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I've worked at a couple of Indian "consultancy" firms and my experiences have been far from good. At the first one I automated some testing for them what would

I've worked at a couple of Indian "consultancy" firms and my experiences have been far from good. At the first one I automated some testing for them what would free up 3 people they were having to hire for that job. They didn't like it. Thats because they don't have to bear the cost associated with hiring them. It's the client who has to pay. By the person, by the hour and the company gets a (mega) huge cut from it. I'm not sure how such consultancy firms handle this conflict of interest else where but for Indian firms, I know anecdotally, this is very common. So there is no incentive to hire good programmers. Or do good programming because the server costs, etc. again are going to be borne by the client. And the second one, I was working at another such Indian consultancy firm bit out of Singapore this time. The company was run by the sales force. My manager's manager said in one of his speeches that "as the iPad becomes dual core it will replace servers." I looked at him as my dual core iPad 2 lay in my lap and clapped because that's what you have to do. And I'm pretty sure he didn't mean a P2P future of the web. My manger on the other hand wanted a "function" done that could take in an "iDevice program" and output a BlackBerry app. He wanted it done in 3 hours. My team could have been an isolated incident and I want to believe that but it wasn't so. The only thing my team was doing different than the rest of the organization was the rest of the organization used some form of source control I had never heard of. Probably Microsoft based as that was the decision criteria in all cases. Out team was using none. Files were shared using USB flash drives. There were instances where old employees had left and we didn't have the source of their work - only the binaries. They only hiring a particular ethic group of Indians by the time I left. Majority of jobs in India are consultancy jobs. They may not be as terrible as my last one but I would think they are half way there. Things may be changing but that's how most of "IT life" is.

gaius 14y ago
Dominic Connor says the same thing http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2012/05/28/channel_techy/ http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2012/05/28/channel_techy/ A good employee wants to drive down costs and drive up revenue at his company. A consultant can only drive up revenue for his company by driving up costs at his clients. This is seems very obvious, but the existence of the consulting industry versus in-house employees suggests that it actually is not...
- a-priori 14y ago
  Yes, on a per-project basis, it's in the best interests of the consultancy to drive up the project costs, thereby driving up their own revenues at the client's expense. But that's a toxic way to do business, and in the long run it's against the consultancy's best interests. The correct way to think is to maximize the revenue of the account, and the best way to do that is to get repeat business. Also, by referrals. Neither of those will happen unless you're acting in the best interests of the client. It's a pity that these firms don't realize this. Some do though; I work for one of them.
  - excuse-me 14y ago
    Seems to have worked for EDS/Cap Gemini/IBM/Whatever-Anderson-is-called-today so far
    - mtrimpe 14y ago
      These companies thrive on three types of arrangement: 1) "Deals with the devil": The company knows they'll be drained for all they're worth, but they planned badly, overcommitted and basically just cant hire the expertise they need to do 'X by Y' any other way. 2) "Screw the cost, just make this go away": It's a big project, management has plenty of money and mostly just doesn't want to think about this project. A big name might cost a ton of money, but you can sue if things go sour and generally shit will be delivered eventually. 3) "A fool and his money part easily": If you got a bunch of money somewhere and have no clue as to how things work, these big boys will diligently take your money, lavish you with nice dinners while they extract every cent of your budget while making sure all the paperworks points to your own incompetence as the ultimate cause for the project failing. All three types are variants of 'you messed up, now pay the price' and in that they perform a valuablem, if decidedly unglamorous, function in the IT ecosystem.
      - excuse-me 14y ago
        4, The customer is the government. The contract always requires that everything from the data-center to the training is in the same contract so these are the only possible suppliers They underbid the contact and don't deliver while dumping 1000s of untrained new-grads as "consultants" at $N*1000/day for changes until the project is ultimately cancelled by the next government. The process then repeats
scott_w 14y ago
Perhaps Indian companies can get away with this because of the (possibly perceived) cost differences compared to a US/European consultant. If the base day rate of an Indian consultant is £100/day, and an English consultant £500/day, then the Indian consultant can still throw on more inefficiencies (5x as much) before matching the cost of an English consultant. So, in theory, an Indian consultancy firm can afford to throw extra developers, servers etc. at a problem and charge the client because it still works out cheaper. Please note that I'm not slating Indian firms or programmers, merely pointing out economics that could help explain the above behaviour.
pnathan 14y ago
Pardon me and my ignorance, but this seems so totally ripe for a highly competent consultancy to come in and deliver excessively amazing value compared to ... others. Why doesn't that happen?
- gaius 14y ago
  Because this consultancy would first need to become golf buddies with its clients senior management, at which point it would be just like every other consultancy. The whole consulting model is broken. Third-parties can never replace employees for the simple reason that their interests are misaligned. The most you can get from outsourcing is a boost in this quarter's figures (which is enough to get said management their bonuses, and then they move on!).
  - venkatmangudi 14y ago
    True that. Also because once a consultancy decides to do a good job, the hiring manager at the client needs to ensure that the job would make their career prospects better. Nobody really cares if the software or system will be useful. What they care about is "What's in it for me?". Outsourcing is different from Consulting. Consulting brings in experienced people who can actually provide useful advice. Outsourcing typically replaces expensive and smart people with mostly inexpensive and less competent people.
drieddust 14y ago
"At the first one I automated some testing for them what would free up 3 people they were having to hire for that job. They didn't like it. Thats because they don't have to bear the cost associated with hiring them." This happens because client wants automation for free. If you keep doing it manually client pays for the man power happily but once you automate despite seeing a recurring cost eliminated, they do not even want to pay for one time effort of automation. Everything exists for a reason. These practices are adopted because of clientele.

