As a loyal Obama supporter, I’m prepared to withstand a bit of political pandering during a tough primary. Hillary’s not going away without a fight.

But, Obama’s latest appeal to the blue collar workers of Ohio - the “Patriot Employers Plan” - sounds as ridiculous (and misguided) as the Patriot Act.

Basically, the plan rewards companies for keeping jobs in the US - something I personally believe is admirable (after all, he’s not running for President of India).

However, the problem is that the plan is, well, stupid:

Mr Obama’s plan met instant scepticism from otherwise sympathetic Democratic economists who said it would require a large regulatory apparatus to put into practice. They also said that companies could “game the system” by spinning off overseas subsidiaries in order to reduce the offshore-onshore workforce ratio. ‘

“I would say that this plan is borderline unimplementable,” said a Democratic economist in Washington. “It is also puzzling. Normally presidential candidates only come up with plans that are unrealistic when they are losing. But Obama is now the favourite.

Mr. Obama, it’s better to stick with strong US training programs, the elimination of tax breaks for companies that have offshore labor (we don’t need them and shouldn’t get them), and most importantly, to stop the hypocrisy that is American economic policy. You can’t lecture others about buying your entertainment, agricultural goods, and Coca Cola, if you won’t give them a fair shot to sell to you.

Read the FT article >>

Why did we change our name? 

On January 1st, we officially became Monsoon Company (after 7 years as BCM Digital). 

There was no obvious business reason for the name change.  We didn’t get acquired, change strategy, or get sued.   Instead, we changed our name for a much simpler (and perhaps more important) reason.

For too long, ‘outsourcing’ has being stigmatized as new and disruptive.  Due to political rhetoric and cultural biases, many of our competitors mask their Indian roots under an ambiguous identity (what’s an infosys?). But, the rhetoric doesn’t make sense.  

Global trade is as old as the monsoon winds that used to carry spice traders to India.   With our new name, we choose to celebrate our Indian team. 

And why not?  Their work has lead to long term relationships with Fortune 100 clients, dozens of innovative software products, and industry-leading expertise in development platforms like Vista, Ruby on Rails, and Facebook. 

We’re about a year, 500 attack ads, millions of dollars, and dozens of celebrity voicemails away from next year’s election. Yet, it feels like the right time to begin covering each candidate’s position on ‘outsourcing’ (r.i.p.).

It’s only appropriate to start with the current frontrunner.

Recently, Hillary’s stance adapts like time. IST, she’s pro; EST, totally against. PST, and we’re back to pro again.

Roll some context: the 90s The Clintons have a long history of support for free trade. NAFTA and increases to the H1B program are probably the strongest examples.

“Clinton’s positioning on outsourcing dates to the 1990s, when her husband’s administration aggressively pursued free trade agreements such as NAFTA that union workers today consider the start of a huge exodus of U.S. jobs to cheaper overseas competition.

During the rise of the Internet, the Clinton administration also distributed temporary-worker visas to hundreds of thousands of Indians who came to the United States for jobs at high-tech companies.”

source 1999 Clinton realizes a new-found love of the Indian community to begin the millenium:

“As Clinton pursued a Senate seat in 1999, the Indian American community stepped up its giving. Indian businessman Sant Singh Chatwal raised $500,000 for her in his Upper East Side penthouse, including $210,000 from 14 entities connected to him.”

Chatwal and the Indian community have continued to support Clinton’s presidential run:

“Chatwal is now a finance co-chairman for Clinton’s presidential campaign, and Clinton aides said they have counted more than $2 million in contributions raised at Indian American events.”

(more…)

Working with a global team is hectic.

If you run a small business, your work now transcends both the job description and the time zone. You spend days meeting with customers, refining requirements, pushing sales, and cleaning up finances.

At night, your team wakes up, and it is time to manage projects, have strategy meetings, and enforce (nag about) deadlines.

Somehow, you find time for a few hours of sleep before waking up to do the whole thing over again.

If you’re in the Bay Area tomorrow (Thursday), come find out why we still think it’s worth the effort (or not).

You do it every day and never think twice: buy something that was made in another country.

Maybe you make a big purchase, like a Honda or a BMW. Do you then refer to your car as your ‘outsourced’ ride? When you drink with your friends, do you get uncomfortable knowing that your champagne has been ‘outsourced’ to the French? How about when you eat a mango or a banana?

Of course not. Germans make better cars. The French know their wine. And produce comes from where it grows (or where people can pick it cheaply…California).

