Posted by Michael Kulisch, BPO/BPaaS Program Manager, NetSuite
The Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry is ripe for change.
Need proof? Check out what longtime industry observer Phil Fersht had to say recently on his Horses for Sources blog (opens in new tab):
In a nutshell,our industry is suffering from hundreds of stagnating outsourcing relationships, where the service provider has zero incentive to do anything much beyond keeping the margins consistent, while the middle management on the buy side has a similarly lethargic ambition not to do anything much… bar keeping the lights on.
Fortunately, the industry has begun to see the significant advantages that come with one major change, adopting Software as a Service (SaaS) solutions for BPO services, often referred to as Business Process as a Service (BPaaS, for those of you who can never get enough acronyms). For the outsourcers, it offers the benefits of being more efficient, providing greater visibility into clients and performance, standardization on a single system and the ability to work with clients of different sizes and offer different services.
Of course, it’s not just the BPOs, but their clients that reap the rewards that come with those efficiencies, and there are some additional benefits that are not as obvious to clients and providers alike.
We’re seeing these benefits through the success of our own BPO Partner Program. Here are a few key hidden benefits for clients we have uncovered so far:
- Deploying a BPaaS model can be much faster than leveraging a traditional on-premise BPO model - in one recent instance, a company was being spun off its parent and needed to get core operational systems up and running in a matter of a few months. A BPO provider using NetSuite as its platform was able to get an operational infrastructure in place very quickly and without disruption.
- BPaaS clients can easily adopt the cloud software used for the BPO outsourcing at their HQ operations - the client could even choose to take over ownership of the configured system with the cooperation of the outsourcing partner, allowing a seamless transition to managing their own operation, or managing new aspects of their operation while the outsourcer continues to provide services around select processes.
- BPO providers can extend the level of services that they offer to their clients through a BPaaS model – the flexibility and agility of cloud-based software enables BPO providers diversify their service offering from launching new subs quickly to building customizations.
Additionally, with a solution like NetSuite, which offers sophisticated inventory management, POS, ecommerce and manufacturing functionality, BPO providers can extend their services into many different operational processes using one flexible, secure platform.
In short, NetSuite allows providers to offer more types of services to a broader range of clients, and allows both clients and providers to significantly reduce risk and increase the flexibility of their BPO deployments.
Disruption has arrived in the outsourcing industry and it’s a good thing for all involved