Resourcing is one of the most overlooked areas in outsourcing.  Clients enter into large contracts and often hand over the rights to  the vendor to bring in the needed talent.  This works to some extent more so when the arrangement is new when the outsourcing vendor is very particular to get this right to delight the client and improve business.  But once you reach optimal levels you see a big shift by the vendor to turn it to their advantage.    Clients are largely to blame.  In a staff augmentation mode, it is extremely important for both sides to agree the kind of talent you are looking for, skill sets, years of experience, soft skills, visa situation and everything that goes with it to make sure you have a resource that you can bank on.     

Bringing in the right resource at the right time is often a challenge and it could go either way translating to loss of precious outsourcing budgets.  The vendor could present a resource that is not fully qualified to close the open position, the client could sand bag interviewing a qualified resource who could be lost to another client since no one want to keep resources on the bench in a hot market, the client may agree to take the resource without even looking at the profile, the vendor may have inaccurately capture the needs the list goes on and on.  Having a  uniform and consistent procedure from the request stage to the post onboarding phase to declare a resource qualified to continue is the key. Note, onboarding does not end this cycle, a good six to eight weeks of review after onboarding is important to know if the resource is performing to the optimal levels. Most contracts provide for a free billable time if the resources doesn’t fit the bill after onboarding with a cap of 2-4 weeks. Utilize that.

 Swap resources when opportunity arises, use “ last in first out” principle or drop your bottom most performers.  Constant ramp up and ramp down is usual on large outsourcing arrangements due to project needs or end of the year scenario or due to funding situations which goes up and down depending on your IT budgets and initiatives at any  point of time.

 Review your talent pool.  It should look like a pyramid with senior resources at the top and the fresher’s at the bottom.  Your middle tier should almost exactly fit your pyramid while top talent is at the top.  Make sure the talent at the bottom is moving up or moving out.  Review periodically monthly, weekly yearly whatever is the best for the size of  your arrangement.  Maintain metrics on dashboard, verify the data is accurate and covers all resources and distribute at all levels, solicit feedback and update it as needed. Include all relevant data points, use charges and graphs to interpret so it is not just numbers. 

Remember resources are the biggest expense on an outsourcing agreement and maintaining a healthy talent will pay for itself.