Offshore IT providers are not as good as you think

Last night – I spoke with another potential customer who has had a very bad experience with outsourcing their coveted project to an overseas country. Their experience turned down-right ugly.

So what are some of the shortcomings of outsourcing offshore?

There are many, however there a couple notable shortcomings that are hard to overcome.

Most offshore companies are from third-world countries – which means you may have many overwhelming barriers to conquer. Besides the known hurdles like time zones and langauge, you also have barriers like comprehension, understanding, knowledge and employee pool.

You also have to be concerned with legal issues, as the company I talked with last is experiencing. Unfortunately for them – the country in which they contracted with does not recognize or honor our legal system – and therefore the outsourcing company is hiding behind the vail of this oversight. They have now stopped returning their emails and calls. So what can this small USA company do – short of hopping on a plane and flying to the country and knocking on the outsources companies door – nothing. They are now writing off $750,000 for just a small demo application.

So what went wrong? Plenty!

I have seen this scenario so many times. In my opinion many offshore companies are scam artist. I am not saying all of them are and if you stay with a reputable, legitimate and known company you may have a better chance at success. However the success I have seen is far and few in between.

The most prevalent abuse I have seen by these companies are the fact that most of their talent pool is inexperienced and amateur. They are years behind in skill and many times lack the basic skills needed. Many are learning as they go – on your dime.

Do your homework, as I mentioned there are legitimate companies out there. However you should really weigh the cost of outsourcing offshore instead of locally – here in the USA. As well – if you do keep your projects here at home, you will be employing many people and helping our own economy thrive.

Why wouldn’t you?

We can provide a Free Technical Assessment, this can be beneficial to new and startup companies that are not sure where to start. You can always find our cloud and hosted services in the right column of this page or by simply going to our website at Raven Cloud Computing.