I was invited to present this week to the Young Presidents Organization in San Francisco on Global Talent Sourcing . Several others presented on strategy and execution issues - including speakers from McKinsey, Everest Group and entrepreneurs shared their own war stories from India, Philippines and E. Europe.
I am delighted that entrepreneurs are looking at global talent while their companies are still young. It was fascinating to hear one audience member describe himself as the "outsourced CEO" - he and few others are in the US, the rest of his team offshore.
My basic message was to not get stuck in analysis paralysis like I see at so many large companies. Three religious wars - whether to outsource, what to outsource, where to outsource - put many companies in neutral when they could be executing, making mistakes, improving. And I pointed out the issues with both captives and outsourced arrangements.
I also encouraged the audience to look at talent in emerging community and crowdsourcing models. Finally, I reminded the audience the good old USA is for many is still the best "offshore location" - when you add in the total cost of travel, time zone, accent, process familiarity and other issues beyond the basic cost of labor.
My slides are below.
