BPO Providers as Trusted Transformation Partners

By Amitabh Chaudhry

 

"Projects taken up to improve on SLAs like accuracy or turn-around times, though very important, may not be seen by clients as real transformation or innovation. Thus focus needs to be widened beyond SG&A elements to increasing revenues or reducing cost of revenues for clients."

 

In a flattening world, BPO customers seek enhanced value and better efficiencies. To meet these demands, BPO service providers must move beyond process improvement and position themselves as transformational partners. In this white paper, Infosys' experts define transformation and highlight the key levers and success factors. According to them, transformation involves providing business value that exceeds meeting the agreed SLAs.

 

Do We Need a Flat World?

By N.R. Narayana Murthy

"A flat world is a powerful platform for leveraging global intelligentsia in enhancing the innovation power of corporations.A world concentrating on improving the quality of life through international trade is likely to be a peaceful world."

 

 

Infosys' Chairman and Chief Mentor N.R. Narayana Murthy delivered the keynote speech at the inauguration of the Dell Distinguished Lecture Series at the University of Texas, Austin, where he put the concept of a Flat World in perspective. He explained the benefits of a Flat World, from enhancing innovation and competition to being a "sine qua non for a peaceful world".

 

Faster Innovation through Co-creation

By Manjunatha Kukkuru

“Flat World companies innovate faster by co-creating with customers in a global innovation network. In this ecosystem, Internet and knowledge management tools facilitate seamless collaboration between companies, customers and partners. Infosys' expert demonstrates how co-creation platforms accelerate the development of innovative products.”

Manjunatha Kukkuru undertakes research in the areas of customer-involved innovation and adoption of co-creation practices by clients. He has implemented consulting projects on strategy, innovation, process and technology solutions across industries, including automotive, pharmaceuticals, retail, banking and insurance for over eight years. Manjunatha holds a bachelor's degree in engineering and a master's degree in management.

 

Use Technology to Cultivate a Skilled Workforce

By David P. Spencer - April 2008

"There are companies at various stages of development of workforce planning and management strategies looking to inoculate themselves from market resource changes, rather than be invaded by and potentially devastated by them. Most organizations - especially those in the manufacturing industry - are throwing the burden squarely on the shoulders of the HR department. Unfortunately, only a few see that the rapidly changing workforce landscape requires a more comprehensive, technology-enabled solution."

David P. Spencer, Associate Vice President, High Tech and Discrete Manufacturing, Infosys, discusses how technology helps companies to build a skilled workforce. According to him, as the workforce spans manufacturing functional areas, all executives - from HR heads to CIOs, CFOs and plant managers - need to be involved in workforce planning and management.

 

Collaboration to Win in the Flat World

By Manish Srivastava & Balaji Sampath - April 2008

“In today's business environment, employees, customers and partners are geographically dispersed and mobile. This leads to creation of 'information silos'. Creating customer loyalty requires companies to innovate faster by exploring new models of innovation such as co-creation with employees, customers and partners.”

Balaji Sampath, Group Manager, Corporate Marketing, Infosys, and Manish Srivastava, Principal Architect, Microsoft Technology Center, Infosys, share their views on how collaboration and co-creation help optimize cost structures, enhance customer loyalty and speed up innovation. They also share their experiences.

 

Automobile Companies Look at Engineering Outsourcing for Competitiveness

By Valmeeka Nathan - April 2008

“Flat World forces are compelling companies to change their business mindset and the automobile industry is no different. High costs of innovation and regulatory compliances are some of the key issues faced by corporations.”

Valmeeka Nathan, Vice President and head of Product Lifecycle and Engineering Solutions (PLES), Infosys, elaborates on faster innovation and use of cost as a fuel for growth in the automobile industry. He draws from 20 years' experience in providing Engineering and PLM Solutions to demonstrate how Infosys is helping companies in the automobile industry benefit from engineering outsourcing.

 

Shrinking the Expanding Supply Chain

By Dr. Badri Devalla & Vangelis Mavridoglou - Nov 2007

“Global Supply Chains are a prime example of doing business in a Flat World. They have made it possible for companies to derive a huge competitive advantage from sourcing and manufacturing in regions far removed from their major markets. Today's supply chains are longer and more complex than ever before, having expanded to include more partners. The continuing competitiveness of global enterprises will depend on their ability to evolve their supply chains into highly flexible, globally scalable competitive forces. For this, they will have to invest in processes and technologies that enhance three key characteristics - visibility, co-ordination and responsiveness - to shrink their supply chains.”

