Unit 7 Report
I started looking at the outsourcing links and couldn't help but be biased by my views. Outsourcing has always been a very BAD word to me; in my opinion it means that some big corporation decided to lay off its employees and move to another country where they can pay hard-working people there less money. I will say that I looked at the links with as open a mind as possible. Outsource 2 India (O2I) is provides an interesting take on the outsourcing issue by making money off of the companies who are outsourcing. Even though they have an absolutely terrible website (Dr. Wildemuth's User Interface Design class would have a field day), they seem to know what they're talking about - they know how to outsource the right way. In their future trends page they even mention that the rising cost of oil will make the US less competitive in the technology market, allowing countries like India and China to move ahead. I definitely agree with them here - the US is sort of shooting itself in the foot by some of their actions as a country, allowing the possibility for other countries (like China which is growing very quickly) to step ahead in the market.
I enjoyed Thomas Friedman's interview and it brought up a lot of interesting issues. He estimates that 4 million jobs will be outsourced to India over the next 10 years! He also got me thinking about the US and its lack of action to innovate. It reminded me of our readings of France a couple of units back - their government is intentionally trying to put them ahead in the video game market. Other countries (like Finland) make sure that everyone has access to the Internet. What is our government doing? Not much. And if they don't start soon, I'm afraid they will get left behind - leaving countries like India and China plenty of room to step in. For workers here in the US, this is a huge threat to jobs; for people in India it brings up a lot of other issues that Friedman mentioned. His example of the Pakistan/India cease fire and saying that it was not brought about by the government, but by the American corporations in India skims the surface of a really big issue. When you mention outsourcing here, we think of job loss (even I do) but what does it mean for India? It means American corporations have power in India - who knows how this power will be used in the future.
After looking over the Go4Customer site, it became apparent that Indian companies really know what they're doing - after all, they've been doing it for a long time. Looking through Go4Customer's employee pages I realized that they were making work at a call center sound like a lot of fun! Based on their statements, they are aimed at keeping their employees happy; they even mention providing opportunities to "chill out" - something you don't see at many American corporations. Their posting of their "party time" pictures highlights their concern with keeping employees satisfied. The only corporation I've worked for that does anything remotely close to this is Cisco. Cisco's RTP location has 3 cafeterias, an onsite gym, and volleyball and basketball courts at every building. They really promoted the health aspect of the facility and oftentimes provided employees the opportunity to take a long lunch and go work out or to come a little late if they wanted to stop by the gym in the morning. They even had locker rooms in each of their 12 buildings! By fostering an environment that promotes happy, healthy employees, companies will succeed. After all, happy employees are productive employees!
Some of your questions on outsourcing bring up interesting points - what can be outsourced or what absolutely cannot be outsourced? I met with some Project Managers at IBM last semester and their opinions on outsourcing were that database admins and project managers can't be outsourced (and they have been in the business for quite some time). I agree with them that these types of management positions won't be outsourced so that the leaders/managers will be close to home. It's not that these jobs can't be outsourced, I just don't see that happening. One thing I have noticed as I start my job search is that it is nearly impossible to find a management position in technology that doesn't require extensive amounts of travel. All of the 'cool' jobs that I like require 70-80 percent travel which is just something that doesn't work for me personally at this stage in my life. My point is, the technology industry is global - it can't help but be global - and as it becomes more and more global, its employees must do the same.
The difficulty with outsourcing is setting standards. What if an MIS here isn't the same as an MIS in India? How do you set up standards and compare them with what we have here? Certifications (like the CCIE - one of Cisco's engineering certifications) are typically transferable everywhere, but degrees typically are not. As an information professional, I would not make the decision to outsource unless I had an incredible amount of trust in the company I was outsourcing to.
I was very impressed by Pakistan's information technology policy - they are a government who sees the benefit of technology and giving people access to information! From the outsource readings and given a comparison of the US governments views on the digital divide, it seems that Pakistan is positioning itself to become more like India and take part in being a technological world superpower. By giving people access to the Internet and educating its citizens, Pakistan will surely place itself as one of the industry leaders in technology.
