July 28, 2010 at 9:15 am
I have worked in large and small companies. The people that want to protect their turf are there, but they're not in every place. Not all large companies are like this. If you work for someone like this, I'd agree with Blandry, move on or keep your head down.
I have been involved in some outsourcing, and what's happened typically has been some amount of layoffs. Even if you don't wholesale remove people 1:1, usually staff is reduced when there is outsourcing.
I do tend to agree that if companies outsource, it ought to be inside the same country. Nothing against other countries, but legally we ought to be promoting jobs inside our own country, not in others.
July 28, 2010 at 9:52 am
I work in Research at the Veterans Admin Hospital. It is very hard to convert research $$ to IT dollars - as they are congressionally split. So we end up having to outsource. And it is ridiculously expensive! For a good DBA the gov't contract rate is >$200/hr. So we have a bunch of sysadmins, programmers, dba's... that are independent contractors, or from a big company that specializes in outsourcing (Robert Half, Niche ...). Its a terrible waste of money - as the employee does not receive this amount in salary and there is little recourse for us if the employees do a bad job. It definitly slows us down and is bad for morale.
July 28, 2010 at 9:56 am
bnordberg (7/28/2010)
I work in Research at the Veterans Admin Hospital. It is very hard to convert research $$ to IT dollars - as they are congressionally split. So we end up having to outsource. And it is ridiculously expensive! For a good DBA the gov't contract rate is >$200/hr. So we have a bunch of sysadmins, programmers, dba's... that are independent contractors, or from a big company that specializes in outsourcing (Robert Half, Niche ...). Its a terrible waste of money - as the employee does not receive this amount in salary and there is little recourse for us if the employees do a bad job. It definitly slows us down and is bad for morale.
> $200/hr, independent contractors? How do I get such a contract? 😉
July 28, 2010 at 10:26 am
bnordberg (7/28/2010)
I work in Research at the Veterans Admin Hospital. It is very hard to convert research $$ to IT dollars - as they are congressionally split. So we end up having to outsource. And it is ridiculously expensive! For a good DBA the gov't contract rate is >$200/hr. So we have a bunch of sysadmins, programmers, dba's... that are independent contractors, or from a big company that specializes in outsourcing (Robert Half, Niche ...). Its a terrible waste of money - as the employee does not receive this amount in salary and there is little recourse for us if the employees do a bad job. It definitly slows us down and is bad for morale.
Yet another excellent example and reason of why the outsourcing/off-shoring of jobs needs to end. 😀
"Technology is a weird thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand, and it stabs you in the back with the other. ...:-D"
July 28, 2010 at 10:30 am
I forgot to mention - data loss from contractors http://thehill.com/blogs/hillicon-valley/technology/97817-va-loses-another-laptop-with-veterans-personal-information
Some of our contractors use Macs for the sole purpose that we cannot lock down USB ports - so they can use external storage ...
July 28, 2010 at 11:50 am
Outsourcing is not inherently bad. The fact is not everyone should be doing everything, and a lot of IT can be commoditized for many companies. For example, how many companies do payroll anymore? A lot of non-core data center tasks like power, cooling, physical security, network and storage management and the like can be skipped if you just hire boxes from some facility and just focus on your software. You still need to be professional, but you needn't be hands on.
I was at a large insurance company that hired out the regulatory adjustments on the really old policy management app that wasn't used for new sales, and that freed employees to build out the new stuff that was more interesting and important to the future of the business. Again, you have to test and stay vigilant, but you don't have to do all the work. The trick for IT professionals is to not insist that your job is specifically maintaining the old policy app, but be willing to grab other tasks near it and not get caught on any particular ice floe that the company might shove out to sea.
[font="Arial"]Are you lost daddy? I asked tenderly.
Shut up he explained.[/font]
- Ring Lardner
July 28, 2010 at 12:23 pm
The trick for IT professionals is to not insist that your job is specifically maintaining the old policy app, but be willing to grab other tasks near it and not get caught on any particular ice floe that the company might shove out to sea.
I don't think the burden should fall to the IT professional to constantly be concerned about what tasks they are doing now are going to possibly be outsourced by the company in the future. In most cases this would be almost impossible to predict anyway, IT workers are hired to do specific jobs and tasks for the company. They are not hired to read crystal balls and figure out what part of their job their departments are considering outsourcing and then find new tasks to learn that their department is not going to outsource. That would be silly to try and undertake and most people have enough to do and worry about in our daily jobs as it is. Not to mention the SarBox restrictions of learning tasks in other job descriptions.:w00t:
"Technology is a weird thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand, and it stabs you in the back with the other. ...:-D"
July 28, 2010 at 1:21 pm
In most cases this would be almost impossible to predict anyway, IT workers are hired to do specific jobs and tasks for the company. They are not hired to read crystal balls and figure out what part of their job their departments are considering outsourcing and then find new tasks to learn that their department is not going to outsource. That would be silly to try and undertake and most people have enough to do and worry about in our daily jobs as it is.
I couldn't agree less.