 

Creating Supply Chain Flexibility in the Flattening World

By Sandeep Kumar - Sep 2007

“The Flat World has emerged as the mantra that is redefining businesses. The forces of globalization and the ever-flattening world are exerting renewed pressure on global supply chains. It is time that organizations counter supply chain disruptions by building solid 'sense and respond' capabilities.”

Sandeep Kumar, Lead - Manufacturing & SCM Group, Infosys, discusses how the Flat World forces are influencing Supply Chain Management practices. He observes that "Supply chain flexibility has moved beyond managing quality, cost and on-time delivery. It has come to include new product introduction cycle, partner integration and quality of supply chain collaboration, as also the process and functional modularization of supply chains".

 

Flat World CIOs: Getting Ready for the Corner Office

By Sandeep Dadlani - Aug 2007

“As the business world flattens, the role of CIOs has broadened. They have grown from implementers to strategists. They no longer only execute business ideas of their business partners; they initiate and drive new ideas.

Sandeep Dadlani, Associate Vice President, Retail & CPG business unit, Infosys Technologies Ltd., shares his views on retail CIOs based on his interactions with CIOs of various Fortune 1000 companies. He says, "My last few meetings with leading CIOs of Fortune 1000 companies have revealed that the CIO is well-suited to take on another role - that of a Flat World evangelist and champion; that of an originator of business ideas.”

 

"You can't run companies the old-fashioned way anymore"

By Nandan M. Nilekani - January 2007

"We are making sure we have a whole crop of people who can take charge of this company over the next several years. It is reasonable to assume that leadership will be taken by a new generation of leaders"

Nilekani believes that globally, companies are going through a new challenge. "This challenge, in some sense, is similar to what companies went through a hundred years ago. It is a combination of demographics, emerging economies, globalization, technology, Flat World and regulation. There is a fundamental change in the way companies are run today. You can't run companies the old-fashioned way anymore."

 

The Evolving Face of Consumer Lending

By Balaji Yellavalli - May 2007

“The rules of consumer lending are being simplified through web-based technologies that offer intelligent configuration and eliminate information asymmetry in the consumer lending business.”

Balaji Yellavalli, AVP & Head of Solutions, Banking and Capital Markets, Infosys Technologies, believes that changes like financial democracy, disintermediation through the Internet and flattened hierarchies of decision-making have paved the way for new business models like peer-to-peer lending, which has broken down the barriers to entry into lending and investing.

 

Convergence - The Transformation Challenge

By Subhash Dhar - January 2007

“In the world of Convergence, the new business model for a telecom service provider also needs a new operating model to support it. How fast you transform the operating model will determine the success of the new business model.”

Subhash Dhar is the Senior Vice President and Head of the Communications Service Providers (CSP) business unit at Infosys Technologies Ltd.

In his view: "Telecom firms are experiencing a fresh round of opportunities and challenges in the Flat World. The combined impact of globalization, demographics, deregulation and technology change is driving the need for operational transformation. With changing value propositions, telecom firms must, in effect, flatten their businesses and become more agile."

 

Winning in the Turns

By Nandan M. Nilekani - June 2007

“CPG and retailing executives cannot leave their consumers and shareholders exposed to health and financial risk. Some of the answers lie in technology that will give them better visibility through their food supply. Other answers lie in better understanding the markets and geographies from where they procure.”

According to Nandan Nilekani*, "Ensuring a safe and secure global food supply chain is not only good business, it is the fiduciary duty of those that we entrust with a significant portion of the responsibility for the safety of our family's health and life. Simply restricting food procurement to local farming and processing industries does not guarantee avoidance of these risks, as last year's issues with North American-grown spinach showed. The solution lies in tightening quality controls and better oversight of procurement and processing."

*In an interview published in the GMA/ FPA Executive Conference/ Greenbrier Issue 2007

 

"A lot of us are growing up": Global Sourcing Practices of Industry Leaders

By Stephen Lane - July 2007

Stephen Lane is Senior Manager, Corporate Marketing, Infosys Technologies Ltd. He leads the Infosys Leaders of Change program for some of the most experienced global sourcing practitioners among Infosys' clients.

Stephen shares his perspective on the practices of global sourcing leaders. He compares and contrasts their practices with companies having lower levels of sourcing maturity. He says, "Increasingly, the trend is toward measuring results, leaving the vendor to decide how the work gets done and with how many people."