As for Pakistan President Musharraf's recent meetings in the US, I think they are making a statement that as a government they are interested in holding good ties with the US; although, I'm not so sure the people of Pakistan feel the same way. Musharraf even mentioned on the Daily Show that his book discusses how he had no choice but to support the US in the war on terror and how he as a political figure faced outrage from his constituents. I think Jon Stewart did an incredible job of interviewing Musharraf who also proved to be one of the Daily Show's more interesting guests.
As an amateur yogi I had a lot of fun reading about yoga in India. Interestingly enough, Dr. Joanne Marshall is my yoga instructor (this is off-topic but just goes to show that SILS is everywhere)! And may I add that I was very excited when I learned Warrior III pose:
I will say that I am worried that things are becoming too commercialized and people are just trying to make money off of what is a science and a religion to some. I think the more serious Ayurvedic centers are keeping true to its origins and the other places offering a few Ayurvedic services seem to be acting more as the new day spa. I also wanted to say that I love the sign below and I want one for my house!
Dr. Marshall tells us that yoga originated in India so many years ago because people wanted a way to connect with the spirit world and to be more in tune with their bodies. Even though I think a lot of people are trying to make money off of an age old practice, there are still ways to practice yoga without spending a lot of money. Yoga journal offers so many guides to yoga, pose pictures, etc. that anyone can go there and develop their own practice - all you need is a mat!
The information on health tourism in India is interesting - I think it would take a lot for me to travel to another country for major surgery. It's not that I doubt that Indian hospitals and doctors are great (undoubtedly many of them are better than what is offered here), it's just that it is always scary to be very sick or have surgery and then you are placed in a foreign land to heal. Although if you are very sick and haven't had a lot of success here in the US, why not travel to a place as reputable as India to heal?
The Tsunami information was sad to read - one can get lost in all of the comments posted on the blog! The way they have everything set up seems like a great way to find volunteers willing to help and to let people at a grassroots level know what kind of relief is needed. The news media quickly forgets the aftermath of natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina and the Tsunami, even though people are still suffering. Some of the pictures on the Wikipedia page about the earthquake were so scary I wanted to post them here:
The thing we can learn from this disaster and the Hurricane Katrina disaster is how the world can use technology to communicate their needs at a much faster rate - using blogs and posting to message boards is a cheap way to get one's message out to billions of people.
I think the Phone Ladies are doing a great thing by selling their access to technology! As a Women's Studies minor at UNC, we often talked about women in areas of the world who were financially suffering because of a sexist economic system. One book that is really interesting is Travels in the Skin Trade by Jeremy Seabrook - it discusses how women in Thailand have two choices: work all day and night in a factory and make less than enough money to feed their children or join the sex workers movement where they are faced with disease and pregnancy, but make enough money to put food on the table. Selling cell phone minutes is a healthy and safe way for women to make money in small villages and it puts them in an economic place of power - something a lot of women in these areas of the world are, unfortunately, without. Microlending agencies, like the ones you mentioned in the powerpoint presentation, are helping women gain ground in areas where they haven't been able to before. I love this idea!
The Water Crisis all over the world is another common topic in Women's Studies international courses. Wikipeida's page on the water crisis talks about all aspects of the situation - including overpopulating. India is such a small country with so many people, you can see how lack of resources could be a huge problem for them. From this page I found a BBC article on the Ganges in India that discusses the dispute between India and Bangladesh and the fact that this river is a source of water for over 350 billion people! Sadly enough, getting clean water is a major problem; the picture below shows a nuclear power plant that lets its water flow into the Ganges!
This is such a terrible situation - so many people are affected by this water that something needs to be done! It will take a lot of money and power to get clean drinking water - maybe with all the outsourcing of US corporations to the area that one of them will step up and help out with this problem!
On to a more light-hearted subject - the libraries in the near East! I enjoyed looking through the sites but there was one huge problem - it seemed like NOTHING was digitized! The National Library of India mentions all of these rare books and cool documents that I would have loved to see! Unfortunately, all I could get online were photographs of them:
I wanted to look through, view pictures, etc., but that just wasn't possible! It's unfortunate that these countries (particularly Pakistan and India) are so concerned with technology and information but their library collections can't be seen online!
Watching the video on India was a great way to end this unit - it brought everything together visually. From yoga to tourism, this video was helpful in helping me gather my thoughts on everything we've discussed. Once again, I've written way too much for this unit report but there are so many issues with this area of the world that it was hard to stop myself!
