ࡱ> 8;567 CbjbjWW 4==c9#,vv8%43111   B3D3D3D3D3D3D3$o58vh3     h311}3 11B3 B3r(T)1eE$&).33034)8$|8)8)\       h3h3@   3    8         v :  WORKING, THE JOB, AND POSTINDUSTRIAL CAREERS WITH OUTSOURCING: THEORIZING ABOUT JOB QUALITY AND LOSS Jacqueline M. Zalewski, Ph.D. West Chester University of Pennsylvania Send comments to: Jacqueline M. Zalewski, Ph.D. Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology and Sociology West Chester University of Pennsylvania West Chester, PA 19383 630-310-6116 (mobile);  HYPERLINK "mailto:jzalewski@wcupa.edu" jzalewski@wcupa.edu ABSTRACT Research on the effects of workplace restructuring suggests that a bifurcation of skill and job quality is occurring in many professions and occupations. While descriptions of restructurings effects are plentiful, few studies explain why there is variation across jobs within various fields. New trends of outsourcing professional jobs, often to another company that does the work onsite or onshore, gives a unique opportunity to examine the effects of workplace restructuring on job quality and job loss across this employment sector and to explain any variation that exists in these outcomes. Through qualitative interviews representing 13 cases of outsourcing information technology (IT; N=10) and human resource (HR; N=3) jobs, I found differences in rates of job loss in these sectors as well as varied effects on the professional challenges in this work at outsourcing companies. Findings suggest that institutional and environmental factors have important effects on outcomes of job quality and job loss with outsourcing. Institutionally, it matters whether the job function is tied to the companys core competency. The IT function is more readily linked to a retailers goals of getting the right products in stock for related seasons, for example, and when to mark up or mark down. These ongoing processes are embedded in the technical systems that IT professionals develop and maintain. As a result, fewer jobs in IT are lost when a company outsources this function today. Similarly, the degree to which outsourcing decisions are made for cost reduction purposes matters as well for job outcomes in these fields. Human resources work is mostly perceived as costly in relation to the companys bottom line. This has significant consequences for job loss and quality with HR outsourcing. Environmentally, regulatory constraints on the work correspond with job loss and poorer job quality outcomes with outsourcing. This is clearly seen in the HR cases. Much of this work (e.g., payroll and benefits) is standard across companies and industries because of federal laws that regulate it. Although the variation in outcomes may give a reason to hope against the inevitability of negative outcomes, the commonalities of the work across these employment sectors (e.g., its new organization and speedup) shows that strategies designed to control, standardize work, and deskill jobs are being applied by outsourcing companies, which will inevitably function to degrade work in the IT and HR professions with time. INTRODUCTION Over the past few decades, research on the effects of workplace restructuring suggests that a bifurcation of skill and job quality is occurring within and across many professions and occupations (Burris 1998; Gordon, Edwards, and Reich 1982). It is commonly noted that the automation of industrial work and then computerization led to significant job losses in the 1970s, which continue on through today (Braverman 1972; Aronowitz & DiFazio 1996). On the bright side, new communication and digital technologies have also created lucrative and challenging work for a new cadre of expert information and engineering professionals (Barley and Kunda 2004). Labor process theory provides a general understandingthe control and profitability motives of employersfor why the bifurication of job outcomes and significant job losses have characterized the industrial and post-industrial workplace. But labor process theory gives limited insight into important factors that produce varied job quality outcomes within and across occupations and professions. This paper contributes to our understanding of important factors involved in the variation and similarities of job outcomes, both quality and loss, with outsourcing. As multiple news and scholarly sources commonly report, the outsourcing of workand professional work specificallyis on the rise. In the initial wave of this research, I conducted qualitative research on the in-house or onshore outsourcing of professional jobs in information technologies (IT) and human resources (HR). Data was collected on nine separate outsourcing deals, six involving IT work and three involving HR work. As I show, job outcomes (both job quality and loss) varied across these professions for reasons that relate to institutional markets and because of environmental factors that can shape the content of professional work across organizations and industries. Yet the similarity of outcomes across cases1. the decentralized, multi-layered organization of the work at outsourcing companies, 2. the work speedup that this causes, and 3. the change management processes outsourcing companies are using to routinize the work and make it less costly to deliver to their customershave social implications for outsourced professionals in these professions and, presumably, others in the future as well. BACKGROUND FOR THIS STUDY Labor process theory gives a commonly used explanation for why bad jobs exist in capitalist economies (Braverman 1972). From managements perspective, labor is generally the largest or one of the largest suppressants on profit levels. To reduce its effect on profits, the stewards of capitalism have incorporated strategies that function to control, deskill, and automate work and labor. Through the 19th and 20th centuries, industry was the bedrock for ongoing organizational, technical, and bureaucratic changes that led to the degradation of work in occupations and professions (Clawson 1980; Edwards 1979). For example Clawson describes early industrial practices that were designed to control the work process, including centralization, internal contracting, piece-rate systems, and Taylorism. Strategies to deskill and exact more work in professions continues today. For example, as Hochschild (1983) and Leidner (1993) have noted, feeling rules and Taylorist measures are embedded in many types of service work not only for the purposes of standardizing and deskilling itand reducing its costbut also controlling service workers, their customers, and (in theory) service quality. With the workplace changes accompanying the global and information age, job quality and loss are fervent issues on the minds of scholars and everyday people today. Digitized computer and network technologies have led to dramatic changes in the workplace and have meant varied outcomes for work and working people. Characteristics such as reduced hierarchy, decentralization, the influx of team organization and other flexibility measures, and the growth of professional, technical, sales, and managerial work have corresponded with computerization of the workplace. Research findings suggest that many of these changes have required greater worker involvement (e.g., discretion), as compared to the detailed and narrow scope of roles in industrial organization, and a general upskilling of labor (Burris 1998; Gallie et.al. 1998; Smith 1994). On the negative side new information technologies, especially, have correlated with significant job losses across most unskilled and professional job sectors (Aronowitz & DiFazio 1996; Lipset & Ray 1996). What explains variation in job quality outcomes in the workplace today? Multiple changes make the analysis of outcome variation and the teasing out of their significant variables a complicated exercise. Yet, studies of labor process changes do establish several important factors that are significant to job quality outcomes. On the macro level, it has been argued, economies, regulations, and product or service markets matter for job quality and loss (Gordon, Edwards, & Reich 1982; Piore & Sabel 1984; and Walsh 1997). Declining markets have led to the lean and flexible measures capitalist organizations have taken to restructure their economic enterprise during the past decades. It has been characterized as an era where corporate giants have learned to dance flexibly and take risks, in order to sustain established markets and leverage new ones (Kanter 1989). As is well-noted, professionals have had to reckon with the greater contingencies and new challenges this poses to careers, other aspects of work, and personal lives. See discussions of the effects of flexible organization on professionals, for example, in Barley & Kunda 2004 and Sennett 1998. Regulation, in contrast, can provide curbs to the restructuring practices capitalist organizations have adopted. For example, in a comparison of the British and Australian banking and postal service industries, Walsh (1997) concludes that the level of market competition and state regulations influenced employment trends and job quality in their core and peripheral labor markets. Finally, labor process theory gives great weight to the role technology plays in deskilling and automating the labor process and uses it to explain the significant job losses that generally follow the adoption of new technology in the workplace (Braverman 1972; Edwards 1979). Qualitative analysis of the effects of new shop floor technology underscores that, although the deskilling effects of technology are a predominant outcome, new technologies often do lead to new roles, challenges, and an upskilling of work for some workers (Blauner 1964; Zuboff 1988). Blauner argues that the rhythm of the work, whether the work flow involves continuous or batch technology processes, had significance for its effects on job quality outcomes; in this case the experience of alienation versus freedom. After extensive research, Zuboff shows that the bifurication of the work force was generally the case when industrial and administrative work settings became more automated and computerized. With new workplace technologies, a significant proportion of the work and workers were deskilled while others used it as an opportunity to develop new cognitive competencies, which she calls intellective skills. This research explores the outsourcing of professional work to determine its effects on job quality, loss, organizational, and subjective aspects of this work. Outsourcing has grown exponentially over the past decade, now constituting a large and powerful business industry. The outsourcing of the information technology function (ITO) is far and away the largest sector (Gartner 2004). In contrast to widespread belief that the outsourcing of work means offshoring it to countries like India, ITO usually leads to the legal transfer of work and people to a supplier but not the relocation of that work nor people to another physical location. Rather the work continues to be completed in-house or, in cases of batch technology processes such as data storage and payroll, onshore at a regional location of the outsourcing company. Finally other non-core professional functionssuch as human resources, accounting, and financeare being increasingly outsourced. Human resources, the job function I examined in addition to information technologies, has a long history of outsourcing and currently is its fastest-growing sector (TPI 2005). Analysts report that 85% of US companies outsource at least one human resources business process (Human Resources Magazine 2005; Outsourcing Essentials 2003). As I show, the outsourcing of human resources work is far more likely to lead to job loss, be relocated to the physical location of the outsourcing company, and result in immediate work speedup and other degradating effects. The broad question guiding this study was: how does outsourcing affect professionals and their work? Specific to this paper, I discuss what effects outsourcing has on job quality and loss in the information technology (IT) and human resource (HR) professions. I compared IT and HR outsourcing to see if outcomes would differ on these measures and, if so, why the bifurication existed? Drawing from both professions, I interviewed workers who had experienced or had knowledge of outsourcing firsthand and found both differing and similar effects. The differences between IT and HR outsourcing have theoretical implications for scholarly explanations of the role that workplace restructuring measures have on the bifurication of skill and job quality in occupations and professions. Institutional and environmental factors, such as the reason for outsourcing and the job functions relation to an organizations core competency, mitigate its effects on job quality and loss. The rhythm and content of the work have consequences as well. When the work is characterized by continuous flow and there are few regulatory constraints, it is less likely to be standard across organizations and industries. This has positive benefits for job quality and significantly reduces job loss in IT. In contrast, job quality and loss are affected negatively when the work is already of a highly standard nature (HR) because of its batch technology processes and regulatory constraints. The findings from this study also have theoretical and social implications. The similarities I found in the reorganization and speedup of work across the IT and HR professions, after outsourcing, underscore that outsourcing companies are eager to satisfy growth and profitability objectives. For outsourcing to be profitable, the work needs to be produced and delivered at a lower cost than done previously. As studies of the labor process have consistently shown, an important way of making work profitable has been through its reorganization and standardization. At outsourcing companies growth and profitability objectives underlie their flexible organizational structure, which makes delivering work just-in-time possible. They also manifest in change management processes designed to standardize the work, making it less costly and lucrative to deliver to customers. Both features of work at outsourcing companiesflexible organization and standardizing processestranslate to both immediate and future degradation in job quality and significant job losses across both professions. RESEARCH DESIGN In 2005, I interviewed professionals with first-hand outsourcing experience. Several friends and family members, working in IT, were employed by large organizations that had recently outsourced jobs or were in the process of doing so. They gave me names of coworkers who had been affected. I obtained subjects for this study from these outsourcing cases, from cases referred to me by other friends and former students, and by networking through two professional organizations; the associations were the Outsourcing Institute and a regional human resources listserv for managers. In the initial wave of this research, I spoke with 22 professionals. Most professionals worked in information technologies (17 as compared to 5 in human resources), in management positions (45%), were in their 40s or 50s (77%), and white (91%). My sample includes several director and executive-level professionals (23%). The remaining subjects had positions as technical expert, information technology or human resources specialist, team leader, or senior systems analyst. Interview questions asked subjects about career histories, their experience in jobs before outsourcing, the transition of work and people to outsourcing companies, employment conditions there, the new organization, any changes to their scope of work, its content, or their social relationships. Combined, interviews gave information on the effects of outsourcing in 9 outsourcing cases, 6 in IT and 3 in HR. The number of interviews per case varied, from one to five subjects. The core companies in this samplethe term I use for companies that buy outsourced servicesinclude major competitors in national or regional product and service markets. Core companies compete in the telecommunications, manufacturing, retail, chemicals distribution, financial, and healthcare industries. The outsourcing companies include four of the five largest providers of information technology services and the largest provider of human resource services. Most cases (6) represented deals that were continuing, with a minority of deals (3) that were terminated at the time of the interview(s). Table 1 below gives information on core and outsourcing companies, the dates of contractual deals, and the subjects I interviewed in each case. Table 1: The Outsourcing Deals Outsourcing Contract PeriodCore Company & Their IndustryOutsourcing Company & Their IndustrySubjectsJune 2004 May 2005Merchant Inc. (retail)Master Technologies (IT, industry leader) Brad, Security ExpertKeith, ManagerMaria, SpecialistDavetta, Team LeadRussell, DirectorAugust 2003 continuingConcerto Inc. (retail)Circuit (IT, industry leader)Paul, Site ManagerAugust 2004 continuingPeoples Banking Inc. (financial)People Solutions (HR, industry leader)Gerri, Project Lead on the Outsourcing DealFranca, ManagerMay 2005 continuingForeign Motors, Inc. (manufacturing)First Class Resource Management (HR)Sandy, SpecialistJuly 2003 continuing Wireless Inc. (telecommunications)Web Tech (HR, industry leader in IT)Lynette, Strategic Business Unit ManagerUnknown July 2003Accolade Hospital (health care)Accessible Hardware (IT)Hope, Senior AnalystRob, Manager1980s modified in 2004 but continuingRapture Hospital (health care)Right Technology Solutions (IT)Nadia, ManagerRosemary, ManagerKathleen, SpecialistBarbara, Team LeadDoris, Manager1990s January 2001Technologies Inc./Apex Inc. (telecommunications)Tech Leader (IT, industry leader)JB, ManagerMike, ManagerFred, Manager1998 continuingIndustrial Solutions Inc. (chemicals distribution)IT Services (IT, industry leader)Bryan, Director of Outsourced Services COMPARING INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND HUMAN RESOURCE OUTSOURCING: BIFURICATION OF JOB QUALITY AND LOSS The role that technologies have traditionally played in the deskilling and automation of work and the subsequent job losses this produces significantly shaped the expectations I had about the effects outsourcing would have on information technology versus human resources work. My expectations were that the processes that information technologists were involved in with outsourcingi.e., the standardization and routinization of workwould make their jobs more unstable as compared to human resource outsourcing. My expectations were also shaped by the then predominant image of outsourcing: the offshoring of IT work to places like India. Human resources work, I felt, was less capable of being