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Much has been written and talked about regarding the "ifs" and "whys" of outsourcing. Our contention is
that even firms that are open to outsourcing generally don’t have a good strategy for "how" to implement it.
With an eye toward the mechanical engineering function the following are some guidelines that should
help in that regard. |
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Medium to Large Companies
The ideal situation for medium to large size companies is to have a mix of in-house and outsourced resources: |
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100% in-house is not ideal. |
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70/30 or 60/40 inside to outside is generally better for a lot of reasons. |
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Diverse Skill Sets Are Required
Mechanical engineering encompasses a diverse skill set, including such specialties as mechanical design, structural analysis, thermal engineering, materials science, and manufacturing engineering. It is unrealistic to think that a small company is likely to find, hire, and keep one engineer who is strong in all areas. Therefore, |
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Small Companies
Small companies should consider the following growth scenario: |
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Growing toward a 70/30 or 60/40 mix should be the goal. |
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If the sustainable workload is less than one person, outsource all of it. It doesn’t make sense to pay a full-time salary for part time utilization. |
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If the sustainable workload is between one and two people, outsource all of it. It is not a good idea to try to maintain an engineering infrastructure for one person, and two internal people are inefficient for this workload. |
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If the sustainable workload is between two and three people, two internal people and the remainder outsourced is a good way to go. |
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And so on and so forth. In general an outsourced engineering firm has more, better, and more up-to-date resources than a small company could even consider having internally. Therefore, small companies should utilize outsourcing as the primary resource, and grudgingly add full-time employees at key points in the growth cycle. |
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| Redpoint Engineering’s staff consists of 3 Principal Engineers, 4 Associate Engineers, and 2 Industrial Engineers with over 80 years of combined skills and product-design experience across numerous industry sectors. Our backgrounds combined with our dynamic team approach, gives us a unique advantage to help companies of all sizes. Contact Us today for a free consultation! |
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