IT outsourcing is no longer a bad word - it's pretty much accepted as part of doing business today.
The debate has moved on. Now the issue is what to do when those multimillion-pound outsourcing deals negotiated a few years back go wrong.
Judging by a poll of silicon.com's CIO Jury - and even more recently by the results of this year's exclusive Skills Survey - the answer when an outsourcing relationship sours is not to find a new supplier but to bring the deal back in-house (aka in-sourcing).
What was particularly interesting about the Skills Survey result was the different levels of support for in-sourcing from different parts of the organisation.
IT pros - the ones whose jobs are most likely to be cut when IT is outsourced - are unsurprisingly the most in favour of bringing projects back in-house. Their motto: 'We want our jobs back.'
But CIOs and IT directors are right behind them in our survey, by only a few percentage points. Their motto: 'We want control of IT processes back.'
By contrast, the least support came from the very top of the business - the board directors, CEOs, CFOs and COOs. Only about half of them agree that in-sourcing is a good solution to a bad outsourcing relationship, compared to around three-quarters of the IT pros and CIOs. Their motto: 'We don't want to explain this messy situation to shareholders.'
But is that it?
Perhaps this research also reveals that IT outsourcing really isn't just about cost - at least not to the IT department. To them, it's also about control and quality of performance - they feel more comfortable, if the outsourcing relationship is going poorly, just taking control of the project again. Of course, this only applies if there's a bad relationship - we hear from plenty of CIOs who are happy with their suppliers and thus happy to continue outsourcing.
However, the boardroom execs, more removed from the goings-on in the server room, think simply staying the course is best. In short, they don't care if the relationship is lacking because they don't have to deal with it - to them it really is all about the bottom-line costs.
