Outsourcing has become a strategic imperative as organisations seek to reduce costs and specialise in a limited number of core areas. Increasingly, organisations are looking beyond the traditional boundaries of the firm to reduce costs and achieve performance improvements. Services outsourcing has grown as organisations have been transferring responsibility for entire functions such as human resources, finance and information technology services to both local and global vendors. Business services are services provided by businesses to other businesses and include legal services, consultancy, customer contact, human resource services, and research and development. The growth of services outsourcing has generated considerable debate among economists and policymakers. Much of this debate has focused on issues such as labour costs, tax incentives and location advantages. However, while this debate has continued, practitioners have had to get on with the job of implementing services outsourcing arrangements. Services outsourcing is often a complex phenomenon, which is driven by factors that transcend cost considerations alone. Issues such as service design, unbundling processes, managing work across different cultures and time zones, and business process redesign have become important elements of managing services outsourcing arrangements.

The analysis presented in this book focuses on the implications of planning, implementing and managing services outsourcing arrangements. Services outsourcing arrangements encompass a range of areas including continuous improvement, change management, stakeholder management, knowledge management, information technology, contracting and performance management. These areas are integrated into the book by providing insights into their application in outsourcing arrangements in practice.