more on Outsourcing to India: All that glitters, or even glisters, is not gold

[Dave Farber <dave () farber net>]

Delivered-To: dfarber+ () ux13 sp cs cmu edu
Date: Sun, 15 Feb 2004 12:24:15 -0500
From: Meng Weng Wong <mengwong () dumbo pobox com>
To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>

On Sun, Feb 15, 2004 at 08:15:30AM -0500, Dave Farber wrote:
| If however, programming is only 40 - 50% of your week and the
| rest is in design meetings, code reviews, architecture reviews, change
| management, etc. Then you are a Professional, you are NOT a programmer, you
| are at least an Analyst, if not an Architect/Engineer or more. This is a
| role that is VERY hard to outsource, because it blends intimate knowledge of
| the technology with intimate knowledge of the business and marketplace.
| Something your average Indian graduate/programmer will have a hard time
| competing with in an outsourcing paradigm.

Where do software engineers and systems architects come from?

From the ranks of the code monkeys.

The monkeys of yesterday are the architects of tomorrow.

Today, India and other countries are getting second-to-none
apprenticeship/journeyman level training from the US companies that
outsource to them.

Give them time.  One in a thousand coders will make the jump to software
architect.  One in a thousand product managers will make the jump to
entrepreneur.

Japan started out making cheap electronic knock-offs.  Today I can look
around the room and count at least eleven instances of the SONY logo.

Why shouldn't the same thing happen in software?  I wouldn't be
surprised if in 2014 my billing/accounting/customer-management backend
came from India or China.

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