BPO Providers: from Arbitrage to Innovation

Robotics are on my mind at the moment, as I am researching their impact on business services. In the past, a lot of the conversation around improvement was about automation – remember the days? – and this is still, of course, just as valid. But automation does require significant investments, and we are now seeing some new opportunities that offer a sort of 'band-aid' solution (but more of that next week). I just read an interesting interview with David Poole, from Sutherland Global. He points out a trend that we’ve all been witnessing but maybe are not really coming to grips with: namely that technology is STILL having a huge impact on service delivery options and solutions, but that, as he describes it, today’s BPO role is really all about innovation – and no longer arbitrage. "It [arbitrage] was an interesting phase," he says, "but we need to be thinking about offshore capabilities as access to talent, rather than access to cheap labour." There is a lot of work that was previously offshored, which could, today, really be automated, he points out. And this also touches on the sensitive spot of retaining customer proximity – which many organisations feel they surrendered when they let labour arbitrage rule their sourcing decisions. David also believes that data analytics has not yet delivered. Yes, there have been some results, and companies are loving the ‘business insights’ to make smarter, more informed choices. But much of this still lacks the context to give it its proper weighting. Meaning: if we are still looking back over our shoulder, or even taking ‘today’ as our benchmark, we are not really preparing for tomorrow, are we? It will be interesting to watch providers like Sutherland break new ground as they shift their focus beyond cost, onto that holy grail of 'value-add'. (Read the interview here.) [inlinead]

BPO Providers: from Arbitrage to Innovation

To continue reading this story get free access

Upcoming Events

Why Your AI Costs More Than Your Workforce and How AI Employees Change the Equation

From Transactions to Trust: Transforming AP, AR, and Communications into Customer Experience Drivers

Through Trust and Governance: How AI Agents are Redefining Accounts Payable

Why Shared Services and GBS Transformation Stalls and How to Overcome Change Fatigue

How AI-Native Accounts Payable Is Changing the Finance Function

Germany’s 1 January 2027 E-Invoicing Deadline: Timely Guidance for Time-Crunched Leaders

Follow Us

Latest Webinars

From Legacy to Cloud ERP: How Victrola Transformed Finance with SAP

From Visibility to Action: How Finance Risk Intelligence is Transforming Modern Finance Operations

The AP Automation Reality Check: What True Intelligent Automation Looks Like Inside D365

Recommended

Egypt: The Next Country North American Shared Services Should Consider IT and Bu...

How Do Sourcing Objectives and Criteria Determine the Sourcing Approach ?

The Outsourcing “Conundrum”: Securing the Benefits You Expect

EP17 The critical link between digital transformation and GBS (Global Business S...

BPO = Business Process Outcomes [not Business Process Outsourcing]

5 Ways Your Business Process Management System Could Be Failing Your Back Office

"Parts Is Parts" - The Key to Differentiating Yourself

Tech Demo: Accelerating Invoicing to Overcome Workload, Speed and Regulatory Cha...

What Will Save BPOs?

Shifting to SaaS may not eliminate the “Technical Debt”

Offshore Engineering R&D Centers Will Continue to Flourish in Current Crisis

Play Nice, Outsourcing Providers. There will be life after COVID-19

FIND CONTENT BY TYPE

SSON COMMUNITY

ADVERTISE WITH US

JOIN THE SSON COMMUNITY

BPO Providers: from Arbitrage to Innovation

To continue reading this story get free access

Upcoming Events

Follow Us

Subscribe to our Free Newsletter

Latest Webinars

Recommended

FIND CONTENT BY TYPE

SSON COMMUNITY

ADVERTISE WITH US

JOIN THE SSON COMMUNITY