Here’s another one for the outsourcing horror story collection
My friend Matt often complains about some of the outsourced staff he gets stuck with on his consulting projects. He sent me this IM conversation that really illustrates his point:
- Matthew/Chicago/: Srini I’m in a room filled with 20 very concerned UAW workers trying to run their new line financial pareto reports for the US financial accounts. This is one of the BTO transition items I have to get setup for the client ASAP.
- Srinivasanu/India: Yes Matt this is Srini.
- Matthew/Chicago: Yes Srini I know. I am inside of the report we are stuck on the case number selection field which has been searching for results for approximately 5 minutes without a result.
- Srinivasanu/India: Yes Matt. Are you connected into the internet?
- Matthew/Chicago: Srini yes I am connected to the internet. There are no values showing up in the prompt selection. The report is failing. People are not happy I’m in a room filled with upset union workers. I’m wasting their time.
- Srinivasanu/India: Matt can you see if you can get to the Google.
- Matthew/Chicago: Srini I’m connected to the internet I’m speaking to you on the internet.
- Srinivasanu/India: Yes Matt internet is not issue.
- Matthew/Chicago: You and the team marked this as a passed item in your SIT testing according to the client. Note the test cases all mentioned a specific value to search on 12501 for example case number 2 does not work. The users are trying to do the same it is not working.
- Srinivasanu/India: Matt yes I test the field and when the field didn’t return value I skip it.
- Matthew/Chicago: Srini did you skip everything that was not working and just mark it passed?
- Srinivasanu/India: Yes Matt.
- Matthew/Chicago: So you have no idea what you’re doing? Is this a correct assumption?
- Srinivasanu/India: Yes Matt.
- Matthew/Chicago: I think I’m in the Twilight Zone.
- Srinivasanu/India: I not get message Matt.
- Matthew/Chicago: Get up now walk over to Prasad and let him know you are no longer on my project. Tell him to get the entire team in a conference room in 10 minutes and to dial in my line. You’re not invited. Do you understand this?
- Srinivasanu/India: Yes Matt I think there is a problem.
About
Thanks for visiting! My name is Keith Forsythe and this is my blog about product development, product marketing, mobile devices and general business practices at an Internet Startup.
I am currently co-founder and Director of Product Development at RideCharge, Inc (Taxi Magic), a startup mobile and web taxi booking service. Prior to RideCharge, I was an IT project manager as CVS/Caremark, and a software engineer at Baxter Healthcare. I have a MS in E-Commerce Technolgy from DePaul University and a BS in Chemistry from the University of Illinois at Champaign Urbana.
