think about," could just be slipped off to India or Pakistan and therefore ticked off of your "to do" list, freeing up your psychic space -- as well as your work time -- for something more productive that would make you look good. If you managed it right, an assistant could really help you to use your mind on the RIGHT projects and free it from the ones that get you down.
On the other hand, you could also just try to pay someone else to do your job for you. Really, there's nothing morally wrong with that in the long run; it's what your employers are doing to you in the first place, isn't it?
I'd recommend people also look into assistants who are in their own communities. Putting an ad up on Craig's List or similar (E-lance?) you can get plenty of people who need the odd jobs. Especially in the computer and writing fields, folks really seem to be attracted to setting themselves up to perform piece-work rather than having to have long-term daily grind commitments at an office.
Some of the bigger drawbacks are in communication. If you don't make absolutely clear your aims and objectives when you initially describe the task, the assistant is likely to have different assumptions from you and really get it wrong. Adding a clear final deadline, and an intermediate deadline for reporting of progress according to set parameters, also might help.
Eolake, I'd suggest that your DOMAI business is probably something that can be reliably outsourced. I'm sure there are regular daily or weekly chores that are quite repetitive, including billing and collections, and rotating images on the site. That's the sort of thing an assistant would be wonderful at. You can look at it as saving money by not hiring one; or saving time by making a desirable trade-off between you having to grind through doing it, as opposed to someone else taking care of it for a mild fee.
"Four Hour Work Week" suggests just this. If you dislike it because you feel you're "losing" money, the author would recommend you start evaluating your life in terms of other currencies, including mobility and leisure-time.
"Since he's smart he can do it, give him more more more"
ReplyDeleteBut you're clearly not. You're a dunce, judging by your posts here.
Anon, how about demonstrating your own intelligence, instead of just denigrating that of others?
ReplyDeleteAnyone who, like Final, goes around constantly talking about how smart he is (when he's obviously not) deserves to be slammed and slammed repeatedly. He knows the truth, as does everyone else, so why lie? It's pretty much the same as when he blames absolutely everything else in the world for his problems - his lack of money and dates - instead of himself. "But I'm so highly intelligent, studly, and hardworking - oh, except I'm not...right...forgot about that..."
ReplyDeleteCome on, Eolake, be a sport. Insulting others is not an easy job. It takes skill to put people down, any company boss knows that. Just like a good arsonist needs to always be careful not to set himself on fire.
ReplyDeleteAre you aware just how many Hamas bomb makers blew themselves up? It happens every day. Why? Because they don't have the smarts to aim only at others.
Or it could be subconscious self-destructive tendancies, but let's not play shrinks, that's Pascal's job. When he returns from his camel ride among the long-nosed sexy desert vixens.