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The potential benefit of having part (but not all)
of your document team overseas is that the
overseas team members are online while the
US-based members are off for the night. If
you device an effective hand-off methodology,
you can have the overseas team members
continue working on documents after the US
members have gone home for the night. When
I was managing a global team my US writers
would gather initial data, generate document
files and write the introductory text, during our
night the overseas writers would generate data
tables, log into engineers' test accounts to run
data, verify documents, rewrite as needed and
send drafts to engineers for review, then the
US writers would come in the next morning,
hammer reviewers for turnaround, incorporate
last-minute changes and release.
OTOH, without effective hand-off methodology,
you're just rolling dice on whether less expensive
labor overseas will outweigh global chaos.
> Maybe the movement to offshore will help revive that version of the
> well-rounded documentation team here at home. Keeping my fingers
> crossed.
>
> I've been waiting a long time to hear about the benefit, over time, of
> offshoring documentation work. Has anyone seen numbers or a report
> (internal, leaked is fine with me) on whether it results in savings,
> or just creates new frontiers where documentation dollars must flow?
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