There are no equivalents to "general laborer" in IT, so a certain amount of specialization is implied in every job in the industry. Beyond the obvious example of a COBOL guy in this day and age, there are some tasks that are more vulnerable and some that are less. Some company cultures are more open to outsourcing than others. If you can see your job or your company's IT work on the fungible side of the scale then start to prepare for possible changes. You don't need to act like it's weeks away, but ask yourself honestly why your job shouldn't be sent out, and be harsh in evaluating your value. Really try to see how much or how little value you add compared to an anonymous voice on the phone with similar skills. If you also offer suggestions on how sprocs are stored in source control or how system metrics are saved for evaluating long-term usage patterns or better ways to arrange the databases on the SAN then you are different. But if you're just doing your daily tasks and punching the clock you need to accept that you aren't that different and perhaps might be vulnerable. If that's the case you need to find ways to be unique or you need to investigate more drastic moves like adding different skills or changing to a company with less impetus to go this direction.
I guess my main point is the world doesn't owe you a job. If you want to passively watch bad stuff roll toward you like a summer storm and just sit there getting wet then no one can help you. You can't legislate stuff like this: my current company outsourced some work to Idaho and that's not something that'd be stopped by the government. You need to actively manage your career, and that includes envisioning the good and the bad and steering in particular directions: be valuable, be open to change, keep your skills current and keep your eyes open.
[font="Arial"]Are you lost daddy? I asked tenderly.
Shut up he explained.[/font]
- Ring Lardner
July 28, 2010 at 1:28 pm
I don't think the burden should fall to the IT professional to constantly be concerned about what tasks they are doing now are going to possibly be outsourced by the company in the future.
You are right, Travis. IT professionals should instead focus on doing their assigned tasks to the best of their ability. We should all be focused on doing the best we can and growing both personally and professionally. Though the economy is a concern right now, I am confident that having the right knowledge combined with the right attitude will help you land a new (and possibly better) job soon if you lose your job due to outsourcing.
July 28, 2010 at 1:28 pm
Your career is up to you.
I think you ought to try and be thinking about whether your not your job can be outsourced, and what you can do about it. It's not that you need to be accurate in your predictions, but everyone searches for the easy way out. If your management thinks they can easily outsource your job, for less money, they might. It is your career to convince them to you aren't worth outsourcing.
July 28, 2010 at 1:34 pm
Cris E (7/28/2010)
In most cases this would be almost impossible to predict anyway, IT workers are hired to do specific jobs and tasks for the company. They are not hired to read crystal balls and figure out what part of their job their departments are considering outsourcing and then find new tasks to learn that their department is not going to outsource. That would be silly to try and undertake and most people have enough to do and worry about in our daily jobs as it is.I couldn't agree less.
There are no equivalents to "general laborer" in IT, so a certain amount of specialization is implied in every job in the industry. Beyond the obvious example of a COBOL guy in this day and age, there are some tasks that are more vulnerable and some that are less. Some company cultures are more open to outsourcing than others. If you can see your job or your company's IT work on the fungible side of the scale then start to prepare for possible changes. You don't need to act like it's weeks away, but ask yourself honestly why your job shouldn't be sent out, and be harsh in evaluating your value. Really try to see how much or how little value you add compared to an anonymous voice on the phone with similar skills. If you also offer suggestions on how sprocs are stored in source control or how system metrics are saved for evaluating long-term usage patterns or better ways to arrange the databases on the SAN then you are different. But if you're just doing your daily tasks and punching the clock you need to accept that you aren't that different and perhaps might be vulnerable. If that's the case you need to find ways to be unique or you need to investigate more drastic moves like adding different skills or changing to a company with less impetus to go this direction.
I guess my main point is the world doesn't owe you a job. If you want to passively watch bad stuff roll toward you like a summer storm and just sit there getting wet then no one can help you. You can't legislate stuff like this: my current company outsourced some work to Idaho and that's not something that'd be stopped by the government. You need to actively manage your career, and that includes envisioning the good and the bad and steering in particular directions: be valuable, be open to change, keep your skills current and keep your eyes open.
It's not about the world owing anyone a job, that is not what stopping the off-shoring and outsourcing of American jobs to other countries is about and if you don't know that then maybe you need to get up to speed on the movement that many senators and congressmen are basing their upcoming election campaigns on. I can provide this information for you if you would like. Idaho is not what I and most Americans are concered about right now. It is about protecting the jobs we have in our country right now in an economy where millions of Americans are currently out of work. No one is saying you shouldn't keep your skills in your current job sharp, but learning tasks in other jobs to hedge against this is tough to predict and in many companies SarBox and HIPPA standards prevent this anyway. If you are classified as a DBA you cannot double as an application developer if there is a separate job description for that job in companies that enforce SarBox auditing standards.:-D
"Technology is a weird thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand, and it stabs you in the back with the other. ...:-D"
July 28, 2010 at 2:43 pm
TravisDBA (7/28/2010)
Cris E (7/28/2010)
In most cases this would be almost impossible to predict anyway, IT workers are hired to do specific jobs and tasks for the company. They are not hired to read crystal balls and figure out what part of their job their departments are considering outsourcing and then find new tasks to learn that their department is not going to outsource. That would be silly to try and undertake and most people have enough to do and worry about in our daily jobs as it is.I couldn't agree less.
