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Friday | 5 December, 2008
CIO
Is your outsourcer an IT sweatshop?
Adherents say an ethics-based approach to outsourcing is good for your conscience and your company
Mary K. Pratt (Computerworld) 22 April, 2008 07:42:11

What to Ask
    An outsourcing provider's record on social and labor practices often speaks to its ability to deliver products, says Christine V. Bullen, a senior lecturer at Stevens Institute of Technology in the US, and president of the Global Sourcing Council, a nonprofit professional organization. If a company keeps workers in windowless rooms without access to the outside to prevent data leaks, for example, it will likely experience high turnover.

    Here are some questions that Bullen and others suggest asking to evaluate an outsourcing provider's record on social policies:

  • What percentage of the local workforce do you employ?

  • What are the laws in your area regarding the minimum age of employment?

  • What is the minimum age of workers you will employ?

  • What salary and benefits do you provide?

  • Does your compensation plan meet your workers' needs, and how have you reached that conclusion?

  • Tell me about workers' schedules: How many hours do they work in a week? How many days a week do they work? How many hours per shift? What are the starting and ending times?

  • What career paths are open to your employees?

  • Do you work with government or other stakeholders in the community to advance community development?

  • Do you provide education or training for community members outside your actual workforce?

  • How do you balance security needs and your employees' working conditions?

  • What green techniques are you using?

  • How are you reducing your carbon footprint?

  • Does your company have any environmental initiatives?

---Mary K. Pratt

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CIO Webcast Innovation #8 - What are the biggest roadblocks to IT's involvement in innovation at your company?
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CIO Live Podcast #79: Brent D Taylor, author of The Outsider's Edge: The Making of Self-Made Billionaires Part II
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