Gregory North joins Outsourcing Institute President, Daniel Goodstein, to examine digital convergence and transformation within the enterprise.

The interview explores:

• What is Convergence and What is Happening in the Marketplace?
• Buyers vs. Providers – How will I Be Effected by Digital Convergence?
• Advice on How to Go About Digital Transformation: Digital Acuity vs. Digital Agility vs. Digital Affinity
• How to Adapt to the Digitally Fueled Outsourcing and Automated Environment
• Challenges & Advice to Companies Embarking in Digital Transformation

Gregory North will moderate a panel about how analytics and data science can drive competitiveness at this year’s event. Don’t miss out–to learn more about the topics, speakers and sessions, download the agenda.

Vice President of Digital Transformation and Executive Director of the BPO/ITO/ KPO Chamber at the National Business Association of Colombia (ANDI) interviews  IRPA AI Founder, Frank Casale, about RPA and AI, its impacts, and his advice to Columbian business and government leaders.

Santiago Pinzón Galán: Is this new trend of RPA and AI playing out as you expected?
Frank Casale: Well yes and no.  Back in 2014 when I launched The Institute for Robotic Process Automation and Artificial Intelligence I did predict that this would be a game changer and that it was about to take off.  That said I’ve been surprised to see that while many outsourcing service providers have moved quickly to invest – the enterprise buyers have moved much slower.

Santiago Pinzón Galán: What is attracting so many companies to automation and AI?

Frank Casale: Regardless of what people tell you 90% of the efforts are driven by cost reduction.  Specifically, labor cost reduction.  We are talking 20-40% +. This is great news for some.  Very dangerous for those in the outsourcing business if they aren’t already embracing this and transforming their business and pricing models

Santiago Pinzón Galán: You coined the term digital labor several years ago.  Please explain the term.

Frank Casale: While many see this rapidly growing trend around RPA, intelligent automation and AI as a tech revolution it’s really a reinvention of how work gets done.  What started for many organizations as an onshore model two decades ago, then shifted to an offshore near shore labor arbitrage model is now shifting to a no shore model.  It software. Very intelligent software that does a good chunk of the work your workforce is doing today.   There is only one thing better than inexpensive people getting your work done.   And that is no people.  So, this is really about a shift from traditional labor and labor arbitrage to what I call digital labor.

Software that replaces people.  It’s better faster and cheaper

Santiago Pinzón Galán: What impact do you see this having on outsourcing?

Frank Casale: If you are an outsourcing customer it’s all goodness.   You save money , increase speed , quality, analytics and reporting.   Your organization is much more effective, nimble and scalable if not elastic.  Outsourcing service providers on the other hand are today facing a significant threat to their survival.   Their entire business is based on labor arbitrage which is exactly what is being outmoded by digital labor.  Some providers will see what is happening, embrace and invest in these new technologies and thrive in this new world of digitally fueled service offerings. These players will experience more growth and profitability than ever before.  Others will move too slow and be forced to exit. The market no longer wants or needs a traditional outsourcing service provider.  It’s about being a next generation service model.  And being a next gen service provider.  One just needs to see the many layoffs already taking place among the leading Indian Service providers to see the writing on the wall.   It’s about to get ugly.

Santiago Pinzón Galán: What about the nearshore service providers?  How will they be impacted? 

Frank Casale: Similarly those who hesitate will be in trouble.   The providers to ” get it” and pounce on this will do very well.  The interesting opportunity for Latham providers is that the right countries and companies will for the first time be able to compete and win quite often against India.   With the right intelligent automation and next gen business and pricing model you will be able to consistently out price and out deliver especially for US clients.  This could be a game changer.

Santiago Pinzón Galán: What about Colombia specifically what is your advice to business and government leaders here?

Frank Casale: What I really like about Columbia is that a hand full of the govt and business leaders get I and are investing. I sense a real hunger and desire to evolve and lead in this changing market.  You can feel it and see it when you are there.  If the momentum and the investment continues and the right partnerships and channels are established then Columbia can be a leader in the industry.  I’m talking significant business and social impact.   This is not just about toolset.  It’s about mindset.   And Columbia has the right mindset and seems ready to make some big moves.

Visit http://www.andi.com.co/SummitTransformacionDigital/Paginas/agenda.html to learn more about the agenda at the ANDI Conference.

To contact Frank Casale directly, please email Frank.Casale@irpanetwork.com

@FrankCasale

Kate Vitasek, University of Tennessee has done extensive research in outsourcing and discusses 5 research-driven rules for sound outsourcing.

Paul Pinto, Managing Partner, Sylvan Advisory and Donald Mones, Managing Director, GlobeSource Partners discuss the vendor selection process, top five reasons why standard vendor selection process fails to produce the desired results, preferred approach to selecting a vendor, and the real benefits.

One of the biggest myths about user experience is that it is something you can assign to just one person in your company.

Let me tell you right now, if you just assign a designer to UX and wash your hands of it, then it won’t work.

UX is more than one person. UX is a team.

Everyone who is involved in a user-facing element, software, product or service needs to be part of the UX team. Who might this include?

