IT outsourcing in Russia - current realities and perspectives, opinions and experience of experts

TAdviser recorded a 15% growth in the Russian IT outsourcing market in 2015, and its volume reached 76.2 billion rubles. At the end of 2016 and in 2017, further growth is expected.

IT outsourcing (eng. IT outsourcing) - partial or full transfer of support, maintenance and modernization of infrastructure in the hands of companies specializing in customer service organizations and having a staff of specialists of various qualifications. Simply put, outsourcing is the transfer of work (order) to another company.

For financial reasons, small and even large companies are ready to cut staff and use outsourcing.

However, considerations are not always financial: often companies that are not engaged in the development of software themselves need IT support. Usually, in such cases, entire companies that professionally provide outsourcing services in the field of support of computer networks and a complex of software products take the stage.
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There are several types of IT outsourcing services on the modern market: infrastructure maintenance of geographically distributed enterprises, expert technical support, software development and outstaffing.

By involving third-party organizations in managing the infrastructure of your company (as well as in its direct creation), the company, according to some estimates, saves up to 30% of its total expenses.

Many outsourcer services cost less in terms of a year than, for example, the rate of the system administrator in the staffing table. True, managers are confused by the clear contract limitation of the volume of services provided by the company.

Unregulated work, if necessary, performed by IT professionals, as a rule, must be paid separately.

In some circumstances, it is more profitable for companies to use one-time services — for example, when updating an entire fleet of computer equipment or installing licensed software in full. In addition, one-time services are easier to order for work on expanding the local network: laying a network cable, installing telephone outlets, installing boxes and so on.

Often, outsourcing companies act as resellers of the most well-known software vendors and can offer a variety of programs for customers, ranging from antivirus programs and operating systems to server applications.

We talked to representatives of Russian companies and asked them to express their attitude about what is happening with Russian outsourcing today.

We asked the experts the following questions:

• How big is the need for a permanent outsourcing software development team for a non-IT company?

• What tasks, in your opinion or experience, are best suited for delegating them to an outsourcing team? What tasks most often trust freelancers? And to outsourcers?

• Why is IT outsourcing more successful than outsourcing (or outstaffing) in other areas?

• How often have you had unsuccessful results of cooperation with outsourcers? Why?

How big is the need for a permanent outsourcing software development team for a non-IT company?

Maxim Zakharenko, CEO of Oblakoteka:

Developers always need to be able to manage. Therefore, not an IT company, if it did not initially have a development unit, it is better not to try to establish its own structure - the correct management of the development team will not work, there will be routine and slow progress. Whether a team is permanent or not is determined by the level of "digital transformation" of the business. If we are talking about a new "handler" in 1C, then a permanent command is not needed.

Nikolay Patskov, Director General, “FreshDoc.ru Document Designer”:

This is a very controversial issue. The edge on which the benefits of outsourcing teams and the convenience of forming an internal IT department are balanced is very thin. It all depends on the amount of attention paid to software development in a company that does not link its activities with IT. If a company is interested in episodic development, a rare functionality update, or if we are talking about a one-time order, outsourcing is applicable and beneficial. Occasionally turning to a third-party team, you will significantly save company money.

But if we talk about continuous improvement and software support, it is better to start building your own IT infrastructure. Practice shows that outsourcing and mobility are not exactly compatible things. In addition, by recruiting internal employees who will constantly work on a specific product, you will greatly benefit from the quality and speed of work. And the interest in promoting your brand will be much higher.

Dmitry Chekin, founder of CSSSR:

In most cases, non-IT businesses with a turnover of less than 30 million rubles a year should not get involved in the development of their own automation. A company whose IT is not a core business is easier to use combinations of ready-made solutions. Depending on the needs of the business, it will be a CRM system, a accounting system or just an excel table.

