In the recent context, almost all the businesses are planning to expand their market globally and to in order to accomplish this objective, outsourcing has been playing a significant role. Outsourcing in simple terms refers to availing certain services to a third party such as Information Technology (IT), accounting, facilities, human resources and management. Apart from these services, the business firms also outsource call-center functions including customer services, telemarketing and other customer support services. These are done, when the supplier of outsourcing services and organization enters into an agreement (Constantin, 2007). Thus, the initial part of this study focuses on the project objectives along with its scope is mentioned in details in the literature review based on outsourcing as a business function. In the later part of the study, both primary and secondary research questions are hypothesized, in addition to the detailed analysis of research design and methodology. Furthermore, research limitation and time schedule or research plan is illustrated with proper conclusion.
The key objective of the study is to produce a business research proposal based on the literature review of the previous assignment and future scope. However, the basic purpose is to outline the details of the proposed research project along with the identification of the gaps that are present in the literature regarding the research topic “outsourcing business function”. Thereafter, this proposal included research questions and methodology that supports the feasibility of the research project.
Since various businesses have been increasingly using outsourcing in the recent period. Therefore, in a general basis, outsourcing has a wide scope, wherein transfer of services occurs to an external provider, who is specialized in a particular function (Nakkiran & Franklin, 2004). Therefore, the future scope of the project would be to explore the advantages of outsourcing and its growing importance in the business sector. Thus, having a clearer understanding of the topic with respect to the business perspective, the future scope and challenges in the literature can be addressed to attain competitive edge in the global market.
Evans (2015), stated that well established businesses today have been availing to outsourcing services. Therefore, the future scope of outsourcing would be used during the start-up of the business. There can be six areas in which a start-up business can utilize outsourcing. This includes ‘manufacturing’ such as on-shoring, ‘accounting and finance’, ‘technology’, ‘administrative’ department to manage costs, ‘human resources’ and ‘marketing and sales’ through social marketing (Evans, 2015). Therefore, understanding the future scope of outsourcing in the business context, various literatures would be analyzed in this part of the business proposal. According to Willcocks, Lacity & Sauer (2017), the theoretical perspective of outsourcing had been researched over two decades encompassing the concepts of strategy, system sciences and sociology as well as economics. It was observed that the companies are increasingly relying on outsourcing services for IT purposes such as software, hardware, computing resources, automation tools and telecommunication. Furthermore, detailed understanding of the IT outsourcing, BPO as along with off-shoring was undertaken wherein, offshoring focused on outsourcing services from another country to another. Therefore, critically analyzing the outsourcing and its implications, it was found that to enable outsourcing services, context-specific capabilities must be present. In addition, concepts such as business model can influence these capabilities. However, one of the negative aspects of the study was that the research was limited to the identification of these capabilities and lacked longitudinal perspective (Willcocks, Lacity & Sauer, 2017).
According to Oshri, Kotlarsky & Willcocks (2009), the global ITO has been growing on a yearly basis ever since 1989. The outsourcing industry was only worth USD $10 billion when it first started. However, with the passage of time, its market has been estimated to be more than $700 billion. Thus, having a critical understanding of the issues of outsourcing, which are pertinent to be faced in the business processes/services in the global scenario has been highlighted. In the case of China, the human resources available lacked appropriate managerial skills than what was required in the ITO or BPO industry. Hence, it is perceived as one of the reasons that led Chinese economy unable to internationalize through outsourcing. It was further reported innovation through outsourcing was also possible due to the fact that it had wide scope in the future, which was based on various business operations in the business firm. It was also stated that the outsourcing was quick and the performance was immediate in nature. The costs that were incurred was decided as per the contract with the service providers, which was agreed on the basis of outcome, materials, services and time (Oshri, Kotlarsky & Willcocks, 2009). Similarly, Massini & Miozzo (2010) researched the challenges of outsourcing/offshoring with regards to the management, innovation and related theories in the business sector. It was found that the nature of decision-making, the suppliers, investments, geographical location and nature of the market are perceived as the characteristics of outsourcing in the recent context (Massini & Miozzo, 2010).
It further involved restructuring of firm’s decisions along with the integration of multi-national corporations of all the industries in the global context. In Australia and the US, companies were the investors of R&D facilities, thus carrying out outsourcing and offshoring activities. Considering the data collected from the companies of Australia, Europe and the US, it was found that the evolution of these practices were involved in the functional areas, choices of locations, service delivery and strategic drivers. Furthermore, understanding the perceived risks, future plans and performance matrices of the companies, the evolution of offshoring was enabled (Massini & Miozzo, 2010). Therefore, understanding various related theories of outsourcing along with its advantages and disadvantages can opine that irrespective of the gaps in the literatures, it has been one of the most eminent topics for the researchers. Thus, being one of the prominently used business practices, it is significantly used in both local as well as the global market.
