A report by HfS and Accenture has found that neither sourcing buyers nor providers are making the necessary investments in the key driver of value creation – people. Barely a third of enterprise outsourcing customers believe their current governance talent – the people responsible for managing the service relationship – can drive innovation or define business outcomes. And only about half of outsourcing providers have established formal training programs to develop industry expertise and skills in analytics and relationship management.

According to the report, which featured a survey of executives from 282 enterprises, two examples of strategic business skills are increasingly important to enterprise executives: defining business objectives beyond cost reduction and efficiency (83 percent regarded this as important or critical) and influencing executives (77 percent). However, executives acknowledge that their current skill levels are deficient in these areas.

Mike Salvino, group chief executive, Business Process Outsourcing, Accenture: “If outsourcing is to deliver on its full potential, buyers as well as providers need to invest in developing the skills and talent to capture the greater levels of value available from fourth and fifth generation BPO solutions,” HfS Talent study – the first of its kind – highlights the growing talent gap between what the industry and its clients aspire to achieve and the lack of sufficient investment in people to make it happen. We hope it serves as a call to action for everyone involved in the business of outsourcing. The bottom line is that outsourcing business or IT functions is never ’done’ and with proper investments in talent, the outsourcing governance team has continual opportunities to improve productivity, efficiency and access to critical data.”