compartmentalized and this workfrom a sociological standpointpaid real dividends in terms of a companys bottom line. As the findings show these expectations were not satisfied. Rather, it was human resource professionals who experienced significant job loss with outsourcing and they reported significant work speedup with few challenges in the scope of their new roles at outsourcing companiesa real and immediate degradation of their work. In contrast after becoming employed by outsourcing companies, information technologists overwhelmingly described the capability to learn new information about their work practices in different industries, share their knowledge and unique experiences with others in the company, and reported opportunities to break out of old roles and be perceived as experts. I describe the bifurication of outcomes in information technology versus human resource outsourcing in more detail, followed by an explanation for why this difference existed in the sample of cases. In three of four cases of information technology outsourcing (the most recent deals), professionals reported that most people scheduled to have their job outsourced remained employed. They rebadged, the industry term for professionals who begin working for outsourcing companies at the beginning of a deal. In the fourth case, Industrial Solutions Inc., all the information technologists left the company after the outsourcing deal with IT Services was signed. It was pre-Y2K (1998) and going on the labor market was viewed as more desirable, and less risky, than working for an outsourcing company. Presumably, this was a novelty in employment at the time. In part, very few job losses with information technology outsourcing was because core companies elected to keep this work and the people assigned to do it onsite at the physical location of their company. In contrast, in two of the three cases of human resources outsourcing there were significant job losses. In the Wireless Inc. deal with Web Tech, 100 of 700 human resources employees lost jobs (14%). And in the Peoples Banking Inc. outsourcing deal with People Solutions, 45 of 60 professionals lost jobs (75%). In both these cases, the human resources work was relocated to a regional location of the outsourcing company and professionals there (whether former employees of core companiesthe case of Wireless Inc.or notthe case of Peoples Banking Inc.) were now responsible for old tasks plus added ones. Work speedup with outsourcing, a common outcome, is discussed further below and in the next section. Information technologists at all ranksfrom specialists to managerswere also far more likely than human resource workers to say they had the opportunity for new professional challenges at jobs with outsourcing companies. Many subjects positively described the opportunities to learn how their work was done at another company, or in a different industry. The one thing I like is that I work on different accounts so I see something different with each one, compared to when I was with Merchant Inc. I only saw one way. You become familiar with all these different environments and you see so many problems that you often find You know what? We saw this with this client. Try fixing it this way. (Brad, security expert at Master Technologies) They particularly favored learning from the range of experience and problem-solving with new team members at a company that specializes in providing services in their professional field. Youre working for an IT company. This is what they do, so the advantage is the exposure to the way that other businesses do what they do. There were people who came to the Merchant Inc. account from the Wireless Inc. account, who were aware of how Wireless Inc. did things. Okay well at Wireless Inc., this is how they did this. It might be something you want to consider. So everyone brings to the table the way other companies have done things. At [another client] this didnt work, and heres why it didnt work. Not saying it wont work at Merchant Inc. but heres a test case. We tried this there, and it didnt work because of X, so you might want to be aware it didnt work because of X. Or we tried it there. It was a great success, therefore, it should work here. (Davetta, team leader at Master Technologies) In large part the opportunity to learn from and share experiences with other IT professionals resulted from the new flexible organization at outsourcing companies. I will discuss the new organization and the future ramifications this has for professional work in the IT and HR fields in the next section. A new organization, new management in most cases, and the new challenges they faced gave IT professionals the opportunity to be perceived as an expert and break out of old roles. After working for a company with the same group of people for extended periods of time, changing established perceptions of ones abilities is difficult. Seeking another professional opportunity or a new job and role change, especially when supervisors resist losing a valued team member, can be challenging as well. Many subjects said the formerly steadfast barriers to professional opportunities and recognition of abilities and expertise dissolved, and--of significant consequence--this was a primary benefit of the new jobs they obtained at outsourcing companies. When I was at Merchant Inc. I couldnt seem to get out of the role I was in. No matter how hard I tried or how good my reviews were. I think at Master Technologies theres more opportunity and more chance to break out of a role that youve always been in, do new things, and be considered the knowledgeable person on certain things. So thats definitely a benefit, not being silod. (Maria, specialist at Master Technologies) It was a nice thing because, even though we were working with the same group we did have different upper-management people. So it gave me a chance to fluff my feathers, strut a little bit, say Hey! Where people that knew me for years, they go Oh yeah. Its just like an old shoe or being married for 25 years. Yeah okay, its you. You blend in after so many years. (Mike, data center manager at Tech Leader) Outsourcing companies and advocates for the industry usually herald the new job opportunities that professionals can experience working there. For example at an Outsourcing Institute event I attended in 2004, the host explained that people who rebadge to outsourcing companies move from cost centers at core companies to the revenue generating function at new employers. There they will find more resources, professional, and promotional opportunities. It revitalizes careers! he concluded enthusiastically. My sampling of information technologists, with experience at outsourcing companies, does suggest that there is truth to the industry claims of greater professional and promotional benefits. Several subjects were quickly identified as being capable of fulfilling larger roles at outsourcing companies. In the Merchant Inc. case, three of four professionals moved up in ranking. Brad moved from a security specialist to expert role; Davetta changed from a specialist in identity management to the role of team lead; and Keiths role as manager expanded to include dual coverage at Merchant Inc. and another client. Over a nine year period, Fran had changed client assignments regularly at Tech Leader and, with each change, had moved up to her present position of an executive-level account manager. During the first year of the Concerto Inc. contract, Paul was so effective in his position as site support manager at one facility that his role was expanded to include support at four facilities. As several subjects commented, the opportunities they had at outsourcing companies likely would not have arisen at old employers due to the structural constraints of a limited number of positions and because of the resistance of direct managers discussed above. For information technologists, there was a strong perception that mobility at outsourcing companies was a viable option. Many, including Barbara, discussed this option when I asked if mobility or promotional opportunities existed at outsourcing companies. Her response was typical of the information technologists I spoke with, especially those who began working for multi-national outsourcing companies. One of the benefits of going to Right Technology Solutions was it was multi-national, so all of us enjoyed having big benefits, competitive salaries, not health-care based community salaries. We got profit-sharing, we were free to buy stock, you could transfer to another client or another division in another part of the country if you wanted to, and a number of them did. One moved to Colorado, another 2 or 3 moved to Georgia, another guy moved somewhere West. (Barbara, manager at Right Technology Solutions) Yet, some subjects did acknowledge that making this choice personally would be difficult because of family commitments and constraints. They also acknowledged the travel requirements and greater contingencies with jobs at an outsourcing or consultant company, even with big players in the industry like Tech Leader. Most recognized when contracts or projects end, positions will end as well. The biggest thing that I wanted to avoid was hitting the road again. I didnt want to travel as a consultant for Accessible Hardware and thats what would have happened if I stayed with them [instead of going to work for