I think India and Pakistan are moving in the right direction in regards to technology - which may prove to be unfortunate for corporations in the US. If their governments do step in and provide Internet access to as many people as possible, they will step ahead and lead the industry. Putting information in the hands of the people is a way to stay innovative and be successful as a technological superpower. If they could put some of their library collections online then I think these countries will be well on their way to educating the masses!
I enjoyed Thomas Friedman's interview and it brought up a lot of interesting issues. He estimates that 4 million jobs will be outsourced to India over the next 10 years! He also got me thinking about the US and its lack of action to innovate. It reminded me of our readings of France a couple of units back - their government is intentionally trying to put them ahead in the video game market. Other countries (like Finland) make sure that everyone has access to the Internet. What is our government doing? Not much. And if they don't start soon, I'm afraid they will get left behind - leaving countries like India and China plenty of room to step in. For workers here in the US, this is a huge threat to jobs; for people in India it brings up a lot of other issues that Friedman mentioned. His example of the Pakistan/India cease fire and saying that it was not brought about by the government, but by the American corporations in India skims the surface of a really big issue. When you mention outsourcing here, we think of job loss (even I do) but what does it mean for India? It means American corporations have power in India - who knows how this power will be used in the future.
After looking over the Go4Customer site, it became apparent that Indian companies really know what they're doing - after all, they've been doing it for a long time. Looking through Go4Customer's employee pages I realized that they were making work at a call center sound like a lot of fun! Based on their statements, they are aimed at keeping their employees happy; they even mention providing opportunities to "chill out" - something you don't see at many American corporations. Their posting of their "party time" pictures highlights their concern with keeping employees satisfied. The only corporation I've worked for that does anything remotely close to this is Cisco. Cisco's RTP location has 3 cafeterias, an onsite gym, and volleyball and basketball courts at every building. They really promoted the health aspect of the facility and oftentimes provided employees the opportunity to take a long lunch and go work out or to come a little late if they wanted to stop by the gym in the morning. They even had locker rooms in each of their 12 buildings! By fostering an environment that promotes happy, healthy employees, companies will succeed. After all, happy employees are productive employees!
Some of your questions on outsourcing bring up interesting points - what can be outsourced or what absolutely cannot be outsourced? I met with some Project Managers at IBM last semester and their opinions on outsourcing were that database admins and project managers can't be outsourced (and they have been in the business for quite some time). I agree with them that these types of management positions won't be outsourced so that the leaders/managers will be close to home. It's not that these jobs can't be outsourced, I just don't see that happening. One thing I have noticed as I start my job search is that it is nearly impossible to find a management position in technology that doesn't require extensive amounts of travel. All of the 'cool' jobs that I like require 70-80 percent travel which is just something that doesn't work for me personally at this stage in my life. My point is, the technology industry is global - it can't help but be global - and as it becomes more and more global, its employees must do the same.
The difficulty with outsourcing is setting standards. What if an MIS here isn't the same as an MIS in India? How do you set up standards and compare them with what we have here? Certifications (like the CCIE - one of Cisco's engineering certifications) are typically transferable everywhere, but degrees typically are not. As an information professional, I would not make the decision to outsource unless I had an incredible amount of trust in the company I was outsourcing to.
I was very impressed by Pakistan's information technology policy - they are a government who sees the benefit of technology and giving people access to information! From the outsource readings and given a comparison of the US governments views on the digital divide, it seems that Pakistan is positioning itself to become more like India and take part in being a technological world superpower. By giving people access to the Internet and educating its citizens, Pakistan will surely place itself as one of the industry leaders in technology.
As for Pakistan President Musharraf's recent meetings in the US, I think they are making a statement that as a government they are interested in holding good ties with the US; although, I'm not so sure the people of Pakistan feel the same way. Musharraf even mentioned on the Daily Show that his book discusses how he had no choice but to support the US in the war on terror and how he as a political figure faced outrage from his constituents. I think Jon Stewart did an incredible job of interviewing Musharraf who also proved to be one of the Daily Show's more interesting guests.