There are no equivalents to "general laborer" in IT, so a certain amount of specialization is implied in every job in the industry. Beyond the obvious example of a COBOL guy in this day and age, there are some tasks that are more vulnerable and some that are less. Some company cultures are more open to outsourcing than others. If you can see your job or your company's IT work on the fungible side of the scale then start to prepare for possible changes. You don't need to act like it's weeks away, but ask yourself honestly why your job shouldn't be sent out, and be harsh in evaluating your value. Really try to see how much or how little value you add compared to an anonymous voice on the phone with similar skills. If you also offer suggestions on how sprocs are stored in source control or how system metrics are saved for evaluating long-term usage patterns or better ways to arrange the databases on the SAN then you are different. But if you're just doing your daily tasks and punching the clock you need to accept that you aren't that different and perhaps might be vulnerable. If that's the case you need to find ways to be unique or you need to investigate more drastic moves like adding different skills or changing to a company with less impetus to go this direction.
I guess my main point is the world doesn't owe you a job. If you want to passively watch bad stuff roll toward you like a summer storm and just sit there getting wet then no one can help you. You can't legislate stuff like this: my current company outsourced some work to Idaho and that's not something that'd be stopped by the government. You need to actively manage your career, and that includes envisioning the good and the bad and steering in particular directions: be valuable, be open to change, keep your skills current and keep your eyes open.
It's not about the world owing anyone a job, that is not what stopping the off-shoring and outsourcing of American jobs to other countries is about and if you don't know that then maybe you need to get up to speed on the movement that many senators and congressmen are basing their upcoming election campaigns on. I can provide this information for you if you would like. Idaho is not what I and most Americans are concered about right now. It is about protecting the jobs we have in our country right now in an economy where millions of Americans are currently out of work. No one is saying you shouldn't keep your skills in your current job sharp, but learning tasks in other jobs to hedge against this is tough to predict and in many companies SarBox and HIPPA standards prevent this anyway. If you are classified as a DBA you cannot double as an application developer if there is a separate job description for that job in companies that enforce SarBox auditing standards.:-D
I think it depends on how you structure things. I was with a company that did just that and was SarBox, the team was small and required us to be both developers and administrators. We just made sure we documented everything we did so that auditors could see what we did, when we did it, and why we did it. No problems.
July 28, 2010 at 3:02 pm
I think it depends on how you structure things. I was with a company that did just that and was SarBox, the team was small and required us to be both developers and administrators. We just made sure we documented everything we did so that auditors could see what we did, when we did it, and why we did it. No problems.
Or maybe it was how your job descriptions were written too. But in my experience most SarBox auditors are very clear on the saparation of job duties in IT departments and I have seen companies get gigged over it too. 😀
"Technology is a weird thing. It brings you great gifts with one hand, and it stabs you in the back with the other. ...:-D"
July 28, 2010 at 4:53 pm
Usually for SOX the separation of duties only comes into play if the duties are related. ie, can a developer deploy his or her own code into production even though there's a designated deployment team? In most cases it's usually b/c of unnecessary/elevated permissions. I wouldn't see DBA and developer duties together being a SOX conflict as long as there's still a system of checks and balances. As long as any job sharing is operating within the boundaries of the existing security framework then I wouldn't see the SOX auditors raising a stink over it.
July 29, 2010 at 2:09 am
OK folks, I read what you think about the whole outsourcing issue and its implications. I agree to the general opinion here that if you are smart enough, you can make the management think that the work that you do cannot be outsourced. But, there is always a trade-off and sometimes managements will just go ahead with outsourcing (i mean both getting the work done in a less expensive developing nation and getting it done by consultants who could still be Americans).
I think a major issue here is that American jobs are done by non-American people. Well, that's a primary reason for the unemployment. I do agree that it is not fair, when millions of Americans are jobless, jobs that should rightly be done by Americans are being done by people from developing nations like India and Philippines. So, say the President makes a law that stops the shipping of jobs. So, a lot of jobs come back. People get jobs. Everyone is happy.
I have a question here and I would like to add that I don't mean to pick up a fight. I am from a third world country, a developing nation (India). And I am doing a job that should actually be done by an American. I think so because, the company I work for is American, the project I am doing is for a huge American corporate (a financial services company) and it will eventually be used by people in America. My point is I, being on the other end of the chain, will have a different perspective from you. Please let me know what you think about my question.
Qn:
A lot of software projects that should be done in US are outsourced, a lot of them to India and to other countries. This should be stopped or at least controlled so that the jobs come back to US and more people get jobs. I agree to this too.
A lot of devices, say for example iPhones, are made in China. This makes sure that the price of the device is kept low and well, Apple gets more profit. Do you think iPhones should instead be made in US? Apple is an American company. So it is fair to say a job created by Apple should employ an American. Isn't this also a form of outsourcing? Do you think this should be stopped too? Or do you feel less strongly about it because you are happy with the quality and of course, the low price of the device?
PS: My views are a result of what I see around me and may be very different from yours. I am sorry if I sound unpleasant.
- arjun
https://sqlroadie.com/
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