Accolade Hospital after the contract ended]. I would have been a traveling consultant. At that point, I had one kid at home and another one on the way. I didnt want to hit the road again. (Rob, former manager at Accessible Hardware) Jackie: Job security? Fran: Theres no such thing. J: But for an outsourcer is it particularly so? F: I think so. We just went through a resource action [Tech Leaders term for layoffs]. I have initiated them. It seems like every year we have a resource action. (Fran, account manager for Tech Leader) In contrast to new professional opportunities perceived by information technologists, subjects in two of the three human resource cases said they felt cut off from opportunities to expand skills at outsourcing companies. Franca, formerly a staffing manager at People Solutions, said that the work was way too transactional for me. Transactional, she explained, meant a lack of autonomy and creativityor the routinization of her recruitment work. In part, this was because of the added checks and balances for approving any work flow changes in an outsourcing environment. Because of the added risks of giving work away for free (Paul) with new market relationships in outsourcing, every work change requested by an outsourcing customer has to proceed through new governance or approval processes (Zalewski 2007). At both People Solutions and Web Tech, two leaders in the outsourcing industry, human resource professionals described the heightened intensity, or speedup, of their work. Franca described the new service levels she had to meet at People Solutions: I now had to fill staff positions within a set number of days. Several times, she linked the increased pressure she and colleagues at People Solutions felt to service quality: having the time, energy, and incentive to find and hire the most suitable candidates for open positions at Peoples Banking Inc.. At Web Tech, an industry leader in IT that was leveraging a growing share in the HR market, there was very high pressure among management to obtain new outsourcing deals and sell added work in established ones. Lynette and the 600 other former Wireless employees experienced an immediate speedup of work after rebadging to Web Tech. Not only were they responsible for the scope of work in old roles, but now they were expected to do the same work for two or more clients. Managers were not only responsible for ensuring the requirements in contracts were satisfied, but they were also expected to sell services to established clients and try to secure new ones. As Lynette alluded to below and discussed directly in another part of our interview, attrition at outsourcing companies like Web Tech is unusually high and is causedin partby the high pressures to do more work with less people. At the very start, 100 people lost their jobs. Soon after that, they wanted people to work dual companies. Consequently, people are saying Ive already got a lot to do here, now youre asking me to do this here? And so we lost some people from attrition. Also, some of the attrition was from the fact that we were working a 12, 15 hour day as norm. So at some point you have to figure out, do I have a life or not? That was a lot of mine. Okay, I dont mind working hard, Ive always worked hard, Ive always put in 200% effort. But when you call me and Im sitting in the church parking lot, and youre asking me to go over budgets. And youre upset because I dont have the information in front of me, its like Okay! At that point I felt, Okay this is really ridiculous. To them, they were making deals and working till 4, 5 oclock in the morning, getting a couple hours sleep, and then coming back and continuing to do the negotiations, I mean a lot of people thrived on it. I can tell you a lot of people looked at it and said, You know, I got a family. I cant do this! (Lynette, former strategic business unit manager for Web Tech) Work speedup subtracts time from the small breaks that occur throughout the work day, where people establish and foster their collegial relations with coworkers. Arguably positive relationships in the workplace help (versus hinder) work flows and productivity, and they have been shown to increase the feelings of commitment and loyalty of employees (Roy 1960). Successful mid-career professionals, like Gerri, said relationships in the workplace are as strong a motivation to come to work as is the processes of doing the actual work. For them, work speedup is not as significant a drawback with outsourcing as is the reduced opportunities for collegiality in the workplace that results from it. Two years into a compensation job at People Solutions corporate offices, Gerri identified this as the primary drawback of her job there. In an email, several months after our interview, I learned she had ended her employment at People Solutions. I presumed that it was because of the lack of professional community that she discussed with me below. So its sad because, I worked with incredible, wonderful people at Peoples Banking Inc. And I loved that, and I miss it. I dont know that I like the new world yet. At People Solutions, we dont have the same relationships and community that I had at the bank. But Im hopeful that that will happen. Or it will happen someplace else. (Gerri, compensation professional at People Solutions) What factors explain the bifurication in job loss and job quality outcomes in information technology compared to human resources outsourcing across the cases in this sample? I argue that bifurication is explained by both institutional and environmental factors. Institutions are commonly distinguished by their core competencies (Harrison 1994). In this sample, the core competencies of the companies Merchant Inc. and Concerto Inc. are the development and sale of products in retail markets. Technologies Inc. is a major provider of telecommunications services in regional markets, and so on through the sample. In part, I argue that the better outcomes in information technology outsourcing compared to human resource outsourcing are the result of their direct link to an organizations core competencies. IT is integral for efficiently serving and leveraging product and service markets. Because they directly support the core competencies of organizations, information technologies are usually perceived as a strategic resource by business management. Information technology programs structure systems of business processes and increases their timeliness to better ensure that organizations are meeting the anticipated needs of their customer markets. Technical applications help build histories of customer patterns and knowledge of a company's marketsits informating function (Zuboff 1988). This knowledge then becomes further embedded in applications to make an organizations systems more responsive to its markets, more fully automated, and increasingly efficient. In retail, this involves getting snow shovels and mittens on shelves at the right time, in preparation for the season. In the Industrial Solutions, Inc. case, another example, information technologies are used to more rapidly react to and satisfy customers needs for quality chemicals. As Bryan implied below, what often sets organizations apart from competitors in the national (and global) marketplace is their level of responsiveness, product, and service quality. If youre distribution like we are, having somebody in operations there who can make sure that the product is stored properly, is repackaged properly, and is sent to the customer on time, along with somebody in the field calling from sales to get feedback from the customers. How are we doing? Hows our pricing? That sort of thing. (Bryan, Director of Outsourcing Services at Industrial Solutions Inc.) Timeliness and efficiency have been cause for the ongoing reengineering and automation of systems and processes in organizations for the past decades. Reengineering and automation are primary functions of information technology work and, most importantly, these outcomes function dually to lower the cost of business operations while increasing profit margins. For timeliness, efficiency, and profitability reasons, information technology work is perceived as having strategic value for the organization. It is because of the strategic value commonly attributed to technologies by core companies, in large part, that job quality outcomes--such as continuing to do work in the same physical location and experiencing significantly fewer job losses, ongoing challenges with work, strong professional community, and viable career paths--remain vibrant in information technology outsourcing today. On the other hand, as Russell suggested, human resource processes are customarily perceived as a necessary evil. Does it provide me with benefit to our core business, which is retailing. The whole business is to make cash registers run selling stuff. Does this process help us do that, or is it a necessary evil? The difference comes down to, is this something that would help us build our business or is it something we just need to do to keep it going? Like payroll. (Russell, Director of IT Security for Merchant Inc. and helped negotiate their outsourcing deal) Human resource processes support the social organization of a company but, in the estimation of corporate stewards, are only indirectly linked to the core business. As a consequence, the business community tends to under-value them. The