As an amateur yogi I had a lot of fun reading about yoga in India. Interestingly enough, Dr. Joanne Marshall is my yoga instructor (this is off-topic but just goes to show that SILS is everywhere)! And may I add that I was very excited when I learned Warrior III pose:
I will say that I am worried that things are becoming too commercialized and people are just trying to make money off of what is a science and a religion to some. I think the more serious Ayurvedic centers are keeping true to its origins and the other places offering a few Ayurvedic services seem to be acting more as the new day spa. I also wanted to say that I love the sign below and I want one for my house!
Dr. Marshall tells us that yoga originated in India so many years ago because people wanted a way to connect with the spirit world and to be more in tune with their bodies. Even though I think a lot of people are trying to make money off of an age old practice, there are still ways to practice yoga without spending a lot of money. Yoga journal offers so many guides to yoga, pose pictures, etc. that anyone can go there and develop their own practice - all you need is a mat!
The information on health tourism in India is interesting - I think it would take a lot for me to travel to another country for major surgery. It's not that I doubt that Indian hospitals and doctors are great (undoubtedly many of them are better than what is offered here), it's just that it is always scary to be very sick or have surgery and then you are placed in a foreign land to heal. Although if you are very sick and haven't had a lot of success here in the US, why not travel to a place as reputable as India to heal?
The Tsunami information was sad to read - one can get lost in all of the comments posted on the blog! The way they have everything set up seems like a great way to find volunteers willing to help and to let people at a grassroots level know what kind of relief is needed. The news media quickly forgets the aftermath of natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina and the Tsunami, even though people are still suffering. Some of the pictures on the Wikipedia page about the earthquake were so scary I wanted to post them here:
The thing we can learn from this disaster and the Hurricane Katrina disaster is how the world can use technology to communicate their needs at a much faster rate - using blogs and posting to message boards is a cheap way to get one's message out to billions of people.I think the Phone Ladies are doing a great thing by selling their access to technology! As a Women's Studies minor at UNC, we often talked about women in areas of the world who were financially suffering because of a sexist economic system. One book that is really interesting is Travels in the Skin Trade by Jeremy Seabrook - it discusses how women in Thailand have two choices: work all day and night in a factory and make less than enough money to feed their children or join the sex workers movement where they are faced with disease and pregnancy, but make enough money to put food on the table. Selling cell phone minutes is a healthy and safe way for women to make money in small villages and it puts them in an economic place of power - something a lot of women in these areas of the world are, unfortunately, without. Microlending agencies, like the ones you mentioned in the powerpoint presentation, are helping women gain ground in areas where they haven't been able to before. I love this idea!
The Water Crisis all over the world is another common topic in Women's Studies international courses. Wikipeida's page on the water crisis talks about all aspects of the situation - including overpopulating. India is such a small country with so many people, you can see how lack of resources could be a huge problem for them. From this page I found a BBC article on the Ganges in India that discusses the dispute between India and Bangladesh and the fact that this river is a source of water for over 350 billion people! Sadly enough, getting clean water is a major problem; the picture below shows a nuclear power plant that lets its water flow into the Ganges!
This is such a terrible situation - so many people are affected by this water that something needs to be done! It will take a lot of money and power to get clean drinking water - maybe with all the outsourcing of US corporations to the area that one of them will step up and help out with this problem!
On to a more light-hearted subject - the libraries in the near East! I enjoyed looking through the sites but there was one huge problem - it seemed like NOTHING was digitized! The National Library of India mentions all of these rare books and cool documents that I would have loved to see! Unfortunately, all I could get online were photographs of them:
I wanted to look through, view pictures, etc., but that just wasn't possible! It's unfortunate that these countries (particularly Pakistan and India) are so concerned with technology and information but their library collections can't be seen online!Watching the video on India was a great way to end this unit - it brought everything together visually. From yoga to tourism, this video was helpful in helping me gather my thoughts on everything we've discussed. Once again, I've written way too much for this unit report but there are so many issues with this area of the world that it was hard to stop myself!
I think India and Pakistan are moving in the right direction in regards to technology - which may prove to be unfortunate for corporations in the US. If their governments do step in and provide Internet access to as many people as possible, they will step ahead and lead the industry. Putting information in the hands of the people is a way to stay innovative and be successful as a technological superpower. If they could put some of their library collections online then I think these countries will be well on their way to educating the masses!
posted by Christie at
6:44 AM
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