The employment gaps caused by the Great Resignation are having a major impact on the outsourcing industry and the type of talent that companies need.
So says Edward Batten, executive vice president of growth at BairesDev, a San Francisco-based technology company that provides software development outsourcing services. Batten shares insights into how team structures, longevity of outsourcing projects and leadership needs have already changed during this challenging time—and where he expects them to go.
How have client engagements shifted from the beginning of the pandemic in terms of timeline and team size? What are clients expecting from their outsourcing partners now that they didn’t expect before?
Companies nowadays are looking to improve efficiencies from a remote working perspective, trying to integrate this new reality into their office space, scheduling and daily activities. Clients are proactively seeking those partnerships to accelerate their digital transformation in a wide range of industries.
We have seen a shift in clients’ needs and engagement. Clients are looking to deploy their technology or product roadmap faster, or desire to accelerate their plans to recover the time lost during the pandemic.
Clients are also now establishing longer-term relationships and assigning more complex projects to their outsourcing partners. The competition for talent has become extreme and while many organizations would like to hire their own employees, the combination of time-to-hire, time-to-value and poaching in the market means there is a consistent serious threat of losing mindshare and internal knowledge and resetting the six- to nine-month clock—which is detrimental to making it to market. Clients expect their outsourcing partners to maintain consistency and, in turn, mindshare and internal knowledge.
Currently, BairesDev is collaborating with clients accelerating their business transformation plans, while others that were negatively impacted by the Covid-19 crisis are now investing in their product roadmap. Still others are adapting their business models and pivoting to offer better experiences to their customers.
What do these changes say about how the outsourcing industry has changed as a whole from the start of the pandemic?
We have seen a rising competition within the industry to recruit top talent, especially software engineers. This situation is driven by remote working conditions, increased demand for outsourcing services across industries and the Great Resignation phenomenon. Many outsourcing companies are reaching out for untapped talent all over the world. This requires a solid recruitment and assessment process to capture those individuals who will provide value to clients.
How can we expect the outsourcing industry to shift in the coming months as businesses continue to rethink their return-to-office plans?
We will see an increase in remote working to more sectors, as remote work can positively impact productivity and performance, provide a better work-life balance, induce savings and even help the environment.
Remote work as a response to the pandemic led to improvised systems and workflows, which were implemented without understanding the advantages and drawbacks of this model. Now, companies must create new ways of organizing workflows for a fast ramp-up to produce high-quality solutions for clients while minimizing issues during the development lifecycle. This entails a wide range of implementations to provide a high-quality customer experience, add value to the client and support them upon completion.
The outsourcing industry will be more focused on providing services that integrate the company’s team with the clients’ so that they can work with the best talent as required and reduce the communication, security, performance and collaboration issues.