gaius 14y ago

Dominic Connor says the same thing http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2012/05/28/channel_techy/ http://www.channelregister.co.uk/2012/05/28/channel_techy/ A good employee wants to drive down costs and drive up revenue at his company. A consultant can only drive up revenue for his company by driving up costs at his clients. This is seems very obvious, but the existence of the consulting industry versus in-house employees suggests that it actually is not...

a-priori 14y ago
Yes, on a per-project basis, it's in the best interests of the consultancy to drive up the project costs, thereby driving up their own revenues at the client's expense. But that's a toxic way to do business, and in the long run it's against the consultancy's best interests. The correct way to think is to maximize the revenue of the account, and the best way to do that is to get repeat business. Also, by referrals. Neither of those will happen unless you're acting in the best interests of the client. It's a pity that these firms don't realize this. Some do though; I work for one of them.
- excuse-me 14y ago
  Seems to have worked for EDS/Cap Gemini/IBM/Whatever-Anderson-is-called-today so far
  - mtrimpe 14y ago
    These companies thrive on three types of arrangement: 1) "Deals with the devil": The company knows they'll be drained for all they're worth, but they planned badly, overcommitted and basically just cant hire the expertise they need to do 'X by Y' any other way. 2) "Screw the cost, just make this go away": It's a big project, management has plenty of money and mostly just doesn't want to think about this project. A big name might cost a ton of money, but you can sue if things go sour and generally shit will be delivered eventually. 3) "A fool and his money part easily": If you got a bunch of money somewhere and have no clue as to how things work, these big boys will diligently take your money, lavish you with nice dinners while they extract every cent of your budget while making sure all the paperworks points to your own incompetence as the ultimate cause for the project failing. All three types are variants of 'you messed up, now pay the price' and in that they perform a valuablem, if decidedly unglamorous, function in the IT ecosystem.
    - excuse-me 14y ago
      4, The customer is the government. The contract always requires that everything from the data-center to the training is in the same contract so these are the only possible suppliers They underbid the contact and don't deliver while dumping 1000s of untrained new-grads as "consultants" at $N*1000/day for changes until the project is ultimately cancelled by the next government. The process then repeats

scott_w 14y ago

Perhaps Indian companies can get away with this because of the (possibly perceived) cost differences compared to a US/European consultant. If the base day rate of an Indian consultant is £100/day, and an English consultant £500/day, then the Indian consultant can still throw on more inefficiencies (5x as much) before matching the cost of an English consultant. So, in theory, an Indian consultancy firm can afford to throw extra developers, servers etc. at a problem and charge the client because it still works out cheaper. Please note that I'm not slating Indian firms or programmers, merely pointing out economics that could help explain the above behaviour.

pnathan 14y ago

Pardon me and my ignorance, but this seems so totally ripe for a highly competent consultancy to come in and deliver excessively amazing value compared to ... others. Why doesn't that happen?

gaius 14y ago
Because this consultancy would first need to become golf buddies with its clients senior management, at which point it would be just like every other consultancy. The whole consulting model is broken. Third-parties can never replace employees for the simple reason that their interests are misaligned. The most you can get from outsourcing is a boost in this quarter's figures (which is enough to get said management their bonuses, and then they move on!).
- venkatmangudi 14y ago
  True that. Also because once a consultancy decides to do a good job, the hiring manager at the client needs to ensure that the job would make their career prospects better. Nobody really cares if the software or system will be useful. What they care about is "What's in it for me?". Outsourcing is different from Consulting. Consulting brings in experienced people who can actually provide useful advice. Outsourcing typically replaces expensive and smart people with mostly inexpensive and less competent people.

drieddust 14y ago

"At the first one I automated some testing for them what would free up 3 people they were having to hire for that job. They didn't like it. Thats because they don't have to bear the cost associated with hiring them." This happens because client wants automation for free. If you keep doing it manually client pays for the man power happily but once you automate despite seeing a recurring cost eliminated, they do not even want to pay for one time effort of automation. Everything exists for a reason. These practices are adopted because of clientele.