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Study of maintenance project manpower dynamics in Indian software outsourcing industry

Debasisha Mishra (Department of Strategy Area, Indian Institute of Management Shillong, Shillong, India)
Biswajit Mahanty (Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering, Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Kharagpur, India)

Journal of Global Operations and Strategic Sourcing

ISSN: 2398-5364

Article publication date: 14 February 2019

Issue publication date: 14 February 2019

1236

Abstract

Purpose

The paper aims to study manpower dynamics at offshore and onsite location for maintenance project, which are transferred to offshore location in a phase-wise manner. The purpose of the paper is to find good values of onsite–offshore team strength, the number of hours of communication between onsite and offshore teams for smooth transfer of software maintenance project to offshore location.

Design/methodology/approach

This study uses system dynamics simulation approach to study manpower allocation at onsite and offshore locations to transfer the maintenance work to offshore location in a gradual manner. The authors consulted 13 experts from Indian software outsourcing industry during the model construction and validation.

Findings

The simulation results show that the complexity of maintenance project has an insignificant effect on offshore migration. The maintenance work transfer should start with initial onsite team strength higher than that of required for ticket solving and project. The initial offshore team strength should be based on training capacity available at the onsite location. The higher attrition rate at an offshore is detrimental for offshore migration.

Research limitations/implications

The implication of the study is in the development of a broad framework of software maintenance work transfer to offshore locations for Indian software outsourcing projects. As the study is based on expert opinion in the context of India, it cannot be generalized for outsourcing scenarios elsewhere.

Practical implications

The software project manager can use the findings to get more insight into maintenance project offshore migration and divide the software team between onsite and offshore location.

Originality/value

The study is novel as there is little attempt at finding the manpower composition at onsite and offshore locations for software maintenance project during the migration phase.

Keywords

Citation

Mishra, D. and Mahanty, B. (2019), "Study of maintenance project manpower dynamics in Indian software outsourcing industry", Journal of Global Operations and Strategic Sourcing, Vol. 12 No. 1, pp. 62-81. https://doi.org/10.1108/JGOSS-02-2018-0009

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2018, Emerald Publishing Limited

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