An IS Offshore Outsourcing Framework: Emerging Knowledge Requirements for IS Professionals

The offshoring of information systems tasks has come to be a major feature of the international IS domain. This chapter introduces some basic concepts of offshoring, some reasons companies are offshoring, how offshoring has evolved, the costs and benefits of offshoring, difficulties and risks of offshoring, and the future of offshoring. It also provides a framework for analyzing IS offshoring and outsourcing decisions and discusses the emerging offshoring-related knowledge requirements for people working in the IS field. This chapter makes a case for IS professional who are knowledgeable in offshoring management by providing management and skill requirements and implications for IS/IT educational programs.