Chris and I are much of a like mind here. Managers tend to not have a
clue, but they tend to have an MBA or they are reasonably good mirrors;
they copy what they see their superiors or outsiders that they consider
knowledgeable do. Hardly an original thought amongst the lot (now,
there are quite a few people with original ideas and some are in
management, and they tend to be the founder of their company).
In some cases, such as doing commodity work, off-shoring makes sense if it is indeed cheaper. I've heard stories that suggest that the time and number of red-lines and multiple revs of designs are so great that the total cost is no less and might be a good deal more. Especially if one considers the time value of money. I work with a lot of client firms that are experimenting with or have a policy of off-shoring their commodity work, but they all realize that they need to keep the specialty work local. I have no personal problem with off-shoring, except that it is often an expensive failed test, because I don't do commodity work, except to round out a custom job.
I used to work for 3M. They pushed me out, and I owe them nothing. Several times they spent tens of milions of US dollars trying to manufacture computer disks in Asia; anywhere in Asia. They sent US experts to Asia for months to train engineers and entire factories everything that they knew. 3M had successfully made diskettes in Oklahoma in a small town for years, but the conventional wisdom was that they could make them cheaper in Asia (even with labor rates equal to or higher in Japan). After spending enormous amounts of money (even building factories for Asian companies to make diskettes for 3M, so the Asians only had to commit time), NO ONE could make diskettes cheaper and more reliably than a bunch of small town Okies. Obviously no one needs diskettes anymore, but multiple attempts at offshoring by one of the most respected companies in the USA failed miserably.
We often don't acknowledge that engineering is a significantly CULTURAL thing. That doesn't mean that it can't be done, one way or another, by any culture or nation, but what a client needs or expects will have a significant cultural component. Indian mfg will best be served by Indian engineers, Chinese mfg by Chinese engineers, Nigerian mfg by Nigerian engineers, and so forth. I've done work in several European countries, and although I could contribute, the end product had to be Italian, German, Swiss, Dutch, or what have you. Canadian and US are so close I haven't seen a difference, but there might be some small differnces.
Sometime soon, management will see the true cost and impact and the pedulum will swing back (perhaps too far). One the up side, a lot of Indonesian, Indian, Chinese, Fillipino and other major countries' engineers will have had better training and be able to help their economies diversify and grow. And the MBAs will find some other goofy thing to do (it's their job security).
Just my opinion....
... Bruce D. Bullough ...
Sebesta Blomberg & Associates, Inc.
2381 Rosegate
Roseville, MN 55113 USA
desk: 651-634-7344 fax: 651-634-7400
www.sebesta.com
-----Original Message-----
From: <a href="/group/PipingDesign/post?postID=cfvqEa5E8c0C2RRtiTzS50Dlko6hqv59G-SiKXh_iVoEw3OHIE1o6YM6stG7aHGpiNOuThzRcoB0Pf9fkk7-pRhX3XkF">PipingDesign@yahoogroups.com</a> [mailto:<a href="/group/PipingDesign/post?postID=cfvqEa5E8c0C2RRtiTzS50Dlko6hqv59G-SiKXh_iVoEw3OHIE1o6YM6stG7aHGpiNOuThzRcoB0Pf9fkk7-pRhX3XkF">PipingDesign@yahoogroups.com</a>]
On Behalf Of Paul Bowers
Sent: Wednesday, September 28, 2005 10:59 PM
To: <a href="/group/PipingDesign/post?postID=cfvqEa5E8c0C2RRtiTzS50Dlko6hqv59G-SiKXh_iVoEw3OHIE1o6YM6stG7aHGpiNOuThzRcoB0Pf9fkk7-pRhX3XkF">PipingDesign@yahoogroups.com</a>
Subject: Re: [PipingDesign] The Question: Talking Heads - Offshoring
[bcc][faked-from][mx][spf]
Christopher Wright wrote:
> It may be a comfort to note that all the people who were interviewed
> for the article are marketing VP's or something of that ilk who
> probably know more about the far side of the moon than they do about
> engineering. These are the guys who invent phrases like 'Service pack'
> so they won't have to admit their software is buggy. People at that
> corporate level get hired only if they ask for more money, not less.
> Who else would say in one paragraph that IBM is moving 14000 jobs
> overseas and in the next say it isn't a zero-sum game?
Chris, you're forgetting all the service sector opportunities that are open to these laid-off people.
The only other two listmembers that have responded to this topic do work
as smaller engineering contractors. I don't think they would be affected
by something like this, so it's easy to pooh-pooh concerns about large-scale industry trends.
Then again, that's probably the way to go in the future for western workers as those accustomed to working on mid to large size projects get
squeezed to death while worldwide hourly rates/cost of living balance out. That ain't gonna happen in the next 20 years.
Paul
Yahoo! Groups Links Received on Thu Sep 29 10:07:00 2005
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