An Outsider's View

Richard Mills, a Canadian who is currently based in the Philippines, is considered a leading expert on Asia-Pacific outsourcing by ComputerWorld magazine. He has recently been published in the Economist Intelligence Unit's Business Guides to the Philippines, and he is even more upbeat than I am on the BPO industry's prospects in 2006. Please take the time to read his thoughts here.

Happy 2006!

2006 will be a big year for the Philippine BPO industry! I'll soon post the 2005 numbers and what the year ahead looks like. In the meantime, allow me to share with you one of my favorite outsourcing blogs, compiled by Information Week.

Particularly good are the postings of Paul McDougall; some of his 2005 gems are a write-up on what the WTO has to say about offshoring, and what he thinks about Friedman's book, "The World is Flat".

If you haven't read the book, you can purchase an online summary, written by Friedman himself. You may also want to read the Fortune magazine article on Friedman. The Fortune article says if you type "thomas friedman the world is flat" into a search engine, you'll probably find this scathing review by Matt Taibbi, which is also referred to in McDougall's blog. As for me, any outsourcing advocate with a handicap of 5 and whose next book might be about golf is certainly welcome in my home!