Outsourcing helps Valley business

An information technology outsourcing company started under Lehigh University 's business incubator program in 1981 has grown into an international powerhouse with more than 30 U.S. locations as well as offices ...

[WHAT]

Outsourcing helps Valley Business??? It would be nice if the 2500 jobs were in the UNITED STATES!!!

[True American]

What a worthless article.
Outsourcing only helps the CEO of the company improve the bottom line.
It doesn't help the local workers that get laid off when their jobs go to India for pennies on the dollar.

[Thomas]

EXACTLY!!!!! "Help" valley businesses? How, exactly? All I see are unemployed, displaced IT workers. Sure, it pads the pockets of the corporations and squeezes out the little guys who are trying to make a living. Same can be said for the manufacturing industries.

WHAT wrote:

Outsourcing helps Valley Business??? It would be nice if the 2500 jobs were in the UNITED STATES!!!

[Too bad]

Outsourcing is an abomination. It sets up two or three levels of employees: The ones who count (the ones who work for the company and get all the benefits), the ones who don't count less (they get benefits from their company) the ones who don't count at all (the ones who get no benefits at all from their companies).

Outsourced workers have no sense of security. They work side by side with the regular employees day by day, year by year and can't participate in company functions because they are not "real" employees. What's more, they have little hope of ever becoming real employees.

What is sickening is that the real employees find this acceptable much the same as pre civil war southerners accepted slavery as okay.

I'm here to tell you it's not okay.

To hell with these little entepreneurs.

[LOL]

Computer Aid pays it's employees pennies on the dollar for the contracts they get.. They are a rip off, I'm ready to start my own business, i've had to work in NY the last 10 years because noone of this technology companies in the Lehigh Valley pay anything.

[Miss Manners]

As if PPL is a shining example of how to outsource! They dumped (i.e., outsourced) their generation plants, and look at what's going on with future electric rates! Case closed, Gentlepeople!

[Um no]

WHAT wrote:

Outsourcing helps Valley Business??? It would be nice if the 2500 jobs were in the UNITED STATES!!!

Not all outsourcing is overseas. Plenty of companies outsource support operations with colocated staff to supplement existing, US-based resources.

[Dennis Mac]

Um no wrote:

<quoted text>
Not all outsourcing is overseas. Plenty of companies outsource support operations with colocated staff to supplement existing, US-based resources.

EXACTLY!
The knee-jerk reaction to the "O"-word is just that.

None of these posters, when in-need of a brake job, would go take a course in auto mechanics, buy the parts, and do the job themselves.

So why should companies spend huge $ to build IT organizations from scratch, for a project?

PS: Do you live in Canton, NC? I'm looking to move to Haywood County in about a year and a half.

[Um no]

Dennis Mac wrote:

PS: Do you live in Canton, NC? I'm looking to move to Haywood County in about a year and a half.

I don't, I'm in over a VPN connection and one of our ISP connections is in NC.

[Too bad]

Um no wrote:

<quoted text>
Not all outsourcing is overseas. Plenty of companies outsource support operations with colocated staff to supplement existing, US-based resources.

Do you think we're all stupid. We know that.

[Duh]

Looks like "WHAT" is confusing "outsourcing" with "offshore." The article didn't mention how many of the 2500 employees were in the US. Maybe 2400 are US, and 100 aren't. Maybe it's the opposite. If the former, it's just consulting. Without facts, rants are senseless.

"Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt."

[Too bad]

Whether or not the jobs remain in the United States is besides the point.

The point is that outsourced workers are getting screwed because they are paid about 1/2 the rate the outsourced company is paid. Often the worker gets no benefits, at least not the same as the regular employees get.

[A Hot Chick]

wow... that Mark guy in the picture looks like the dude from Maroon 5 doesn't he?

[Um no]

Too bad wrote:

<quoted text>
Do you think we're all stupid. We know that.

The first few posters didn't quite get it.

[Um no]

Too bad wrote:

The point is that outsourced workers are getting screwed because they are paid about 1/2 the rate the outsourced company is paid. Often the worker gets no benefits, at least not the same as the regular employees get.

I work as a full time employee of a different outsourcer. I have excellent benefits and wage. We are engaged on a long term contract, so job security is nearly as quaranteed as any other full time job.

[Too Bad is a Whiner]

Too bad wrote:

Whether or not the jobs remain in the United States is besides the point.
The point is that outsourced workers are getting screwed because they are paid about 1/2 the rate the outsourced company is paid. Often the worker gets no benefits, at least not the same as the regular employees get.

Do you actually have any idea what you're talking about, or do you just whine because you have a crappy job?

[Been There]

Reality is a mix of many of the sentiments here.

Companies with large IT staffs DO outsource some of their work. This is usually passed off as a cost savings, and many times, it includes cost savings by job elimination. Sometimes the eliminated employees get hired by the outsourcer... always for less money and potentially fewer benefits.

These outsourcing companies DO export some of the work offshore. It used to be to India, until they wised up and realized they could demand the same amount of money as US resources could. Currently these companies look to the far east for cheap labor. It also yields a nice follow-the-sun support model.

I know several people who work for CAI and other companies like it. It's not as bad as many posters claim; it's also generally not as good as working for a fortune 500 type of company. Training and career advancement are limited to money-making opportunities for the company. If you are stuck on an outsourced project, you frequently get the s**t work, the crap maintenance no one really wants.

As I said there are bits of all of these posts that are probably applicable.

I feel the tone of the article is just a bit too overly joyous regarding the total impact of outsourcing. If there are winners, there have to be losers, too.

[Dog]

Most of the so called outsourcing is people who work in the Lehigh Valley. They are Computer Aid employees that perform IT related functions at area companies. Outsourcing does not always mean the jobs are going overseas. Some of you need to get your fact straight. Computer Aid is one of the larger employers in the Lehigh Valley (and surrounding areas; out to Harrisburg, etc.). Most people probably haven't heard of them because they are a private company (i.e. not a publicly traded stock). If you want a software project done, I could almost guarantee you get a better value from them versus the big wig consulting companies like Accenture (because it is a flatter structure; when a company contracts with an Accenture they are usually overpaying because you are paying for a boatload of people who don't do any real work on a project; e.g. a series of directors, a senior director, customer relationship people).

I have worked at companies like a Computer Aid (flatter structure and you are mostly paying for people that are actually doing work) AND also worked for one of the big time consulting companies (where you have a few people doing the hands on work but the contract is paying for alot of other people as well).

[Says it how it is]

Miss Manners wrote:

As if PPL is a shining example of how to outsource! They dumped (i.e., outsourced) their generation plants, and look at what's going on with future electric rates! Case closed, Gentlepeople!

Do you have a clue what you are talking about? The state deregulation laws had them seperate the generation units from the transmission and distribution units. Generation units are still part of PPL and the employees whom work their are PPL employees. Met-Ed sold all of their generation units. If reregulation occurs Met-Ed's costs to purchase generation will be high... Outsourcing IT groups is somewhat smart because it is not on your companies dime to keep the employees up to date on the latest technologies and programs.

[Been There]

Says it how it is wrote:

<quoted text>
Do you have a clue what you are talking about? The state deregulation laws had them seperate the generation units from the transmission and distribution units. Generation units are still part of PPL and the employees whom work their are PPL employees. Met-Ed sold all of their generation units. If reregulation occurs Met-Ed's costs to purchase generation will be high... Outsourcing IT groups is somewhat smart because it is not on your companies dime to keep the employees up to date on the latest technologies and programs.

Uh...no. Typically companies outsource their legacy crap. They keep their internal people up to speed on the latest stuff, which is where their key applications run.