So why think of software that way? Global IT teams support cost advantages and time efficiencies that domestic teams simply cannot compete with. Done right, software can be developed more quickly and efficiently this way. From cars to wine to software, the principle is the same. It will inevitably get done where it can get done best.

As long as we refer to our work as outsourcing, we are stigmatizing something that is as old as civilization. What the monsoon winds did for the spice trade, the Internet does for software development.

So, let’s agree. Outsourcing is dead (long live outsourcing).

[and yes, this blog will soon have a new name]

From a debate at Howard university last week. It was refreshing to see almost every candidate stress education and removing tax breaks as the two keys to helping America compete for technical jobs.

First, a recap: this week, the Obama camp released an ‘anonymous’ memo to the press, berating Hillary Clinton for accepting money from companies that outsource, for investing in Indian companies, and no joke, for having Indian friends.

The Clinton camp circulated it widely, and Obama’s clean political image was appropriately slammed in the press.

To his credit, Obama apologized profusely, said he had no idea the memo was released, and apparently got really upset at his staff about it. To his discredit, no one on his staff got axed.

Whether or not this was Obama’s macaca moment, whether Obama should do more to apologize, whether someone should trademark Obamacaca (.com still available!), etc…all of those things are up to bloggers with way more time on their hands than me to decide. Heck, I still might vote for the guy.

For me, this moment is even more significant than all of that. The ObaMacacaMemo (say it three times fast) means…that…(DRUMROLL PLEASE) outsourcing has officially arrived to Indecision 2008.

Welcome to the party, Outsourcing! Come on in! Take a seat and grab a drink! You’re gonna have to sit behind Iraq & Global Warming, maybe a bit to the right of abortion & gay rights…oops, not that far right! Let gun control sit there…hey gun control! Blam blam! Ha ha! Hey listen, why don’t you sit next to Immigration - you guys both seem to piss the same people off! Ha ha, just kidding! Oh wow - this is your lucky day! That cutie John Edwards already wants a dance! Lucky you wore a comfortable sari!

Outsourcing has arrived, and she’s just getting warmed up.

For a while, you will probably just hear the Lou Dobbs fans, spreading borderline racist commentary and screaming about offshore phone support (as if it was better before). They will choke up the blogosphere and land prime-time slots on Fox News, arguing vehemently that it is inconceivable that cheaper goods and services could actually be good for an economy. And, they will tell you that you hate America if you think otherwise (for example and example.)

Then, John Edwards will remind us, repeatedly, that his father was a mill worker. I mean, like, thousands of times.

(more…)

Worldmapper.org warps world maps based on factors such as birth rates, GDP, and population. It amazes me how much more significant it feels to see a visual representation of something rather than to read facts and figures (which is why Al Gore climbing a ladder to show the rise of global warming in an Inconvenient Truth was an excellent touch).

Check out how fat India looks based on its population in 2050.

Kinda scary or exciting, depending on your feelings around volume and glasses of water (not to mention the presence of heavy metals in the water, the temperature of the water, the availability of that water, and perhaps the politics around access to that water - makes me want a coconut.)

Wanna see the US get fat? Check out their maps based on carbon emissions or GDP.

It is the most perfect example ever of America’s contradictory attitude towards outsourcing and illegal immigration (from this month’s Harpers Index).

Fine paid in 2006 by a company building the U.S. Border fence, in a guilty plea for hiring illegal immigrants: $4,700,000.

On March 7, Bill Gates testified before the US Senate about bringing IT workers into the US:

“We have to welcome the great minds of this world, not drive them out of this country,” Gates said.

Nice.  To be clear, he is discussing the H1-B program, which currently allows 65,000 foreign professionals into the US every year.  He went on to say

“At least foreigners, who are already used to massive government inefficiency, will be more willing to tolerate the compatibility issues and other bugs in Vista.”

Okay, he didn’t really say that. But he did say

“The IT industry, I guarantee you, will be in the United States as long as we can get these people to come to the United States.”

Sometimes, I love Bill Gates. These days, I love him a lot of the time. He is right, of course, but I am worried about the timing of these types of discussions. With the war at the forefront of all political agendas, I am hoping that jingoistic calls to ban outsourcing will remain muted during Indecision 2008. But, as usual, I underestimate the democratic “Mill Worker” strategy. Sherrod Brown of Ohio:

“…skilled workers in my state are watching their jobs move overseas, not because foreign workers are more qualified, but because U.S. companies can get away with paying poverty wages to workers in other countries.”

Poverty wages? Check the average salaries for programmers in Bangalore, Sherrod.

More on this, soon (because I’m sure more is coming)