• User Researcher
• Information Architect
• Content Specialist
• Interaction Designer
• Visual Designer
• Project Manager
• Front-end Developer
• Online Marketer

Not every project has each of these positions, and many projects have multiple people on each position. But the point is, if you have people in these positions, then they need to be on board with user experience.

What does it mean to have people on board with user experience?

At the very least, these people need to understand the importance of UX and be on board to (possibly learn) and utilize UX methodologies.

And it’s important to note that user experience needs to be ingrained in the company even deeper than the above positions.

UX needs to be at the core of the company.

Therefore, management needs to support UX, all the way to the top. That’s why we strongly recommend companies include UX in strategy. If UX is integrated into the very vision and philosophy of the company, then it goes without saying that users will notice and will reward you.

With good user experience, your users will feel respected and heard and will, in turn, respect you and give their attention, support, and money to you. It’s an ROI no-brainer.

Let’s get this straight: if you think user experience (UX) starts and stops with design, then you are not getting the most out of UX. In fact, you might be setting your user experience endeavor up for failure.

User experience should start with the very first strategy meeting. This means you have to include your UX professional at that meeting and all strategy planning after.

If you want a product/service that will truly provide great user experience, then your UX professional need to work on the strategy, vision, and planning. Currently most companies contract UX professional just for design and execution and leave them out of the strategy because they think they’re only designers. However, that’s like trying to build a puzzle using inside pieces and the edge pieces from two different puzzles. They just doesn’t fit together. And you end up with a disorganized mess.

Integrate your UX professional into customer strategy. You’ll have a company who better understands users and their behaviors and is more effectively oriented towards them. And that can only do good things for your organization.

It’s crucial for the success of your product, service, strategy, and ultimately business, to fully integrate user experience into your strategy, design, and development processes. It saves time and money, ultimately boosting your ROI, which is every company’s goal. But it leads to one important question:

Who will lead your UX efforts?

You have to decide whether to recruit members of your team internally or hire an external team.

While it may seem easy to assign this to someone in your office who’s already working for you, there are some disadvantages to recruiting internally.

• Your staff may not have the time to dedicate to user experience. Outside teams are dedicated to UX and aren’t jumping back and forth between different tasks like internal staff have to.
• They might be too close to the company. An outside team has an outside perspective, which is often a more honest perspective to see what needs to change.

• Your staff might not understand the importance of user experience like you do. External UX teams are devoted to it and believe in it, which is important for finding success.
• They might have time and they might understand why it’s important. But do they have the track record to be as efficient and effective as an external UX team would be?

When making the decision to go internal or external with your UX efforts, you have to think about what is best for your project and company. Make sure that whoever you choose has the time, perspective, understanding, and track record to find maximum success with UX integration.

And if you can’t find exactly that internally, then the answer just might be to look outside your company.

Why are creativity, problem solving, and collaboration the most important skills of this century? How does User Experience cultivate them? And how does this help us inspire success?

These are the questions you need to be asking yourselves in the 21st Century.

So let’s break it down.

Why creativity, problem solving, and collaboration?
Our world is getting increasingly digital, which really shouldn’t be a surprise to you. Physical production is, therefore, becoming automated more and more often. In the past, speed and efficiency were the most valued skills a professional could have. You can imagine a production line churning out products and imagine how that impacted values. It’s easy to draw a comparison between the economy and values.

Since the economy is now focused on digital, the skills we value have got to change. Obviously speed and efficiency are still important. But they’re not nearly as important as creativity, problem solving, and collaboration when it comes to predicting success. If we want to inspire success, we have to value skills that are truly inspiring.

So How does User Experience Cultivate these Skills?
Creativity
User Experience encourages thinking outside the box, but within your product/service’s limits. Figuring out how to do this automatically pushes the boundaries of your imagination. It makes you think in a different way. Thinking about what your user needs nurtures your creativity a lot more than just thinking about what your company wants.
Problem Solving
This methodology is all about solving problems. It’s about predicting problems and adjusting your product or service (or strategy or methodology) to keep them from happening. But the key is to not focus on the problem, but on the solution. This methodology gives you the tools, or the action plan, to do just that.
Collaboration
User Experience is a cycle that includes aspects of different departments. Each department has to come together with the same goal of creating a product/service that the user truly wants and needs. This collaboration encourages each participant to bring their best ideas to the table and work together to figure out what needs to get done and how.
Inspire Success
This methodology isn’t used only with digital products and services, but it is inspired by the
digital age. It’s about people coming together and collaborating to find the best and most
creative solutions to problems that products and services have or might have in the future.
And that’s something that we all want.

Larry Heckathorn, Co-Founder, Human Capital Group LLC and Ron Hetrick, Director, Market Analytics, Allegis Global Solutions discuss common employee questions about contingent workers, pricing of contingent workers and drivers of contingent workers and how to utilize them.

Amrita Joshi, CEO, Ahila, Inc. and John Williams, Senior Vice President of Services, Collaborative Consulting discuss domestic sourcing, benefits and challenges, domestic sourcing as part of global delivery and a growing trend, value proposition, domestic sourcing models and key success factors.