Europe is not immune

[Jeroen Wenting]

Some people seem to think that outsourcing is a purely US problem.
Today Shell announced it is going to move some 3000 IT jobs from the Netherlands and the UK to India and Malaysia.

[Jon McDonald]

Originally posted by Jeroen Wenting:
Some people seem to think that outsourcing is a purely US problem.
Today Shell announced it is going to move some 3000 IT jobs from the Netherlands and the UK to India and Malaysia.

Actually, I always thought that the Europeans would get hit harder from IT outsourcing than the US (less IT Jobs to begin with, and higher employement taxes due to social programs).
Jon

[Jeroen Wenting]

Originally posted by Jon McDonald:

Actually, I always thought that the Europeans would get hit harder from IT outsourcing than the US (less IT Jobs to begin with, and higher employement taxes due to social programs).
Jon

OTOH our wages are lower so the difference in real terms with India is less (e.g. I make about half or less from what I hear US people in the same kind of job are making).
Mainly the US cases are far more published on the major newssites than European ones. Jobs here usually trickle away 100 or so at a time rather than the thousands at once US-based multinationals are outsourcing.
Such numbers don't make it on CNN, they rarely even make it into local newspapers anymore.

[Kishore Dandu]

Europeans generally are perceived to be less hard working than those from US.
So, that makes it more reasonable to go for the outsourcing route.

[HS Thomas]

Originally posted by Jeroen Wenting:
Some people seem to think that outsourcing is a purely US problem.
Today Shell announced it is going to move some 3000 IT jobs from the Netherlands and the UK to India and Malaysia.

I wonder why ? Shell is the British Enron. Or rather Anglo-Dutch's - overstating reserves by 20%. Sir Philip Watts and Shell could face criminal charges. Though the company is damaged it ain't bust yet and the company still yields good dividends. But it desperately needs to find new oil reserves. I can see why they would adopt cost-cutting measures.
[ April 28, 2004: Message edited by: HS Thomas ]

[Jon McDonald]

Originally posted by Kishore Dandu:
Europeans generally are perceived to be less hard working than those from US.
So, that makes it more reasonable to go for the outsourcing route.

Finally, there is some group perceived to be lazier than us in the US .

[Jeroen Wenting]

Originally posted by HS Thomas:

I wonder why ? Shell is the British Enron. Or rather Anglo-Dutch's - overstating reserves by 20%. Sir Philip Watts and Shell could face criminal charges. Though the company is damaged it ain't bust yet and the company still yields good dividends. But it desperately needs to find new oil reserves. I can see why they would adopt cost-cutting measures.
[ April 28, 2004: Message edited by: HS Thomas ]

I think they were just overoptimistic rather than deliberately dishonest.
Remember the entire system of predicting oil reserves is based on guesswork as much as anything and as new geological data becomes available there can be big differences.
Shell has officially stated that this plan is NOT due to the latest problems with oil reserves.
Given that it takes time to organise an outsourcing project I think they started the path well before those problems became known.