The research questions that would be used in the research project would be of two types, primary and secondary. The primary question is given below:
The secondary questions would envelop the primary question in a segregated manner, which are as follows:
The proposed research project was aimed to develop the understanding of the issue i.e. outsourcing business functions, as per the gaps that were evident in the literatures. Therefore, the research design and methodology that will be used is qualitative research. The data and information will be collected from the secondary sources like journals and books. Furthermore, as the qualitative research involves subjective experiences of the people having deep meaning can help in addressing the research questions. This research project will thus include descriptive approach, which will describe the characteristics and gaps in the referred literatures. Furthermore, both primary and secondary research questions will be critically addressed complying with the issue covered in the research topic (Leavy, 2017). Along with all the necessary processes mentioned above for a qualitative research, analysis and interpretation also plays an important role in providing the information. It is the process in which the actual meaning of the data and information gathered with the help of the secondary sources would be integrated with the issue of the research project (i.e. gaps involved in the literatures) (AQR, 2016).
In a general basis, the limitations of the qualitative research would be that it is a time consuming approach and the verification of the result is not possible. The analysis can be ambiguous in nature. In addition, the findings obtained for the analysis cannot be related to wider population with more precision in comparison with the quantitative researrch (Atieno, 2009). Furthermore, as per the research project, the possible limitation would be that more detailed analysis could not be possible as compared to the quantitative approaches. The rationale may also be a little biased as the writers of the literatures can have their own prospective.
There are various elements that need to be addressed within certain time limit, which can constraint the overall projects leading it to be unsuccessful. Therefore, making a time schedule or research plan is highly essential (Hopp, 2007). As per the research project the appropriate time schedule can be depicted in Appendix 1.
Conclusion
Irrespective of all the limitations and the requirement of qualitative research methodology, it can be concluded that the issue to be addressed in the research project shall have a wider scope for future researchers. Thus, critical examination of the issue of the gaps that are present in the literatures available regarding business functions outsourcing would be conducted. Therefore, the project objective, scope and the research questions will be properly adhered in the final research report. It shall be done in compliance with the process of qualitative analysis within a specified time schedule.
Reference List
AQR 2016, Analysis and interpretation, Association for Qualitative Research, viewed 27 September 2017,
<https://www.aqr.org.uk/glossary/analysis-and-interpretation>.
Atieno, O.P 2009, ‘An analysis of the strengths and limitation of qualitative and quantitative research paradigms’, Problems of Education In The 21stcentury, vol. 13, pp. 13-18.
Constantin, I 2007, ‘An introduction to outsourcing’, Manager Journal, vol. 6, no. 1, pp.110-117.
Evans, M 2015, 6 key areas to outsource when starting a business, Entrepreneurs, viewed 27 September 2017, <https://www.forbes.com/sites/christinawallace/2017/09/25/podcast-want-to-be-in-the-room-where-it-happens-find-opportunities-to-be-of-service/#1121813e4a92>.
Hopp, H 2007, ‘How to write a research proposal’, Universitat Mannheim , pp. 1-5.
Leavy, P 2017, Research design: Quantitative, qualitative, mixed methods, arts-based, and community-based participatory research approaches, Guilford Publications, US.
Massini, S & Miozzo, M 2010, ‘Outsourcing and offshoring of business services: Challenges to theory, management and geography of innovation’, Manchester Business School Working Paper, no. 604, pp. 1-60.
Nakkiran, S & Franklin, D.J (eds.) 2004, Business process outsourcing (BPO): Concept, current trends, management, future challenges, Deep and Deep Publications, Delhi.
Oshri, I, Kotlarsky, J & Willcocks, L.P 2015, The handbook of global outsourcing and offshoring 3rd edition, Springer, Germany.
Willcocks, L.P, Lacity, M.C & Sauer, C (eds.) 2017, Outsourcing and offshoring business services, Springer, Germany.
Bryman, A & Bell, E 2015, Business research methods, Oxford University Press, USA.
Cooper, D.R, Schindler, P.S & Sun, J 2006, Business research methods (Vol. 9), McGraw-Hill Irwin, New York.
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