Christopher Vera’s Mystic Nebula

Outsourcing for the Bottom Line
By Christopher Vera
www.autumnfactory.com

Let’s face it: Outsourcing is nothing new. There’s no reason to get excited over IT-related jobs like software development and call centers going overseas. Companies will continue to look at the bottom line and they will continue to perceive a benefit to outsourcing.

As a stockholder in many companies, I say there are even better ways that companies serious about outsourcing can save money. As a stockholder, I would like to see companies start outsourcing their REAL big expenses.

For example, why should any stockholder choose to hire a CEO that costs the company millions of dollars a year in salary and perks? There are (as big businesses are fond of telling us) experienced, well-educated business executives in India and other countries that could easily perform this task. And for hundreds of millions less. In fact, depending on the country and the experience of the executive, compensation may be payable in livestock.

With today’s videoconferencing and information routing technology, there’s no reason for the decision maker to be located in the penthouse suite of a New York HQ office building if most of the business critical data the company will be moved offshore anyway. Could not the same decisions be made from Bangladesh in near realtime?

Consider this: For less then a tenth of the cost of a single American CEO, a company could hire a team of outsourced CEOs to work in shifts so there would be 7×24x365 coverage of the company’s most important job function. For global companies with offices located around the world, having a decision maker available anytime day or night would significantly increase competitive advantage. An office in London would no longer suffer loss of business when split-second authorization is needed to close a deal and the CEO is fast asleep in another time zone. With outsourcing, a call to the graveyard shift CEO solves the problem and gets the deal done.

Outsourced CEOs will be less prone to scandal because scandal-protection clauses can be written into their contract. Potentially scandalous or unethical behavior that raises questions could be immediately attributed to lack of cultural understanding or knowledge of the law. Also, in the event all else failed, escape clauses allow for the easy termination of the outsourced CEO. Hiring a new one would be as simple as contacting the outsourcing vendor, requesting a replacement, and choosing from thousands of qualified applicants. In these respects, an outsourced CEO would have saved Enron, Worldcom and Tyco significant headache.

Finally, outsourced CEOs are no worse at golf than their American counterparts.

Stockholders should begin demanding the immediate outsourcing of all CxO level positions in publicly held companies. The cost savings in the first year alone is too great for any company to ignore.

After that, United States citizens should begin considering the possibility of outsourcing high-level government positions to better qualified, less arrogant and, most importantly, less expensive labor.

After all, its all about the bottom line. Right?

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