I’ve been working on multi-sourcing projects for years. According to my observation, the most successfully projects usually are the one which has engaged both onsite team (onshore in US) and offsite team (offshore in China), along with an onshore liaison who is typically a member of China and travelling to US.
Why does this type of team structure have the more chance to be successful? The secret is that the onsite Liaison moderates the communication between China team and US team.
Common issues of the multi-sourcing projects go as below:
- Poor English capability of China team
- Limited overlapping work time due to the different time zone
- Changes occurred in US end can’t be communicated to offshore team timely
- Low efficiency of all hands meeting
On the other hand, it’s not always the case that onshore liaison will be benificial to the project. As observed, following behaviors may place an negative impact on the project:
- Onshore liaison is burnt out by long work hour (work in the day and meeting in the evening)
- Onshore liaison is under pressure and fails to handle it well
- Onshore liaison travels to US for too long (over 3 months)
Hence, having a qualified onshore liaison will be a cirtical decision to be made.
I couldn’t agree more at how important it is to have someone that has a passion for this role (or even more than one)!
I think the negative things that can impact a liaison can be offset by other liaisons sharing best practices at how to effectively balance the role. We have a lot of folks that have struck this balance effectively – it’s not always intuitive how to do this, but that’s where leaning on other experienced people can really help flatten the learning curve – reaping the benefits of having a strong liaison while avoiding the pitfalls that can befall the role.