The 10 Things to Consider When Choosing an Outsourced Vendor
Patrick Kelly;  June 27, 2005

• Consideration 1: Understanding the Power of Team

• Consideration 2: What is the Vendor’s Core Competency?

• Consideration 3: Do You Know the Total Cost?

• Consideration 4: Are You Really Hiring Experts?

• Consideration 5: Does the Vendor Have Sufficient Project Management Experience?

• Consideration 6: How Does the Vendor Ensure Scalability?

• Consideration 7: Can the Vendor Commit to a Schedule?

• Consideration 8: How Stable is the Vendor?

• Consideration 9: Will Your Company Own the Source Code?

• Consideration 10: What is the Vendor’s Overall Reputation?

Consideration 5:   Does the Vendor Have Sufficient Project Management Experience?

There are many ways that projects get managed, but the ideal situation is when you work with people who have a "closer" mentality. These are people to whom you can delegate responsibility and know that the tasks will be done well. You want to communicate what needs to be done, and then it gets done. Ideally, your people can even anticipate certain needs that you didn’t express and then "wow" you when they exceed your expectations.
This experience is what we strive to give every customer. If you desire, we can assist you by handling much of the software management. We have successfully managed test automation projects ranging from one LabVIEW developer to fifteen. One of our customers on a large project gave us the following testimonial:

"LabVIEWexpert is a company with a ‘closer’ culture and, frankly, that is the only way consultancy works. At project start, we worked together to distill written requirements and a mutual definition of project success. With that done, I was able to move on to other things, knowing that LabVIEWexpert would execute to and deliver the solution I wanted."

With all of this said, consideration five is to make sure that any vendor you work with has the project management experience that you need. Once the project is under way, it will be a great relief to know that you can delegate much of the software management to professionals.

Consideration 6:   How Does the Vendor Ensure Scalability?

If you’ve seen as many projects as I have, you’ll have experienced the following situation. A project is hatched and software is written once, used for a few months, and then abandoned. A new set of requirements comes along, and new software is written. The new software doesn’t integrate with the old software for a variety of reasons. Six months later, and the process repeats itself. So, when someone on the team wants to use any software, they have multiple applications to choose from, none of which really does exactly what they want, and all of them have bugs. In fact, to use anything requires finding the original developer because:

1. There is no user manual

2. The software is riddled with subtle bugs

3. The user is not confident in the results

If you have ever experienced this situation, then you have seen software that was NOT scalable. Scalable means that today the software will do ABC with virtually zero defects. And next month we will add D and E, and the software will still do ABC as well as ever. And then later we’ll add F, and ABCDE work just fine. This is what it means to be scalable, and it is NOT a pipe dream. It is achievable, but you have to make it part of your design.

So, make sure that you talk to the vendor about how they ensure scalable software. Ask them for references and testimonials of software that they have produced which exhibited scalability. As for LabVIEWexpert, scalability is always part of the package. Our software applications have been successfully used by customers all over the globe, and everyone is thrilled with the scalability we have delivered. For more information on this topic, we refer you to our article "The Eight Best Practices When Managing a LabVIEW Project".

Consideration 7:   Can the Vendor Commit to a Schedule?

I once hired a landscaping contractor who said that he would finish the whole project in May. He started in March, and worked through April. Then May came and went. Then June came and went. By July, I was pretty worried. I went back to the contract and found that we did have it in writing that he would be finished in May. So, I went to the website for the Contractors Board and was going to post a complaint. That is when I found out that this contractor had tons of complaints, with virtually every customer complaining that he was late. It was not the best time for me to get this information. It would have been nice to have known this information before I chose the vendor. If I had known his background, I never would have chosen him as a vendor.

My point is this: every vendor says that they can do your job on schedule. Some will even sign a contract stating the schedule. However, if the date arrives and the project isn’t done, your only recourse is to sue the vendor. That doesn’t get your project finished faster.

So, what do you do? Consideration Seven is to determine if the vendor can really commit to the schedule. This means the following three things:

1. They can show you a documented project plan

2. They are willing to make a contractual agreement on dates and deliverables

   1. Remember that this step alone is not enough

3. You have contacted references to ensure that they are a company who habitually meets their schedules

   1. This is the step that I forgot to do with my landscaping contractor

If you can find a vendor who meets all three criteria, then you can feel confident about their ability to meet your scheduling needs.

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