What to do when resources and tasks becomes more? This is another question. Take, for example, offline retail. Suppose that a company, in addition to offline stores, has a large online store, which exists as a separate department, and it has all the signs of an IT company. Such a company is unprofitable to keep a large staff of developers in order to globally alter the appearance of the online store and its stuffing once every few years. These are the works that need to be outsourced. This is typical of many non-IT businesses that periodically update their online offices.

Permanent outsourcing is necessary when a business has a regularly increasing flow of IT tasks. Today, an excellent example of such a business is Russian banks. Their future is behind the increase in online share relative to offline. It becomes clear that in the next few years in the banking sector without the development of functionality at an outsourcing is not enough. There are fewer staff resources, and the task list is growing.

What tasks, in your opinion or experience, are best suited for delegating them to an outsourcing team? What tasks most often trust freelancers? And to outsourcers?

Maxim Zakharenko, CEO of Oblakoteka:

In fact, everything is delegated in the development, but it is better if the Customer is responsible for setting the tasks, managing the project and, possibly, designing. In this case, the stability of the process is significantly higher. Of course, it’s good not to write from scratch, but to use a well-known developing platform and customize it at a higher level.

The smaller the task, the smaller the team can be. Again the issue of sustainability.

Nikolay Patskov, Director General, “FreshDoc.ru Document Designer”:

There may be 3 options. If the company is professionally engaged in IT solutions, but does not cope with the number of incoming orders, you can outsource those tasks that take up the most time for your employees.

Such delegation will help to unload the IT department, help to concentrate on the most important and safely close all obligations.

It is possible to transfer part of the work to the outsourcing team. For example, the internal department is engaged in the development of software interface and thinks over usability, while coding and implementation are transmitted to the outsourcing.

In the third case, companies that are not involved in software development themselves and will transfer all work to an external contractor will be interested.

Here it will be especially important to conclude a competent agreement and unambiguously convey to the performers what result you want to achieve.

Dmitry Chekin, founder of CSSSR:

It is not easy to understand whether it is possible to transfer a task to an outsourcing. For myself, I see two main points. First, you need to decide whether a business need yields to an unambiguous, clear description in the form of a technical task. If so, is the company ready to let the outsourcers into its infrastructure to solve this problem?

Tasks such as developing the business logic of a product should remain within the company, as the success of monetization depends on them. All other non-core tasks are most often suitable for outsourcing.

Why is IT outsourcing more successful than outsourcing (or outstaffing) in other areas?

Nikolay Patskov, Director General, “FreshDoc.ru Document Designer”:

The success of IT outsourcing is due to several factors. First of all, this is a really demanded type of service: almost every first company wants a website, a mobile application (cross-platform), a bot for Telegram, and so on. Demand is gigantic, and it continues to grow.

Secondly, development is a specific area. And if the advertising director is drawn to you by a commercial director, who was “praised by the art teacher at school”, then providing IT support by internal non-core employees is problematic.

Thirdly, today in the IT sphere there is a significant personnel shortage. Formation of the IT department from scratch can raise companies in a serious amount, so many actively use the opportunity to turn to outsourcing teams to save money.

Dmitry Chekin, founder of CSSSR:

The reason is that in development, in particular, in programming, tasks are well described, and the evaluation of results is to a lesser extent due to subjective opinion. The problem is either solved, and everything works, or not solved. If we talk about the design or work with the text, then the result of such work should simply “please”, including the decision makers. And this is always subjective and creates difficulties for the outsourcing.

Maxim Zakharenko, CEO of Oblakoteka:

Outsourcing is not only successful in IT. Cleaning, logistics, accounting, legal support, etc. are well outsourced. IT is one of the successful industries in this regard. Building and managing your own development team is troublesome and difficult, so it’s best to take advantage of the experience of an already established team.

How often have you had unsuccessful results of cooperation with outsourcers? Why?

