The Curriculum
Over the years I have worked with several highly respected universities in Australia. I have also broached this topic before with universities in China and the United Kingdom. My earlier forays were just probing. This time, I'd like to take a different approach. I'm keen to hear from academics in universities throughout the world, who would like to contribute to the development of a universal curriculum for this degree. I'm especially keen to discuss with academics the potential to have such a curriculum recognised as a formal post-graduate qualification by their university, such that reciprocity in the recognition of academic credit is made possible. Where participating universities in numerous countries are selected, academic credit from such institutions should be accepted as equivalent.
The outcome should be that a Master of Business (Outsourcing) should be a degree, with a common curriculum, offered by several participating universities, in many countries, and should be recognised world-wide as the defining post-graduate qualification of our profession.
Entry Requirements
Firstly, as a Master's Degree, I take the view that it should have the prerequisite of a prior Bachelor's Degree.
Secondly, I would propose that applicants for admission to this degree should have, as a minimum, three years of employment within the outsourcing industry, irrespective of the capacity of that employment. I take this view as I believe that the world-view of scholars changes through experience, and that students of this degree should be able to draw upon some examples from their own experience and should be able to identify, in some measure with the material being taught.
I realise that these positions may be contraversial, and I openly invite comment, opposing or supporting views and healthy debate. I would also be interested in hearing views on Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL), and experiential equivalence as contributing factors to admission criteria.
Course Structure
My personal view is that the course should be segmented into three sections, each section being capable of being treated academically in a self-contained manner. Each section would take six-months of full-time study, or twelve months of part-time study. Completion of the first segemnt would meet the requirements for a Graduate Certificate (should the student elect to stop at that point). Completion of the first and second segments would meet the requirements for a Graduate Diploma (should the student elect to stop at that point). Completion of all three segments would meet the requirements for admission to the Master of Business (Outsourcing).
- This structure has the appeal to attract post-graduate students to the course, even where they may be uncertain of their ability to see the course through to its full completion.
- It also has the potential to attract students to a lesser qualification, and through perseverance, encourage them to attain a higher qualification.
- It also has the benefit of being able to give an academic qualification to a student who, having completed at least one full section, is, through unforseen circumstances, unable to complete the full course.
- It is feasible that admission to the second section of the course may be dependent upon attaining a threshold performance level in the first section (e.g. a Credit average); the same criteria could be applied for progression from the second section to the third section.
- Such a structure then operates, I believe, in the best intersets of both the scholar and the profession.
I am keen to see the course attract participation from as wide a section of the outsourcing industry population as may be possible. To that end, I believe that online course delivery has the greatest potential to reach a wide audience.
Techniques in distance education are well established. Electronic and online delivery mechanisms, including teleconferenced tutorials, webinar lectures, digital course notes and remotely supervised examinations are all feasible.
I believe that in the first instance, it might be practical to develop and offer the curriculum in English. I would be delighted to hear views to the contrary, however, as I would very much like to see a uniform curriculum offered in Spanish, French, Poruguese and Simplified Chinese. Other languages are naturally welcomed, but in my experience, would have numerically lesser appeal. Whether this is possible at the outset will depend, to a very large extent on the support received from universities and faculty in countries where those languages predominate.
Course Content
There are may different perspectives on outsourcing, and I am keen to engage in discussion as to what should be included in the course. It would also be helpful to debate which should be core elements and which should be electives. Here are some of the factors to consider - but this is intended simply as a conversation-starter:
- outsourcing as an economic philosophy underpinning nations
- outsourcing strategy relating to the core competence of the firm and its competitive advantage
- outsourcing as a business practice; international standards (ISO, CMM, IP protection, data privacy etc.)
- outsourcing from the perspectives of the sourcer, the service provider, the management consultant
- onshoring, nearshoring, offshoring, right-shoring;
- labour arbitrage, anti-competitive protectionism and corporate social responsibility
- multi-cultural, multi-lingual implications of outsourcing in the context of national preferences
- front-office vs. back-office; voice vs. data; analogue (document-centric) vs. digital (electronic)
- sourcing primary resources and raw materials; tangible goods from secondary manufacturing and tertiary intangible services
- outsourcing from micro-transactions (e.g. ODesk / Elance) to mega transactions (governments and industries)
- project direction, project management, project oversight and project delivery
- tools, technologies and techniques in outsourcing
- domain expertise, process expertise and platform expertise
- contracts, pricing, service level agreements; legal and commercial ramifications
- business development; selling outsourcing deals, stages, steps and the deal pipeline.
- activity based costing in outsourced applications; open book pricing; gainsharing
- business process mapping, business process reengineering; intercompany process trasnitioning
- applicactions of outsourcing in specific market verticals (finance, utiltiies, healthcare etc).
- the marketing of outsourcing (corporate positioning, public relations, social media, conferences & exhibitions)
- the role of third parties: professional asssociations, government promtion agencies, lobby groups, industry press, investment advisors, market researchers, analysts.
