bITa Center

‘IT Legacy’ became a frequently used term before the millennium change. Originally used to indicate computer systems that are already in use for a very long time. These systems are often hard to control, maintain and improve simply because there is a general lack of understanding them.
Later,  IT Legacy became a much broader term to denote all IT that is inflexible (or non-adaptive) and thus becomes an inhibitor for change in general and more specifically for business innovation (see also my former blog). By this new definition, we have to realize that IT legacy is still being created every day. This is mainly due to the fact that new IT is in many cases created with a uni-sided focus on cost reductions and productivity improvement and with no attention to flexibility through proper IT architecture.
Since recently there is a new phenomenon, which I like to call ‘Outsourcing Legacy’. This outsourcing legacy can for example be found in organizations that in the last few years outsourced to several IT partners without any overall strategy. There is a good chance that this has left them with a historically grown outsourced situation that is hard to control, maintain and improve.
Similar to inflexible IT, there are also outsourced relations that are just inflexible by the way they are constructed. This leaves organizations with an new inhibitor for change and innovation. Similar to the creation of new IT legacy, organizations are creating outsourcing legacy every day, also mainly due to a uni-sided focus on cost reductions and productivity improvement.
So what makes an outsourcing relation flexible? First of all I would like to define a flexible sourcing relation as ‘having the opportunity to change the service delivery within a short time frame at low costs ’. Changing service delivery can have to do with requiring new services, the ability to up- or downscaling specific services, new ways of delivery or introducing new use of technology .
To create a flexible outsourcing relation, I believe that organizations at least have to pay attention to:

• Flexibility as an explicit driver for outsourcing
• Flexibility in your contract for the types of service delivery and related pricing
• A vendor strategy that is aligned to flexibility
• A Sourcing Governance (managing demand and supply) that is aligned to flexibility
• An enterprise architecture that is aligned to flexibility
• Transparency and the right control mechanisms to be able to steer changing service delivery

Without paying attention to these aspects there is a good chance that a new outsourcing deal signed today - will be ‘Outsourcing Legacy’ tomorrow.