Dmitry Chekin, founder of CSSSR:

All problems between the outsourcer and the customer begin at the moment when the outsourcer begins to consider the customer as an idiot and ceases to delve into the real business need hidden behind the words of the “problem” customer. The manager on the part of the outsourcer should, as a good tracker, be able to ask consistent and unambiguous questions, the answers to which will enable him to find out the real business need.

To understand whether you are on one wave, it is possible by indirect signs. Take a look at how the contractor asks questions. Is he paying enough attention to details and trivia? If at the time of signing the contract you did not have the feeling that your problem was completely covered with questions, it is worth considering other contractors.

In the early stages of CSSSR development, we had several cases in which we decided for ourselves that the customer was hopeless and decided to terminate the contract. Later, after analyzing the situation, we understood that it was necessary to simply continue to do our work, despite the emotions and internal indignation. Now I am sure that there are no idio customers. There are mistakes of management: when they did not understand, did not hear out, inattentively asked.

How to reduce the risks of such a misunderstanding? I can only judge by my own experience. When choosing an outsourcer, I would look at the age of the company. We are now 5 years old, and by this time the time of hard fakaps is now past. The younger the team, the greater the likelihood that the customer will not be able to find a common language with her.

Kirill Grishanin, WB-Tech partner:

If business processes are not IT companies do not depend on software at all, then why should they outsource on an ongoing basis who will develop software? It would seem, absolutely no reason. Well, why lawyers software development? The maximum that they need is an enikee to refill the printer and press ctrl-alt-del to the hung secretary.

On the other hand, we should not forget that we live in 2017, when a company that did not engage in the automation of its business processes runs the risk of ending up in a landfill. For example, what if the founder of a law firm that advises retailers on optimizing the tax burden decided to find patterns in their clients' requests? What is it worth collecting all the requests, each of them put down a dozen parameters and ask programmers to develop an algorithm that will automatically find the way to the lowest tax rate in the shortest administrative way? I think that in such a situation, not an IT company will be very useful for a team of outsourcers, which will help to formalize the requirements for such software and actually develop it.

To summarize, I think that it is NOT IT companies, that is, companies, business processes that are not tied to software. The need for a permanent outsourcing team is 0. However, if the same company decides to noticeably change its usual business processes , automate them, digitize data in order to increase its efficiency (no matter in what area: in the customer drive or in their processing), such an NOT IT company really needs an outsourcing team to develop software. For example, Sberbank, as we remember it before Gref, was not an IT company, but now it has become her, and we cannot imagine it without IT. Just recently, there was a cool news about how they increased the efficiency of their marketing department through working with data.

Risks of using IT outsourcing in Russia

Business leaders often and not without reason are wary of the fact that employees of the outsourcer company have free access to information such as corporate databases and personal employee accounts. In addition, they fear losing control over the operation of the enterprise’s IT system.

It is very difficult to organize control of unauthorized access by unauthorized employees of an outsourcer to confidential information, even if the company has its own full-time system administrator, and the outsource provider provides the company with certain specialized services that require administrative access to local servers.

Currently, there is no practice that would provide for a clear regulation in the employment contract of the obligations of IT specialists of an outsourcing company and their responsibility for ensuring the confidentiality of their clients' data.

Perspectives

In December, there was a discussion of the situation on the Russian IT outsourcing market at the Russian Information Services Summit (RISS) 2016 conference held by PC Week.

CIO CarPrice.ru Ilya Pyatin believes that the main focus of such outsourcing will be the integration of individual services from different suppliers. Mikhail Petrov, director of programs and projects on technologies at the Russian Venture Company (RVC), is confident that standard IT functions will inevitably be outsourced, but to expand the market it will be necessary to increase the level of responsibility of outsourcers.

Igor Tyutrin, Head of the Department for Maintenance and Outsourcing of Technoserv, is convinced that in the current difficult economic conditions, companies will not be able to expand the staff of their IT departments and, therefore, they will be forced to outsource. Another thing is that customers increasingly want to receive high-level service to support not individual IT functions, but integrated information systems.