This time of the year you cannot but think of farm systems and transitions. You watch the best in college football..and then you see the best of college players from the year before play as rookies at the gamespeed of the NFL playoffs.
So, I see this presentation Stephanie Moore of Forrester has on her recent trip to India. And I admire how the Indian firms have learned to schmooze analysts like her, like the Accentures and IBMs did when I was analyzing them 10 years ago at Gartner.
I am fortunate to get sideline passes and I get to see the Indian vendors at gamespeed - in live deals at clients where they compete against the Accentures and the IBMs. When I go to Bangalore or Chennai, it is not to get schmoozed. I get to see that while they are good, they just do not have the references, the investments, the polish - the "pros" do. You get to see their warts - their proposed staff resumes have little to do with all the training investments they brag about. They suffer the same "injuries" - staff turnover, wage inflation - the "pros" suffer through also. And you get to see unheralded players - often drafted late do better than those picked in the first round. Lots of specialist firms do just fine even as the TCSes and the Infosyses get all the press.
In the meantime, high school teams continue to be farms for colleges. The Filipinos and Hungarians and Brazilians are following after the Indians. Keeps improving the game. It is a great time to be a buyer of tech talent - and to sit back and watch the bowls and the playoffs.
Oh and by the way, go Gators!
