Today I came across a blog by a prominent university lecturer. In it he asked the question about whether it was ethical for him to outsource the development of a page on his charity’s website. He asked around and a taxi driver said “Try Freelancer.co.uk”.
Of course he got lots of offers. However, all the ones from the US or the UK were a lot more expensive than the ones from India. So, our man the professor thought “Hmm. Well, it is for charity don’t you know”. And so he went along the route of outsourcing. Not what you might imagine when you think of outsourcing. But I really wonder whether little deals like this truly add up to a whole lot more than the big headline grabbing deals we read about.
Of course now our esteemed blogger complains about communication problems but more than that he asks the question? “Did I do the right thing?”. In fact he used the word ‘disloyal’.
So I sent him a reply, with my opinion.
This is what I said:
Yes, everyone has a case or a reason to find cheaper goods or services. We all want a bargain because we are all ‘feeling the pinch’ even if we are relatively well off or if our company is actually doing well. There is always an excuse to go the cheap route and to get these goods and services from abroad.
Are you being disloyal to your home market? Coaching these things in language like that makes the whole thing seem ridiculous but yes, support for your neighbours should come before support for a foreign economy. Not only for ‘nationalistic’ reasons but the fact that you are also keeping the status quo. India will remain a ‘low’ economy which essentially is set up to support us. The system only works when the cost of living is low in India – this way they can ‘afford’ to offer us relatively low prices. So you are creating a vested interest in the part of business owners and politicians, i.e. the ruling elite, to keep India’s economy lower than the West’s.
It’s often been said the reason for the success of any Empire is ultimately money. The supply of goods and services to the ruling country for no or low cost. We don’t have a physical empire now but an economic one.
What do you think? Does outsourcing hurt or harm us. Comments welcome.
The outsourcing good vs, bad debate could go on forever…! In my personal opinion, in this instance – fine, the development of one website is hardly going to bring in a ton of work to Irish people! (although, arguably, these small projects all add up!) On a larger scale, huge brands who outsource, yes..in my opinion it is disloyal to the home market, where outsourcing locally could potentially create hundreds or thousands of jobs.
I think it also depends on the type of service you are outsourcing. For example, if it is customer service related, such as outsourcing a customer contact centre, then yes – I definitely have a problem with it! Allowing your customers to deal with a contact centre, not even in the same country as you is pretty poor and terribly frustrating for the customer.