Peoples Banking Inc. outsourcing case is a good example of this. Gerri, who led the team that developed and executed this deal, said that the bank struggled with their decision to outsource the function of recruitment and staffing. In her view this process was strategic: recruitment satisfies an organizations need for creative, talented, and hard-working people who add value to a companys bottom line. But the consensus of her project team was the opposite. It wasnt strategic enough (read value here) to keep it internal to the organization. Consequently, it was part of the human resources outsourcing deal Peoples Banking Inc. negotiated with People Solutions. We tried to sort out the more transactional aspects of the function from the strategic policy type things. Although, its a fine line and its not easily broken apart in that way. There were the easy things like payroll, benefits administration. But not things like compensation strategy, benefits strategy, or talent assessment. The struggles that you get to are with the staffing or recruiting function. Theres a belief that that was transactional enough that it could and should be outsourced. But I think that is really difficult to take a part. There are strategic relationship people within that function that it gets to be like taking pieces out of the organization that I think you shouldnt. And we struggled with how to do the staffing piece, but that was a piece that was outsourced. (Gerri, compensation for People Solutions) In this case and the Wireless Inc. case, most of the work was physically relocated to the outsourcing company and, because of undervaluation of human resource processes generally, there were significant job losses. The differing reasons for outsourcing HR as compared to IT work also underscores the importance of institutional value in explaining job quality and loss outcomes with outsourcing. Is the organization outsourcing for mostly cost reduction reasons? If so, in the eyes of senior management this implies that the function has low to little value toward strengthening and building the company's bottom line. Or is the company outsourcing mostly to gain access to the expertise of a strategic partner? If so this implies that the function is perceived as having strategic value, significantly impacting the companys business effectiveness and success. The rationale for outsourcing, therefore, has implications for job loss in information technologies versus human resources. With human resources, cost savings is usually the primary motivation for outsourcing. It was the reason stated by subjects in two of the three human resource cases. Oh cost savings. I mean anybody can tell you efficiency, its cost. (Gerri, steered the planning and negotiation of the People's Banking Deal) Wireless Inc wanted to cut some costs. (Lynette, strategic business unit manager for Web Tech) In the case of Foreign Motors Inc., recruitment and training of temporary production employees was outsourced because the process was too time-consuming and could be managed just as effectively by an outsourcing company (Sandy, HR specialist at First Class Resource Management). With information technologies, expertise and remediation are the most common reasons for outsourcing. Many core companies have limited resources for the development of staff and technologies because they are not competing in IT markets. IT is generally considered a non-core function. Consequently the incentives to develop IT resources, so that beneficial changes to build the business can be made, are constrained. Usually in the IT cases in this sample, subjects said that outsourcing was done primarily to access the expert technology resources and methodologies of suppliers, who would apply them at customer companies. Outsourcing these functions to an expert in IT organization and function allows core companies to focus more effectively on the work that directly generates the revenues for their company. (Jottings from unrecorded interview) Merchant Inc.s rationale for outsourcing: for expertise, a way to remediate. Remediate=transformation of processes, hardware, software, data centers to upgrade. Remediation increases quality and decreases costs. (Keith, manager for Master Technologies) Concerto always says, We need to get out of the business that were not in the business to do. Meaning that if its not the business of creating, developing, and selling retail products, then its not our work. Concerto is a retail company. And so their goal wasnt to create IT experts. Because they dont sell IT products for profit. Circuit does. So therefore, Circuit has the training, the career paths, the expertise built in to how they develop their people because their product is IT services, IT products, printers, servers, etc. And so you have this strategic partner whos going to come in, and literally Circuit now owns Concertos servers. And we manage their forum of servers, because thats what Circuit does well. Thats what were in the business to do. Now Concerto doesnt have to worry about the servers. They get to go and make better soaps, pharmaceutical care products, hair care, beauty care products, because theyre going to focus on that work. (Paul, site support manager for Circuit) The reason for outsourcing, whether for cost reduction reasons in human resources or expertise in information technologies, had a direct impact on job loss. As discussed earlier, in two of three cases of human resource outsourcing significant job losses occurred when the deal was executed. It was the opposite in information technology outsourcing. With the exception of individuals identified as dead weight, there were very few job losses in five information technology cases in this sample. Deciding to outsource primarily for cost reduction reasons, therefore, usually leads to immediate job losses. Deciding to outsource primarily for expertise, as in the cases of Merchant Inc. and Technologies Inc. for example, usually correlates with job preservation. As subjects from both cases acknowledged, however, jobs are only initially retained in information technology outsourcing. Technical expertise in the workplace is always intended to standardize, deskill, automate, and reduce operating costs over time. And cost reductions, as the past decades have shown, typically come from reducing the number of jobs in the workplace and the people employed to do them. I will return to this theme in the next section. It had to do with modernization and things they needed to do, money that needed to be spent, and how best to spend it. It also had to do with, which was the unsaid portion, this was a way of trimming. I think we came over with 700 employees and I think when we came back, there were only 2 to 300 of us. Some stayed back at Tech Leader. But it was a way of reducing salaries. (Fred, former data center manager for Tech Leader) In addition to institutional factors, environmental factors play a role in the bifurication of job quality outcomes and loss with information technology versus human resources outsourcing. Environmentally, the structure shaping the content of work and the nature of work flowswhether the work flow consists of standard, transactional processes or continuous, complex processesmatters for job quality and loss with outsourcing. Human resource processes, for example payroll and benefits administration, are standard processes that vary very little across industries. This is because the work is regulated by federal, state, and local government agencies and laws. For example reporting requirements for the IRS are standard; they require precise information, from a particular time period, and by a given deadline. Human resource processes are also standard because, conceptually, the same thingsattendance, tenure, vacation policies, benefits and deductionsshape the content of work across companies and industries. An applications an application, an absence is an absence. Everybody does the same thing with the applicants, and they do the same thing running the payroll check. (Barbara, former manager for Right Technology Solutions) This compares to the content of work in information technologies, which is different between companies and across industries. For example the organization, the departments, and the work flows will differ between manufacturing companies (a production model) versus healthcare providers (a service model). Companies also distinguish themselves from industry competitors through brand-name products and customer, or patient, services. This internal (or company specific) knowledge has implications for job quality and loss in information technologies outsourcing as well. For one thing, when core companies decide to outsource a department, having company-specific knowledge can mean the difference between remaining a direct employee or moving to the supplier. Applications developers, in the Merchant Inc. deal, were deemed too valuable to outsource because of their internal knowledge of the company. The majority of people in the remaining functions in information technologies were outsourced. Thats why they kept the application developers is because thats where you come up with applications that help you get socks and snowblowers in the right place at the right time. You need to know the retail business, you need to know Merchant Inc. to do thatIf its just something we need to do to keep it going then thats the kind