Managing Offshore IT

I am presuming that planning for these trips begins with a study of guides like “The IT Manager's Essential Guide to India”
A quick googling of the topic brought the following interesting blog, reflective of similar trips by other students. “India Study Trip” (summary of Stanford GSB's visit)
"Not surprisingly, our visits focused on the growing IT sector with stops at the impressive and established Infosys"
"Today’s meetings were last but definitely not least. We were given a tour of the magnificent Infosys campus in the morning. . . . We then met with Mr Narayana Murthy and his wife Mrs Sudha Murthy. They spoke for about half and hour each about the tremendous growth of Infosys, and about the philanthropic work of the Infosys Foundation. The Q&A session was covered by about half a dozen eager paparazzi with their cameras, which added some extra excitement."

What I find interesting about these blogs and other similar trip reports is that they seem to echo a ‘shock and awe’ factor: essentially depicting how the students experienced a different culture and were in awed by the meeting with CEOs. While this is certainly a dimension that students of globalization should be experiencing: what about the nuts-and-bolts? Executing and delivering on sourcing strategies project after project is what affirms the confidence of global clients in the workings of the model, right? So, where is the discussion around observations on sourcing?

An example of this questioning could be:

“The array of business operations that Infosys provides is truly astounding. They provide assistance with finance, life sciences, retail distribution and engineering so that companies can concentrate on their core competencies.

Our last meeting for today was with Infosys, the BPO giant of India….During the presentation by Infosys, there were some items with which we disagreed. They stated that American companies were not all that concerned with cost savings when outsourcing to India, but rather it was the quality of work that attracted companies from around the world. While it is true that Infosys attracts some of the best talent in the world to work on their projects, it is highly unlikely that many US companies would have outsourced their operations halfway around the world if there had not been cost savings involved.” Blogged by International Entrepreneurship Study Abroad Trip Focusing on India

Now, I am not going to be answering this specific query … or even blogging on a ‘guide to successful outsourcing site visit’  However, I must admit that I am fascinated by the sheer energy of students from universities in the west who plan trips to visit and experience flattening of the world halfway across the globe.