Bluewolf, a global consulting firm, released its “State of IT Outsourcing Report” for 2012 to 2013, which shows that the IT outsourcing market is growing.
Based on a survey of CIOs and other IT decision makers, and enhanced by intelligence from thousands of technology staffing placements, cloud deployments and managed services contracts, Bluewolf found that CIOs, directors, and managers are shifting away from traditional staffing methodologies. Most notably, they’re embracing an “elastic workforce” by increasing their reliance on multi-sourcing models to deliver agile talent and capabilities to their businesses.
“The growing importance of the speed with which a business leverages new technologies is creating a new form of outsourcing in which finding the right people at the right moment is paramount,” said Michael Kirven, Co-founder, Bluewolf. “CIOs are looking to the elastic workforce to access not only more talent, but also a specialized pool of workers at the top of their game that offer an outsider’s perspective.”
Focusing on the frequency of IT services being outsourced for application and infrastructure needs, and the sourcing models used, Bluewolf’s survey found:
- The IT outsourcing market is growing: 32% of respondents will increase IT outsourcing investments, and 48% will hire more contractors, rather than full-time staff, in the next 12-18 months.
- On average, 48% of outsourcing budgets are allocated towards application services.
- 17% of all outsourced data center operations are managed in the cloud.
- Cloud computing is partially driving outsourcing growth, as more companies use applications from the likes of Salesforce, Google and Workday.
- Managed services is the #1 outsourcing strategy for Disaster Recovery, Web/eCommerce and IT Security services.
- SMB’s outsource infrastructure services more frequently in order to leverage economies of scale.
“CIOs dealing with cloud, big data, social enterprise and mobile face the challenge of not being able to find top talent fast enough,” continued Kirven. “Companies who don’t modernize both their technology and how they access talent face the possibility of extinction.”
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