we outsource. Like payroll. You gotta do it but I mean is there really any creativity or any internal knowledge or anything like that? (Russell, IT security director for Merchant Inc.) Internal knowledge of companies is also valuable to outsourcing companies, who must take over the way business processes were handled at core companies in order to smoothly transition and take control of the work. This means that information technology jobs and the people who do the work at core companies usually rebadge to outsourcing companies (for the meantime dodging job losses). Specialized knowledge in information technologies is also crucial for the maintenance of job quality at outsourcing companies. Often information technologists are called upon as subject matter experts (SMEs) because of their professional knowledge and experience, as well as for their: knowledge of companies and their industries, business processes and usual nuances, popular (or obscure) technology platforms and their capabilities, common modifications that are made to them, how they are integrated with other applications, and so on. The range of knowledge and the complexities of their work help leverage against job loss with information technology, as compared to human resources, outsourcing. The nature of work flows, whether the processes are transactional or continuous, also has significance for job quality and loss with outsourcing. In human resources, much of the work consists of cyclical batch processes. It is the convention for companies to handle processes like payroll and benefits enrollment in cycles. The processes to pay employees are systematized (e.g., data collection, entry, special entries, running preliminary reports, transferring money, etc.) and occur every other week, for example. Benefits enrollment and change periods happen over longer cycles but are incorporated into a system of human resource processes, each requiring a different period of execution. Each human resource duty, as well, requires the processing of batches of information. New employees are added to databases, as a batch, at the beginning of a new payroll cycle. Deductions are also made to all of an organizations employee records at the same time. When work flows consist of transactional processes, which are greatly consistent across companies and industries, it is much easierand companies are much more willingto migrate it to a supplier, usually offsite where the cost of delivering it is less. In addition to immediate job losses human resources work at outsourcing companies was described as way too transactional for experienced managers like Franca, and the expectations and intensity of work there were magnified for most others. As shown earlier, job quality outcomes are generally poor with human resource outsourcing. The transactional nature of work in human resources, which has consequences for job loss and quality, differs greatly from the continuous process work in information technologies and the effects that it hasI arguewith outsourcing. Many of the subjects in this sample are experienced information technologists; e.g., subjects in the Technologies Inc. case began working with new information technology in the early 1980s. Across interviews a theme that emerged was the non-routinization of much information technology work and how this has lead to ongoing professional challenges that never ceased over the careers of many of my subjects. A striking example of this was Fran who, in the early 1980s, got her start in information technologies dismantling, relocating, and rebuilding an entire data center for Technologies Inc. It was my ticket out of customer service. But I had my best experience in that area. We were moving from one location to another, so we had to dismantle an entire system, all the switches, and some cards, and everything like that, the boxes, the racks, all the cables, we had to document everything, we had to dismantle everything, take it to the new location, and then rebuild it. Do all the testing and everything. That was the best time doing that. (Fran, project executive for Tech Leader) Since that time, Fran has experienced a new opportunityalmost every yearworking in the roles of: operations manager, project manager, database manager, program manager, account manager, and now project executive at Tech Leader. Over the past decades companies have invested heavily in computerizing and networking the workplace with new information technologies. As a result, a revolution in what work is and the way it is handled has and continues to occur. Information technologists have benefited professionally from this investment in terms of the ongoing evolution of business processesand subsequent new challengesin this line of work. Both hospitals in this sample, for instance, were investing tens of millions of dollars on new EPIC technology systems that electronically link the various clinical practices together (both on and offsite) and benefit doctors, staff, and patients by producing a unitary and current medical record. Epic to healthcare is like SAP or PeopleSoft are to the Human Resources or the business side. So its a single, huge application that, for your medical records, your radiology images, your pharmacy, your lab results, your census information, all that stuff is in a single application that all the caregivers have access to. Its huge, its a big deal. Eight year project, $52 million dollars, biggest non-construction project that the hospital has ever invested in. (Rob, network manager at Accolade Hospital) Implementing software creates new opportunities and challenges for information technologists like Rosemary, who moved from an analyst to a team lead position on the EPIC implementation project at Rapture Hospital. Since 2001, Rapture Hospital made this decision to have a one-stop shop, a state-of-the-art electronic patient folder system, EPIC, and although I was working with Right Technology Solutions, Rapture Hospital hand-picked me to be the leader for the ambulatory team for EPIC systems. (Rosemary, former analyst for Right Technology Solutions) Upgrades to systems, integrating parts of systems with others both internally and across companies, remediating business processes to be more responsive, accurate, efficient, and less costly are just some of the other complex and continuous flow of new tasks that the information technologists in this sample completed. COMPARING INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY AND HUMAN RESOURCE OUTSOURCING: SIMILARITIES IN JOB QUALITY AND LOSS Outsourcing companies are capitalist enterprises. They work to satisfy both growth and profitability objectives. The common business method for meeting the profitability objective is to reduce operating costs and increase productivity. Outsourcing companies usually use two strategies to do so. The first strategy is to apply change management systems. Change management systems function by taking the custom business processes of clients and changing them to conform to the outsourcing company's expert processes but standard ones. Over time, change management will lead to the deskilling, automating, and cheapening of professional work. The other policy is the way outsourcing companies have institutionalized flexibility through decentralized and lean organization, which causes significant work speedup. These strategies are significant, are similar to IT and HR outsourcing, and will deteriorate the job quality of work across both industries. I address the new decentralized and lean organization first because of its significance to job quality and loss on the immediate experience of work at outsourcing companies. Change management practices, described after, have greater significance for the future of job quality and loss in both professions. To deliver services to their customers in the least costly manner, outsourcing companies have institutionalized flexibility in their social organization and work practices. Similar to Smith (1994), who found a decentralized and multilayered workforce at a supplier of outsourced copying services, the large outsourcing companies in this sample have organized their staff flexibly in order to deliver services in a just-in-time fashion. IT specialists like Maria are primarily assigned to one client. In her case, its Merchant Inc. where she works onsite and performs tasks of a security analyst role, such as network vulnerability assessments. But specialists are also assigned to functional teams, for example identity management or network administration, that span a region. Functional teams are expected to support teammates at other clients when issues related to that job function arise and require more than the local human resources to resolve them. In another layer of the organization, subjects like Brad supply expert services on IT security issues for a group of 15 clients in the region. IT specialists and experts often work togetherbut virtuallyto resolve problems as needed using the various communication tools at their disposal (e.g., phones, texting, web resources). At Master Technologies its a big network of people, of products, tools, and experience. I can tap resources within the company on other accounts to help me with a certain task, or a certain product. They call them LERMS. You can contact LERMS and they come to your aid to give you education about this tool, or this process, or this task. So thats a