If Offshoring Makes You Happy…5 Observations About Offshoring Color-Blindness

Jay Manahanlinkedin.com/in/jaymanahan

In 1996,Sheryl Crow sang‘If it makes you happy, it can’t be that bad.’

Sadly, many outsourcing and shared services experiences don't have the same optimism.

Many can't even relate to its honest questioning of our perceptions…

If it makes you happy, then what the hell is the matter?

?

Fast forward 17 years…

In 2013, David Gold* said ‘the SLAs look greenbut they feel red.’*Expenditure Process Manager of Shell Shared Services Asia

N

Y\

Everyone chuckled.

Well, maybe not everyone. Some just nodded their heads.

I call this the Psychological Color-Blindness of Offshoring.

It is when factual performance measurements show the outsourcing project is proving beneficial...

N

…but the process owners feel it is not.

Y\Usually following an occurrence or series of within-threshold performance gaps.

Now that is a loaded definition.

So let’sbreak

thatdown.

llll

l Numeric, Factual Performance MeasurementsClear, unquestionable, mutually agreed metrics that outline the outsourced process owner's expectations.

This is critical.

Without it, the experience is not Color-Blindness.But simply the offshore partner Making Excuses.

My dog ate it.

l Process Owner Emotion

This can't be measured, but it has indicators: superlatives or exaggerations; tone; or one-off, anecdotal, minority reports generalized to describe the norm.

“the worst”“always wrong”“lowest it's been”“never met”

l Real Performance Gap

Admit it. Despite extreme, anecdotal, emotional reactions to apparent gaps, there are real offshoring screw-ups out there.

Failing to recognize this is alsoColor-Blindness……from the offshore side.

l Within Performance Thresholds

Performance misses should be demonstrably within agreed expectations. If the offshore

effort is consistentlynot meeting

clear targets and controllable

goals...

…it is not Color-Blindness.

It is simply Underperformance.

So I began recording recurring conclusions about these experiences. Incidentally,

they also serve as

guidelines for any

outsourcing program

observing this phenomenon.

l

ŒRed/green color-blindness is the most prevalent kind. ll

�Offshoring color-blindness is psychosomatic. What the color-

blind see (or feel) is a

misrepresentation of reality,

fuelled by emotional

reaction — it is not fact.

ŽThe color-blind know they are so because the facts have been pointed out to them.So to deal with the offshoring color-blind, just point them to the facts, with empathy.

F

�The color-blind realize their condition through comparison…

Distinction from the greater

majority who are normal.

What is the greater normal majority?The 99.99% of transactions that go well on a daily basis.

Or the majority of other offshore operations that are not “all wrong.”

�In a number of countries, the color-blind are not allowed to drive.

Who, then, should drive?

?

It is the job of offshoring Program Managers…

to lead stakeholders to the program’s destination

to gauge performance through a factual dashboard

½

to point out the road signs

to distinguish the red lights from the green

KP

ll

If you — a key stakeholder in the offshoring program — believe you are Offshoring Color-Blind…

…don't drive. Take a

backseat.

At the end of the day…

…if the offshoring program makes the enterprise happy…

“Then why the hell are you so sad?”

Thank you.

(Sheryl Crow, take

us out.)

This piece first appeared in narrative form in Outsource Magazine in April 2014.

It was republished three months later in the Shared Services and Outsourcing Network (SSON).

colour color

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