Asking someone else to do something for you is as old as mankind. Fairly compensating that person for agreeing to do the task on your behalf is what we normally call work or employment. Outsourcing is simply asking someone coming from outside a group to do something. The group can be a family, tribe, nation or even a culture. Simply defined, outsourcing is delegating a task to an outsider.
Outsourcing during Ancient times
Ancient cultures delegated a lot of tasks to outsiders. Most of these tasks were related to farming, construction, craft making and even war. An example of outsourcing tasks to other groups is farming. Many ancient people asked other groups to tend to their farms and build irrigation canals. The Egyptians had nearby civilizations assist them in the construction of irrigation canals so that their farms would get water. In return, these groups were given a share of the harvest.
The Han Chinese was known to delegate jewelry making to artisans coming from other tribes. Jade carving, silver and gold smiths came from other tribes to the Han Chinese. Most of these smiths knew where to find the precious metals, while the Han Chinese had a lot of food and other resources that these tribes also needed.
The navigators of the old world were mostly Dutch mariners who knew how to travel by sea just by following the stars at night. These Dutch men were asked by the Spaniards and Portuguese to navigate their ships to the Orient.
Outsourcing during the Industrial Revolution
In the mid 1800’s at the start of the Industrial Revolution, financiers and capitalists who needed to put up their factories needed engineers and machinists. These talented men were hard to find at that time. They were asked to design and construct factories all over. After construction, these men moved on to other projects.
During this period of world history, large scale outsourcing activity was conducted by colonizers. Food production, resource extraction and human labor were outsourced from other countries that became colonies of powerful countries.
Outsourcing costs and drawbacks
Outsourcing during the ancient times and at the onset of the industrial revolution was kind of “expensive” socially and financially. Outsourced labor during the ancient times usually ended up as slaves or captive artisans. Navigators during the age of empire asked for up half of what the ship made in a year. Specialist engineers asked to become part of the enterprise, or asked for large up front fees.
Outsourcing WAS about “gaining access to resources and talent that was needed to achieve a goal”. This was the over riding motivation behind outsourcing. The group that got the outsourcing task usually got the short end of the deal.
Outsourcing Today
Outsourcing today is still about gaining access to talent, and the resource that is being sought after are men and women with highly competitive skills that produce the needed results at the soonest possible time. Gone are the days when outsourcing was based on a disadvantageous relationship between a master and a slave.
Present day outsourcing is about talent and skill, and the timely execution of tasks based on mutually agreed compensation standards.
The Current Global Context
Current technology has broken distance and time barriers – the two main obstacles to instantaneous communication. This is made possible through the internet infrastructure that has wrapped up the globe in a web of interconnectedness. By taking advantage of the presence of this web, talented and skilled men and women can be accessed by entrepreneurs to execute tasks that are needed to achieve a goal.
Most of the talent and skill available for outsourcing are knowledge and skill intensive. Constant training and skill upgrading is needed in this outsourcing context. This is also overly technology dependent and technology driven.
Time zone, distance and cultural barriers are no longer factors that impede outsourcing agreements.
Commonly outsourced tasks
The following tasks are commonly outsourced through the internet:
- Software development – programmers, as individuals or as a team can work on their homes apart from each other and still deliver the needed software.
- Research and Content Development – researchers and writers can develop different types of content for any one needing an article on a one time or ongoing basis.
- Back office tasks – office tasks like document filing and integration, customer support and client contact building is being done routinely through the web.
- Design work – architectural or graphic design is also routinely outsourced through the web.
In conclusion
The current wave of outsourcing is growing. The reason behind this unprecedented growth is access to a very large talent pool for those who are looking for talented and skilled persons, and a similarly large and well compensating availability of work online work.
The history of outsourcing may have started out with very sordid stories based on world history. The story line has changed and outsourcing will continue to grow through time. The basic elements in the current outsourcing story are:
- A large pool of talented and skilled providers
- An equally large market of buyers looking for global talent and skill
- A mutually agreed compensation package
- The existence of the internet as the medium of communication and workspace.
I will like to get your feedback on my blog post, did I miss out any key points? I encourage you to share your views about outsourcing by leaving your comments so we can all better understand this relatively new way of doing work.