really great thing. You feel youre part of a big network instead of all on your own. Thats a really good thing with outsourcing overall that, they tap knowledge from the whole company. No matter what account youre on, youre getting experience and expertise from all over the company, not just in your immediate work group. (Maria, specialist at Master Technologies) Large outsourcing companies also commonly make use of numerical and functional flexibility through the high levels of attrition and mobility of their work forces (Peck and Theodore 1998). Having a lean organization means having a set of core employees and either supplementing their numbers when the work requires it (outsourcing companies do this reluctantly) or redirecting their work as needed to satisfy existing contract levels and services (their preferred and more common method). I used a quote earlier from Fran, employed with Tech Leader for nine years. During this time she had witnessed regular resource actions. Resource Actions are the outsourcing companys polite or less egregious way of saying that, to sustain their profitability, significant job cuts are forthcoming. In terms of redirecting employees when and where they are needed, the earlier discussion of the upwardly mobile information technologists shows that companies intend and are effective at reshuffling their professionals with the execution of each new outsourcing deal. Lynette, experienced in a senior management role, commented on the high mobility and attrition at Web Techanother outsourcing industry leader. The next three quotes underscore just how little outsourcing companies seem to mind the added challenges of maintaining a lean organization. The profitability imperative, or reducing their operating costs, is just thatits imperative to the exclusion of other competing concerns. Id say from a job security perspective, never felt secure. I mean you were here today, gone tomorrow. And youd meet someone or talk to someone on the phone and go wheres? Oh theyre gone. And people jump from BPO to BPO [from deal to deal] and no one thinks anything of it. Oh my gosh, this is crazy! (Lynette, strategic business unit manager at Web Tech) Fortuitously for outsourcing companies, it is common for the work force that rebadges to quickly start to evaporate. This happened in the Merchant Inc. case where specialists, then management, began jumping ship just months into this new deal. In the past year, weve lost three specialists who havent been replaced. They dont want to replace people who leave. Theyre always trying to reduce their costs. Ive seen this more since Ive been at Master Technologies than anyplace. And then we lost our manager, and they didnt replace him, then we lost our director and they didnt replace him. (Maria, IT specialist for Master Technologies) One direct consequence of attrition and mobility at outsourcing companies is work speedup. Lynettes earlier example of being phoned by colleagues in her church parking lot to help negotiate and go over details of existing and new deals for Web Tech shows that work life boundaries are very porous and the work-time expectation for senior management is very high. Middle managers at other outsourcing companies, like Keith, confirmed the significant increase in the time they spent at work as a consequence of attrition. In his case, after an IT security manager then director left in the Merchant Inc. deal, his work doubled. The expectations for time spent at work for specialists and other front-line professionals as well is greater in large part because of the lean organization at outsourcing companies. Theyre focused on the work that needs to be done, but not caring so much about the resources that have to do it. Its like Okay heres more work. Everyones gonna have to just do more stuff when youre already maxed out. Its not good news. (Maria, specialist at Master Technologies) Increased time spent at or doing work was also the result of the added requirements of jobs at outsourcing companies. Change management is especially significant to this expansion of roles, and it concludes the discussion in this section. With outsourcing, the roles that information technologists play take on added complexities because of their new task of change management. Change management is an IT management term for systematic and sequenced processes that make work flows more responsive, accurate, and efficient without disrupting the larger technology operation. Change management procedures ensure that changes are developed, documented, and tested before they are put into production; a common technical phrase meaning they are used from that time forward in the organizations normal operations. For reasons related to the great complexities of technical work flows and the emphasis on reducing operating costs, change management has become a mantra in many information technology departments across companies and industries. Professionals at outsourcing companies strictly adhere to change management systems because of the omnipresent threat of termination. Change management processes, along with new contracted service levels and project timelines, significantly added to professionals scope of work and lead to work speedup at outsourcing companies. Some of the things were non-negotiable practices within Master Technologies. They did in-depth training on, These are the systems that we use, these are the change management processes that we follow, and they are non-negotiable. If you dont follow them they can be reason for termination. (Davetta, team lead at Master Technologies) We had pressure on the Master Technologies side because they want the account up and running and working well. So they were pushing, pushing, pushing, You gotta do this. You got SLAs (service level agreements) now. You have deadlines, you have contract and change management issues. If they dont feel you are doing well, they bring in the redline team. Its a scary thing on our side to say, if youre not up to par you can be out the door. (Maria, specialist at Master Technologies) Change management has implications for the future of professional work. Over time, change management will function to produce a standard package of services that can be delivered across a large customer base with an even leaner social organization. Obviously, this will decrease the cost of this work and increase an outsourcing companys profitability. Managers often refer to this end result as an economy of scale, and it comprises the growth and profitability objectives of capitalist enterprise that I described earlier. Most important to this sociological discussion of outsourcing and its effects on job quality and loss outcomes, the explicit intent of change management is to deskill and automate professional work at outsourcing companies. Jackie: How forceful was Master Technologies in standardizing the current processes once they were contracted to deliver the service? Russell: They did a good job at that. You could tell that that was their line of work. Thats how they make their money is providing the least amount of service to you for the most amount of money. And theyve got these set things that they run. Their own problem management system, change management system, and they obviously want to get your processes melded into these as soon as they can because it gives them economies of scale. So they did that pretty efficiently. Thats what they do. (Russell, IT security director at Merchant Inc.) To add, it is highly likely that the decentralized, lean, and flexible organization at outsourcing companies will accelerate the degradating effects on job quality and loss outcomes of change management processes. A striking theme that emerged from interviews was the fluid manner in which information at the large outsourcing companies gets shared. Whereas knowledge about information technologies and processes is somewhat sedentary because of proprietary concerns in a hierarchical organization, when they are outsourced they become the property of the outsourcing company and are used when and as they deem fit. A tool or effective process that was developed by information technologists at one company, for example, can now be used or incorporated at another client. The open and common sharing of information, tools, and processes augments change management and, presumably, speeds up the standardization of work at outsourcing companies. Theres a lot of information sharing, which is very good. An example of that is in UNIX. They needed a tool to push out patches. On the UNIX servers Merchant Inc. never had a tool, but coming over to Circuit Inc. theres a tool that was used at [another company] that now the Merchant Inc. account can take advantage of as well. So you can adopt tools from other accounts. (Maria, specialist at Master Technologies) Fluid information sharing is also coupled with the high rates of mobility among outsourced professionals at outsourcing companies, who move from one account to another out of necessity (i.e., their job was lost) or for new professional challenges. The processes and way in which outsourcing companies deliver work to their customers, consequently, become increasingly interwoven into the social and technical fabric of the organization. Paulwith two years experience at Circuitgave a particularly astute account of how the decentralized, multi-layered organization and social mobility among their