[westajay]

Offshoring is an economic phenomenon involving organizations that only know how to measure their IT effectiveness using cost.

Personal experience is that I've never seen it work, but that's only from my own sample set.

Have also seen a lot of "in-shoring" activity, where consultants are brought in to try and rebuild after a disastrous outsourcing scenario where agreed to service levels could not be maintained.

I've been horrified at the skill level of outsourced resources, not just technically, but chronic deficits in communication, planning and analysis skills.

It feels to me like a big Ponzi scheme that in the end costs clients more, but wish I had more data to back up this assertion.

I have seen some offshore people that are skilled let down but unskilled managers that have been brought into manage IT from other industries, such as manufacturing. Or, offshoring teams put into a skapegoat role by clients that couldn't fix their own problems.