 

The Role of the CIO in the Flat World

By Romil Bahl - November 2006

“CIOs are expected to transform the IT function from siloed, tactical operations into a global, strategic function."

"These newer parameters of CIO performance are increasing in importance while some of the traditional ones are decreasing in importance.”

Romil Bahl, Managing Director, Infosys Consulting. Romil has over 15 years of experience in helping clients with business / e-business strategies, strategic technology direction and large-scale technology-enabled transformations. He spent eight years at A.T. Kearney/EDS and his last role was Global Leader of EDS Consulting Services. He has specialized expertise in strategic planning, e-business and new business incubation and launch.

 

The Markets are Evolving in an Ethical Vacuum

By Dr. Juan Somavia - August 2006

"We need to address the question of the link between growth and employment creation not just as a national problem but as a global question affecting everyone."

Dr. Juan Somavia was elected as the ILO's Director-General in March 1999 and was re-elected for a second term in 2003.

How can governments and international organizations ensure that the benefits of globalization can be enjoyed by more than just the world's elite? Many now believe that the ability for wealth to trickle down - from rich countries to poor countries and from the elite to the working poor - is key to globalization's success.

Dr. Somavia believes that there's a danger this won't happen, and that a backlash may not be far away. He believes that the open markets are evolving in an ethical vacuum. "This is not about throwing globalization out of the window; it's about modifying what should be modified. We need to address the question of the link between growth and employment creation not just as a national problem but as a global question affecting everyone."

 

The Laws of Competitive Advantage Have Not Disappeared

By Michael Moore - August 2006

"I hope I live long enough to see them [jobs] go to Somalia"

Michael Moore's term at the helm of the World Trade Organization began with bitter protests in Seattle in 1999 and ended with a new round of trade negotiations which had development as their focus in 2002. He once wrote that the World Trade Organization "does the right thing, the long way and the wrong way".

In this interview, he talks about his view on the role of WTO and the challenges being faced by governments and companies.

 

Infosys has Defined what it means to be in a Flat World

By Robert Greifeld - July 2006

"Thirty-five years ago, when NASDAQ was launched, we were the very first market to be screen-based, to be electronic."

Robert Greifeld, CEO of NASDAQ, shared his thoughts on the occasion of remote ringing of the NASDAQ opening bell from India. He emphasized that when NASDAQ was formed 35 years ago, every single market on the planet had a physical trading floor. It was the very first market to be screen-based, to be electronic. He added, "We were innovative and had the ability to attract innovative companies of our time. When we think of Infosys, they truly are the epitome; they are the definition of an innovative NASDAQ company."

 

Infosys is a Shining Example of the Success of the Economic Reforms

By N.R. Narayana Murthy, Infosys Technologies - July 2006

"It is a company that has created 55,000-plus high quality, high disposable income jobs, contributed more than US$ 2 billion a year to our exports, raised the image of India by conducting business legally and ethically."

N.R. Narayana Murthy, Executive Chairman and Chief Mentor of Infosys Technologies, shared his thoughts on the occasion of remote ringing of the NASDAQ opening bell from India. He emphasized that Infosys is a shining example of the success of the economic reforms in India. It is a company that has created 55,000-plus high quality, high disposable income jobs, contributed more than US$ 2 billion a year to Indian exports, raised the image of India by conducting business legally and ethically and by earning many laurels globally.

 

The Only Sustainable Edge

By John Hagel - June 2006

“Traditional forms of competitive advantage are eroding, but there's also opportunity in the 'Flat World'."

In a fast-changing world, old business strategies are no longer sufficient to create competitive advantage. For John Hagel, the 'sustainable edge' starts with a new mindset toward innovation that goes beyond major product breakthroughs. His approach has IT at its core and sets up IT executives as the catalysts for business innovation. Turning the challenge of the 'Flat World' into opportunities requires melding new generations of IT with new management techniques to produce rapid and sustained incremental innovation across the enterprise.

 

The World is Flat

By Thomas L. Friedman - June 2006

"This is going to be the mother of all tipping points."

An extraordinary series of events and technological developments in recent years is leading to a revolution in social and economic globalization, believes the author of one of the most influential bestsellers on globalization. Thomas L. Friedman outlines his metathesis of the three historic stages of globalization, the 10 'flatteners' that have created the Flat World transformation and the 'triple convergence' that is leading business into a time of profound uncertainty. To live in the flattened world, we must fully understand its dynamics and be prepared to play by its rules.

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