[SI-LIST] Re: Outsourcing / methodology
- From: "Colin Cairns" <ccairns@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <James.Freeman@xxxxxxx>, <kegan@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Wed, 11 Jul 2007 12:19:06 -0700
I know this list isn't a good place to pitch, however we've been very
successful at Design Solutions, Inc. implementing "controlled
outsourcing" for companies--using a combination of our local engineers
to interface with the client-engineering team, and our in-house overseas
engineers in our Romanian facilities to cut cost and offer 24 hour
design team. =20
I agree that "throwing it over the wall" to a layout group or SI group
doesn't work (or manufacturing for that matter), but that is true
whether the group is internal to the company or outsourced.
=20
You're right about the communication barrier being less about fluency in
English than cultural understanding as well; it took us several years of
working with RO engineers before it became productive, despite being
very educated, quality engineers on both sides... =20
...likewise with schedule slipping due to ECOs, poor documentation,
etc...you know what runs down hill, after all!
Cheers!
Colin
-----Original Message-----
From: si-list-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx [mailto:si-list-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx]
On Behalf Of James Freeman
Sent: Wednesday, July 11, 2007 11:02 AM
To: kegan@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Cc: si-list@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
Subject: [SI-LIST] Re: Outsourcing / methodology
I have had the same difficulty in Vietnam and other Asian countries
as well. It was a disaster from a schedule standpoint. Often, the
reasons for outsourcing are weighted toward a presumed requirement of
quick completion and the people who do the work are often untrustworthy
in both schedule and quality of work.
The managers on the outsourcing entity are masters of obfuscation
and bureaucratic meneuvering. They know quite well how to manipulate a
management structure(yours) to buy time. Often they are outright liars
that actually have no one to perform the work but are betting on being
able to hire and/or finagle resources that don't exist. Even if they do
provide a name, that person is only a tag that is working on several
projects at a time and is only giving incremental progress to stave off
management ire(both yours and his).
The bottom line is that there is a monumental amount of work to
generate the SOW for a particular job due to contractual and other
considerations. If those man-hours were spent actually doing the job,
The cost would be lower overall.
Jim Freeman
Kenneth W. Egan wrote:
> While I agree that the focus of the SI-List is largely technical, I
have to
>wonder if its not appropriate perhaps to have discourse on experiences
>related to SI /PCB in outsourcing.
>
>I work for a company that was primarily setup to outsource the
>implementation of our ideas/specs etc.
>
>Had I / we known the difficulties we ended up facing, we might not have
gone
>down that route.
>
>We had 4 Large SI/PCB physical design projects outsourced. The problems
that
>arose were related to massive communication problems, despite fluency
in
>English, massive overselling of actual technical talent, and refusal to
take
>technical direction in the scope of work.
>
>For SI, we asked for solution space engineering, i.e. topology and
physical
>placment investigation for the proper / best margin design. We supplied
>behavioral topologies / sims to support the physical design and
extraction.
>
>We received a non functional layout, gross errors, and no simulation
data.
>Webinars etc were used to communicate, but the quality of the work just
>wasn't there, or perhaps extreme ignorance.
>
>The other problem we had was in the business contracts. WITHOUT
exception,
>each case negotiated a fee, based on a fixed bid. No one delivered on
THEIR
>OWN schedule, and then attempted to renegotiate the contract,
withholding
>the deliverables until said renegotiation occurred.
>
>Not a political statement.
>
>
>Anyone on the SI-LIST have a tried a true methodology for outsourcing
??=20
>
>I thought a standard SI methodology was sufficient to drive a SOW, and
>constant email/phone and web interaction to contain/control technical
>issues. Our consistant inability to drive outsourcing forced us to do
the
>work internally.
>
>KWE
>
>
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