Multi-Sourcing in Out-Sourcing

I find my current engagement quite unique. My past experiences have been centric on my employer being the sole solution provider with no dependencies other than the client. But here, TCS, Infosys, Cognizant, IBM..... U name it..its there...., work for various functions. All sit on the same floors, attend the same meetings with similar agenda, participate in similar town halls. Often, I hear a Indian name from the other side of the phone and wonder which company is he from. Furthermore, I find Type 1 Outsourcing a fun. To act as decision makers for the client rather than just doing what they want is encouraging. I recollect, the client often asking us “From your previous experiences in other accounts, how can we handle this”, “In other peoplesoft accounts that TCS handles, what implementation process is used”. The window of opportunity is wide yet narrow. As pro-client, we are expected to provide best recommendations. As pro-TCS, we are expected to keep ourselves better than the competition and provide revenue generating recommendations. The line in between is thin and difficult to adopt.

What this process has resulted in is a two fold sword. We have to keep on engaging with the cross functional teams. This has propelled increased efficiency and communication on one hand and blame game on the other. There have been instances where each party plays pass the buck game. Now is it healthy for the clients and for the vendors?

Evaluating the client side, I would take a personal example. As a customer, the more choices I have the better decision and better deals I will get. For instance, if there are 4-5 different telecom operators, I can expect each one offering a wide range of services and I can conveniently find more than one operator offering a genuine deal. Furthermore, it is quite likely that I can negotiate with one operator since he runs a risk of losing me to his competitor. Extending the same philosophy to clients, they have employed the similar strategy at Corporate Level. If we have multiple vendors serving various part of our applications and infrastructure, we stand a better chance of getting improved services at lesser costs.

On the vendor side, If I have more competitors, I stand a better chance of re-inventing myself. In short term, I might run at a risk of losing a part of my clientele or business but in longer term I will have better processes and efficiency from the constrained margins. As a TCSer, I observe an extra sense of commitment and effort from the senior leadership for a particular project that involves cross functional teams of different vendors than when the other team is from TCS. Even at team member level, there is an hint increased efficiency conforming to preserve the image of the company. Certainly there is an extra effort to synergies the best practices to achieve greater efficiency. In all, the impact is positive though sometimes it feels like dealing with unnecessary roadblocks , multiple status reports, and multiple entries in vendor applications at operational level.

In retrospect, I guess this is going to be the way large corporate house will engage the vendors let alone the software services. Hmm, I thought I should have used the title as -- Competition at the cube level -- :) !!