The World is Flat – book by Thomas Friedman – blog by Karl Janowski
A great book on outsoucing, and offshoring that explains how the world came to be at the current level of globalization.
Globalization 1.0 - 1492 to 1800 - key agents of change relied on muscle, how mych economic power the country had and how well it deployed its power, companies went global but only collaborated with other companies in their country
Globalization 2.0 - 1800 to 2000 - multinational companies arise, steam engine, railroad, telegraph and phone, early web
Globalization 3.0 - 2000 to present - using the web for global collaboration
Ten forces that flattened the world
11/9/89/ Berlin Wall Falling – spread of capitalism, world as a seamless whole, democracy
8/9/95 – Netscape went public – rise of the internet, spread of fiber
Work flow software – applications talking to applications
Open Sourcing – community development
Offshoring - search the world for human resources
Supply-Chaining – Walmart style supply symphony
Insourcing – UPS and companies that are expanding their roles to add services
In-forming – Yahoo and Goggle style search engineers
Digital Steroids- Cell phones and PDA style widgets
Triple Convergence – new playing field from flattening, new ways of doing business, and new tools that allowed collaboration
Ambition gap- youth in other countries (zippies in India) more ambitious than Americans
Rules
When world goes flat don’t build a defensive wall.
Small companies act big.
Best companies are the best collaborators.
Best companies get checkups and share results with their clients.
Outsource to win not to shrink.
Outsourcing is for everyone. Not just big corporations do it.