Outsourcing should only be one option in an organisation’s strategic sourcing policy. Centrix offers a decision-making framework that helps managers consider all the different factors that affect whether something should be outsourced or not.

We look at our clients’ current operational capabilities and determine their true costs and value. This allows us to compare them to the cost of an outsourced service, and the value that service is likely to create, in order to identify real opportunities for cost reduction. An organisation may already be sweating its assets effectively and offering a high level of service to users and so unlikely an external provider could do any better.

If outsourcing does make economic sense, we can help clients decide which functions to outsource, we ensure their operations and contracts are structured to deliver the lasting value they are looking for, through strategies such as rationalising applications and consolidation or virtualisation of servers.

We are driven to make sure outsourcing deals deliver the promised benefits. For instance, we aggregate demand for services from different parts of the business to create economies of scale and give our clients more bargaining power. We also bundle technologies and skills into end-to-end service packages that can be described in clear service level agreements written into contracts with suppliers, and work with clients to build the necessary supplier management skills in house. We then make sure those packages still meet the regulatory requirements for the client’s industry sector.