Outsourcing and Insourcing

Filed in archive Opinions & Insights on September 24, 2008

Aside from writing outsourcing columns and providing legal services to the outsourcing community, I am a competitive fencer (as is most of my family). Why is this relevant to a column regarding outsourcing? Because of this article and the issues that it raised.

The question raised by the article was "why can't India be like China?" in the context of Olympic sports. China was an Olympic backwater just a few short years ago, but with solid hard work and good coaching, China has become a world leader in many sports - including fencing.

How did they do this? Certainly, a centralized structure helps, but China took one more critical step - they in-sourced some of the best and brightest coaches in a number of disciplines (including fencing) - and committed to building a program of excellence.

Why is this relevant to outsourcing? For one, there is constant talk about how India is going to "move up the value chain" and really begin performing higher-level work. But moving up the value chain is difficult - it requires two key components - smart people (the athlete) and creative, skilled leadership (the coaching) - to develop the "athletes" that succeed at the highest levels. India has plenty of "athletes" - but is short on "coaches."

This isn't a forever situation. In China, these first generations of champions are entering the next phase of their careers - which often involves coaching and development of young athletes. The same is true in business - once the industry learns to manipulate the levers of creativity and innovation, new leaders will be created.

However, to get over that initial hump, much is needed. If India looks outside of its borders to bring in the best and brightest leaders in industries like technology, automotive design, law and science, it will bootstrap its incredible talent pool and develop thought leaders in these industries. Then we'll be asking "why can't China be more like India?"