workers produced a blending of recently rebadged professionals from Concerto (the core company) and professionals with more established experience at Circuit. Because of the influences from their membership in functional teams and from colleagues who migrate to the Concerto account, newly outsourced professionals are more quickly indoctrinated into Circuits pre-established change management systems and standard ways of delivering work. Once the first year was over, a couple of resources left the Concerto Inc. contract to go and work in other Circuit fields, in other work that Circuits delivering. There have also been individuals who have worked for Circuit for years, who have come in to jobs on this Concerto Inc. contract. So over a period of time, youll get enough of that blending that theyll be fewer people on the contract who were former Concerto Inc., as it becomes more of a Circuit identity delivering the work back to Concerto. Or youll have individuals who worked in areas that maintained our servers. Well now that role is rolled up into the larger Circuit corporate structure. Now theyre on the teams that deliver server maintenance across 5, 6, or 7 different accounts. Its still the same work but now its part of how Circuit delivers across many customers, not just to the Concerto customer. So theyve transitioned deeper into the overall Circuit structure. (Paul, manager at Circuit) CONCLUSION: THEORETICAL AND SOCIAL IMPLICATIONS Findings from this study contribute to our understanding of important factors that lead to bifurication in job quality and job loss with outsourcing. When comparing information technology (IT) and human resource (HR) outsourcing, the findings here suggest that both institutional and environmental factors are relevant to explaining variations in job quality and loss outcomes. There is a far stronger tendency for institutions to assign strategic value to the IT function as compared to HR. This is because its hardware, applications, and support staff have a direct bearing on the delivery of products and/or services to a companys core market. Additionally, the work of information technologists is perceived as having strategic value because they dually serve the important functions of integrating and reengineering business processes to increase their timeliness, efficiency, and reduce their cost while, in the process, helping markets grow. Strategic value is much more likely to drive a companys decision to outsource parts of its IT function. In these cases, outsourcing was done so that a core company could access the expertise of an IT company. The strategic role of IT and the subsequent high value this fosters leads to better job outcomes with outsourcing. For the time being very few job losses accompany new deals, much of the work continues to be completed at the same physical site, and professionals often find greater challenges in roles with outsourcing companies. This compares to the lower value assigned by institutions to the HR function. Most companies in this sample perceive the processes of recruitment, benefits, and payroll administration as routine and a necessary evil. The social organization is necessary for administering and supporting organizational processes that add value to the core business. But to capitalist institutions, they are not as directly linked to core business processes. Because of this, HR processes supporting the social organization are significantly undervalued. I show that this diminished value is embedded in the primary motive for HR outsourcing. In these cases, the outsourcing of HR was most often done for the purpose of reducing the costs of doing this work. Ironically, perhaps, this perspective is shared by many of todays post-industrial professionals as well. Responding to my observation of different outcomes in IT versus HR outsourcing, several subjects commented generally that HR work lacked "creativity" and was a "necessary evil." They too expressed an explicit disregard for this work. For reasons related to institutional value, therefore, human resources work is often transferred to the lowest bidder, the work is physically relocated, the deal includes significant job losses, and the people who move to jobs at outsourcing companies experience immediate work speedup and greater routinization of their work. Thus, the disparate outcomes of IT as compared to HR outsourcing show that institutional value of the work is a significant variable in theoretical explanations for job quality and loss and, specifically, a bifurication of upskilling versus heavy deskilling and job losses in the professions. The bifurication of outcomes with outsourcing also relate to environmental factors. Due to the heavy regulatory environment in human resources, the nature of this work is already highly standardized. Companies are lawfully required to obtain the same pre-employment information, compensation processes are similar, reporting and other aspects of human resources work varies very little from one company to another within and across industries. As such, the work is typically completed in batches and over regular periodic cycles; again with little variance across organizations. Thus the regulatory environment impacts the nature of human resources work, giving it a standard structure and making it an easy target for companies to outsource. At outsourcing companies, HR professional work becomes more transactional and usually subject to heavy Taylorist job quotas. The environment of information technology, on the other hand, is not regulated and companies have made significant investments in technology broadly to make their organizational processes more seamless, efficient, customized, and more responsive to the markets of their core businesses. As a consequence of the complexity this environment produces, information technology work is quite unique across companies and industries. Information technologists have internal knowledge that functions as leverage against job loss. Additionally, the ongoing evolution in technology systems produces a continuous flow of new challenges for information technologists. It is not easily routinized into transactions, at least not the expert work that outsourcing companies are initially contracted to do. Their roles at outsourcing companiese.g., migrating and integrating the work, making modifications and performing upgradesleads to better job quality outcomes for many information technologists. In addition to institutional value, therefore, the findings strongly suggest that factors that relate to organizational environments and impact the nature of work and its resources are also important to theoretical explanations of a bifurication of job quality and loss outcomes in professions. While employment outcomes currently are fairly good for information technologists, the similarities between HR and IT jobs at outsourcing companies strongly underscores that this will not continue to be the case. Outsourcing companies, especially the large ones, are refining the mechanics and ideal of what it means to be a lean and flexible organization. Through their use of multi-layered organization, they meet their contracted obligations for technical systems support in a just-in-time manner. Outsourcing companies, additionally, have profitability prerogatives that lead to strategies of delivering contracted work with the minimum number of people. As many subjects attested, outsourcing companies are very adept at eliminating what they perceive as labor waste and exacting more work from the staff that remain. Across cases, professionals who rebadged to outsourcing companies found their roles and work time significantly increased because of high rates of social mobility (i.e., the constant reshuffling of employees from one client to another) and attrition among their work forces. Work speedup with IT and HR outsourcing, therefore, is the pervasive result. To achieve greater profitability, outsourcing companies give strong emphasis to change management processes. Change management functions, most importantly, to develop standard services and technical solutions that can then be produced at a lower cost by the company. Thus, the strategic work that information technologists do for outsourcing companies is not the work of satisfying contracted service levels. Their strategic work is change management, which brings the outsourcing company ever closer to this goal. As many subjects confirmed, outsourcing companies strongly mandate that their employees adhere to change management processes. 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Zalewski, Jacqueline M. 2007. Discretion, Control, and Professional Careers With Outsourcing Companies. Sociological Viewpoints 23 (Fall):121-137. Zuboff, Shoshana. 1988. In the Age of the Smart Machine. New York: Basic Books.  Specialists are primarily assigned to one client, whereas experts are assigned to a group of clients. Brad was assigned to 15 clients.  Because it generally is not characterized by specialized content, processes, and continuous flow, human resources work is ripe for routinization at outsourcing companies. Companies like Web Techa leader in information technology outsourcingare aggressively pursuing market share in this sector, presumably because of the standard nature of HR processes and the profitability margins this engenders.      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