I, Cringely | The Pulpit

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

> Date: Tue, 12 Aug 2003 09:03:47 -0500
> From: John Lyon <jelyon () mac com>
> Subject: For IP: I, Cringely | The Pulpit
> To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
>
>
> Might be of interest to IP
>
> http://www.pbs.org/cringely/pulpit/pulpit20030807.html
>
> Begin forwarded message:
>
> > There was a story in the news a couple weeks ago about how IBM was 
> > planning to move thousands -- perhaps tens of thousands -- of technical 
> > positions to India. This isn't just IBM, though. Nearly every big company 
> > that is in the IT outsourcing or software development business is doing 
> > or getting ready to do the same thing. They call this 'offshoring,' and 
> > its goal is to save a lot of money for the companies involved because 
> > India is a very cheap place to do business. And it will accomplish that 
> > objective for awhile. In the long run, though, IT is going to have the 
> > same problems in India that it has here. The only real result of all this 
> > job-shifting will be tens of thousands of older engineers in the U.S. who 
> > will find themselves working at Home Depot. You see, 'offshoring' is 
> > another word for age discrimination.
> >
> > ...
> >
> > It is not that moving jobs to India is so bad, though I hate the weasel 
> > behavior behind some of it. It is simply pointless. What is needed, 
> > instead, is a new approach that diminishes the role of headcount in 
> > corporate power.
> >
> > I am not talking about switching the orientation from headcount to costs. 
> > I am talking abut switching from headcount AND costs to true productivity 
> > -- getting the work done and the customer served as efficiently as 
> > possible. And this comes entirely down to hiring. It is not who you get 
> > rid of, but whom you keep.
> >
> > Just as an example, there are programmers who are a hundred or a thousand 
> > times more productive than their coworkers, and every Silicon Valley 
> > startup is constantly on the lookout for that kind of genius. Those 
> > people work in big companies, too, but their impact is muted. What 
> > manager at any big company would trade 100 workers for one, no matter how 
> > smart the one? No manager would do that, and yet they should. Power and 
> > efficiency are in conflict here. And that's why we can scale up the 
> > software and the hardware, gaining efficiencies along the way, but we 
> > don't do that with people. It's not that we can't, we just don't. It is a 
> > disservice to customers and a drag on earnings. There is no rational 
> > justification at all for this headcount mentality, yet it still exists.
> >
> > Productivity is producing more with fewer resources, usually with fewer 
> > people. It?s all about simplification, reducing or eliminating labor, 
> > improving tools, locking in on a standard approach and being smart about 
> > changes. Is this what IBM and others are doing? When was the last time a 
> > systems management product like Tivoli or OpenView really reduced IT 
> > labor? The IT business model is based on bodies. To improve profitability 
> > they are looking for cheaper bodies. They can't envision a business model 
> > where they can do more with fewer bodies. IBM has invested hundreds of 
> > millions in tools for its services division. Very, very little of it 
> > actually reduces the labor IBM needs to support a customer. This mindset 
> > is what is damaging the U.S. IT industry.
> >
> > Ironically, there lies here an enormous opportunity for someone. An 
> > organization of talented people that can get its collective head around 
> > this problem and begin to see its industry, its work, and its goals in a 
> > different way will have a terrific advantage. IBM and companies like it 
> > are vulnerable.
> >
> > And moving jobs to India won't change that.
> >
> > --
> > Posted by John Lyon to :: JELyon's Rampage :: at 8/12/2003 03:43:59 AM
>
> John Lyon
> ______________________________________
> http://jelyon.net

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