Reflective Journal: Exploring Outsourcing in Business Operations

This reflective journal details a student's journey of learning about outsourcing through research. Initially unfamiliar with the topic, the student gained interest by exploring various aspects, including different business functions that can be outsourced. The research involved reading articles, case studies, and conducting interviews and surveys to understand outsourcing processes and benefits. The experience broadened the student's understanding of research methodologies, the importance of outsourcing for businesses, and its potential career implications. The journal reflects on the initial challenges, the evolution of understanding, and the practical application of knowledge, including tactical, strategic, and transformational outsourcing, and how it can be applied in future business and career endeavors. The student also acknowledges the importance of a larger sample size for future research and highlights the benefits and challenges of outsourcing, concluding with the potential to open an outsourcing firm in the future.

REFELCTIVE JOURNAL

REFLECTIVE JOURNAL:
Learning is the process that helps in acquiring new and modified knowledge about the
particular topic. There are many ways that provides the platform for the individual to gain
knowledge and learning. Performing research is one of the best ways to learn. It has been
analysed that when a research is conducted, it requires the researcher to analyse the various
aspects of the topic and this is what I have done in this research. The learning that I have
experienced in this research has changed my opinion regarding the topic. The topic of my
research was outsourcing. I have gathered various knowledge about outsourcing and I think
research is one of the very good options to understand the topic from every aspects. This
experience has added great value to my knowledge. After conducting this research, I have
realised the importance outsourcing for the business and I get to know about the various
functions that the industry or the companies used to outsource. This experience is very much
valuable in terms of getting better professional knowledge.
This learning experience has provided me the knowledge of the subject along with the overall
process of conducting the reserach.it has been analysed that I have learnt about the various
research methods and figured out that conduct research and taking the decision over the
research methods is very difficult as all should be relevant to each other. This learning has
helped me in every phase and field of my life. First of all, if I talk about my course, research
on outsourcing helped me in preparing my assignment and the overall process of research has
helped in conducting further researches all over my course. As far as the overall program is
considered, I have realised that now I am capable enough to prepare for the research and
make the proposal very easily. This is because I have used many research methods in this
research and thus gained the knowledge about the same.
In my future career, this knowledge of outsourcing will help me in understanding the
business operation in whichever company I will go. As I have researched about this topic thus
I can make recommendation to the future company regarding the same and this will definitely
help me in gaining a better image. In general life, outsourcing is not that much related but the
knowledge of conducting research has broadened my thinking skills.

Now I will discuss about the whole research process. When I started this research, the initial
level was very boring. This is because I didn’t find this topic that much interesting to work
upon. For me outsourcing was the process or it is related to the call centre functions. I used to
think that it is just for the companies that are in direct customer service (Lacity & Willcocks,
2013). The, when once I heard that it is not limited to tis functions but there are ay functions
like marketing and HR that can be outsourced and companies are doing that the I realised and
developed interest in the topic. I started reading many articles regarding outsourcing and
searched out many case studies of different companies so that I can know about the various
outsourcing processes and their benefits to the companies. After that I have proposed a
research by writing a literature review that provides a clear conclusion to me. I have realised
that relating the theoretical aspects with the practical applications of the subject.
As far as the learning is considered, it has been identified that studying about this topic has
opened new insights for me. It has not only given me the insights of the topic but also about
the research methodology and process. This research program aims at understanding the
process of outsourcing and the trends that are prevailing in the market regarding outscoring
process of the companies. The research by me was conducted by reading the case studies and
I have realised that the companies IBM are using this process so that they can make efforts in
improving their core activities (Hodari, Waldthausen & Sturman, 2014). It have observed
that the companies which are using the facility of outsourcing are getting various benefits
such as expertise are performing their work and outsourcing also helps in getting the work
done without any pressure by the third party on time (Dolgui & Proth, 2013). Along with it I
have realised that the companies are facing some of the challenges as well such as loss of
interference in their own process and releasing of their personal data to the third party.
The overall learning process was fine and I realised that I have brushed up my skills after
conducting this research.it has been analysed that when I was conducting this research, I have
used many methods for collecting the data and studied many case studies for the same.
Interviews and survey has been used as the methods to collect the data. Performing both of
these methods has given a great experience to me. I have talked to many top managers of the
companies to find out the benefits of outsourcing and its process along with this, I have
conducted the survey on two of the companies to check the satisfaction level of the
organisations.

I have conducted this research in parts and performed various activities. The research
proposal has been prepared by me so that I can get the guideline to perform the research on
practical grounds. After the completion of the research I have realised that I should have
chosen a wide sample size so that I can have the better view of the subject and would have
answered the objective questions in effective way. The research has concluded that many of
the organisations are using these outsourcing services and it is offered by the third party
companies. IBM is using is successfully since years and the managers are also getting the
benefits of the same as they can get time to focus on the core activities.
I have concluded from the research that outsourcing is the process that helps the companies to
deal with the third party in or to get work from them. They can outsource some of the non-
value added services such as marketing, HR, customers service etc (Anwar, 2013). These
functional outsourcing helps the company to focus on core activities and also to get the
specialised services. I think that if I have the better knowledge of a particular field such as
marketing or HR, I can open my own business as an outsourcing firm that can help the other
big companies to perform their functions. However, I want to work with one of the
companies that perform this outsourcing firm so that I can learn more about the same. There
are three types of outsourcing I have learnt about. The first one is the tactical outsourcing,
another one is strategic outsourcing and the last one is transformational outsourcing. I can use
this knowledge of outsourcing in my future business and job as well. As I have performed
this research with using variety of sources thus this may help me in future to conduct other
researches as well. I can apply this knowledge of research in conducting other researches on
different topics. Learning new things and getting new insights of the different topics will help
me in broadening my knowledge and thus it can widen my scope of future learning as well.

References:
Anwar, S. (2013). Outsourcing and the skilled–unskilled wage gap. Economics
Letters, 118(2), 347-350.
Dolgui, A., & Proth, J. M. (2013). Outsourcing: definitions and analysis. International
Journal of Production Research, 51(23-24), 6769-6777.
Hodari, D., Waldthausen, V., & Sturman, M. (2014). Outsourcing and role stress: An
empirical study of hotel spa managers. International Journal of Hospitality
Management, 37, 190-199.
Lacity, M. C., & Willcocks, L. P. (2013). Outsourcing business processes for innovation. MIT
Sloan management review, 54(3), 63.