You’ve finally met your perfect outsourcing partner, signed the NDAs and Statement of Work contracts, and are about to jump into building that world shattering website/mobile app/web application. To ensure a good working relationship and not to lose that magical feeling of any new relationship, here are three critical elements you need to establish.
1 Communication Protocols -This point can be a blog post on its own (and it will be J ) but some of the things to put in place is to firstly, work out the dramatis personae. Typically, you’d want to establish who represents the client-side as well as the outsourcing partner. And who are the seconds/alternatives should the primary contact be unavailable. Secondly, when and how to carry out a weekly walkthrough. Typically you’d want to have a Skype call with your outsourcing partner to work out what has been done and identify any issues which have surfaced. Thirdly, establish some communication rules such as, if there has been an incident at the outsourcing office, they need to immediately inform the client side to expect a delay in the work.
2 Use a Project Management Platform – With the rise of online collaboration, tools such as Basecamp and Active Collab are absolutely key. They allow you to setup and track milestones based on the project plan. It is much easier to update than Excel, and moreover, you won’t have to send that pesky Excel project planner to everyone and either CC the wrong personnel or forget to CC them at all! It is also a great place to store your documents and update them as the project progresses. Source control (ie numbering your documents) is done automatically. Having the ability to leave comments is also a great feature. Finally, the ability to create discussions and more importantly to track discussions is a real time saver. No longer will you be frantically trawling through a mountain of emails to look for an email where a decision or request was made.
3 Feedback – You should set aside sometime to obtain feedback from both sides of the party to comment and work on how the process of working together is progressing. The discussion should focus on whether either party is experiencing any pain points, if there were any issues to discuss how it occurred and how to mitigate future occurrences, and how people generally feel about their project.
Conclusion
Like any working relationship, it takes work but the key is to recognize that there are two sides to any relationship and some give and take may be required. Feel free to comment as we are interested in finding out how else you can ensure your outsourcing experience is a pleasant one. As always, thanks for reading and keep the magic alive!
