Collaborative Sourcing As a New Transformational Approach

Is outsourcing outdated? Yes, collaborative sourcing is currently on the rise.

Application collaborative sourcing is a delivery framework that provides ongoing development and maintenance of an enterprise's full application portfolio. The framework model provides a platform to drive innovation and focuses on time-to-value while introducing working collaborative practices to get critical business functionality into production at a fast rate.

A core theme of collaborative sourcing is improving the business's capability to compete on time. The collaborative sourcing argument is that if we wish to accelerate time-to-value, we need to measure factors of time at the lowest levels of granularity possible.

Collaborative sourcing accelerates time-to-value. Through a set of Web 2.0 technologies and an integrated set of processes, collaborative sourcing focuses on cycle time (elapsed time) and speed (hours vs estimate) as the principal metrics for measuring performance.

Staff behaviors are directed toward competitive, time-based outcomes when not only development methods, but also the talent model and recognition systems, are calibrated on time-based measures.

Collaborative sourcing is a true transformational approach to an enterprise's applications development and maintenance strategy. In addition to providing the mechanism to realize the benefits of global delivery and continue significant cost reductions, collaborative sourcing creates the engine to accelerate time-to-value. Rather than focusing almost exclusively on cost takeout, collaborative sourcing refocuses a CIO's capabilities and resources toward adding value to the business through accelerated time-to-value and outcomes-based measurement processes.

Source: Global Services

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Want to Stay in the Game - Be Progressive!

A clear correlation between IT organizations that deliver IT services at a more strategic level to the business, and how businesses perceive their IT organizations was revealed in the research conducted by a UK based industry analyst Freeform Dynamics.

It says: “There is indeed such a thing as the ‘progressive’ IT organization”. For such organizations it is important to be delivering services to the business at a strategic level meaning taking into consideration what can be kept in-house and needs to be sourced; learning from the experiences of more progressive IT organizations; adopting new working practices and of course, being more than just a cost centre!

Moreover, the research provides a number of steps IT organizations can take to deliver a significantly higher level of service to the business:

- The IT organisation needs to get the basics right
- Create a common language between business and IT
- Establish a peer relationship between business and IT
- Work towards co-ordinated goals and objectives
- Manage IT as a business-driven portfolio
- Foster relationships with key IT suppliers.

The conclusion drawn by the research is “the more progressive IT organizations will be better placed to manage the ongoing integration process that will be required, and deliver appropriate services to the business as a result”.

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