Offshoring IT Services, on behalf of an Indian company, is looking for Regional Manager for the Nordic region.
Job Title: Regional Manager
Education: BE /MCA + MBA
Experience: 7+Yrs
Job Location: Sweden
Necessary: The candidate should be based in SWEDEN currently or has the right to work in SWEDEN.
Skills:
- Business development manager with 7+ years of experience in dealing with Swedish suppliers of automation / automotive/ media / wireless Industry
- Experience in dealing with companies from other Nordic countries(Finland, Denmark & Norway) would be an added advantage
- Should have good understanding in Embedded system
- Should be able to understand customer requirements, interface with the engineering team in making Techno-Commercial Proposals
- Should have a strong sales acumen, leadership, entrepreneurial, negotiation and analytical skills.
- Burning desire to grow and develop the business
- Excellent communication skills across all media ( both written and verbal)
Description of position Responsibilities:
- To catalyze the business development in Sweden market along with other
Nordic countires, by identifying the prospective clients for the Organization
in technology companies.
- Primary contact for any business development/sales activity in Nordic region.
- Study various verticals; identify potential customers and generate leads.
- Carry out marketing research, do sales forecasting, promotional planning and brand promotion.
- Track against targets and budget.
- Meet the profitability revenue goals, grow the market share, and provide customer satisfaction.
- Send regular updates to the management and actively participate in the decision making process.
Contact me at infoatoffshoring.se for more information.
Due to prevailing economic conditions we have to be as lean as possible. One of the projects that I have as project manager, an offshoring project, is as agile as a project can get. It is a completely new application being developed which in itself is a challenge. Almost all development is carried out in India with offshore resources. As usual requirements are discovered too late. These are defined and prioritised continously. Yet, we have succeeded in being agile in the project. How come? Why? What is agile methodologies?
Agile methodologies generally promotes a project management process that encourages frequent inspection and adaptation, a leadership philosophy that encourages teamwork, self-organization and accountability, a set of engineering best practices that allow for rapid delivery of high-quality software, and a business approach that aligns development with customer needs and company goals.
We are using RUP software process framework.
The following practices are used:
- short iterations i.e. between 2 to 4 weeks
- weekly builds even though the requirement is not completely developed on delivery
- planning and communicating this to all involved
- continous follow up
- 15min pulse meeting everyday
- continous quality control through review, demo and tests
- onshore team sitting together once per week
- team spirit – important to have fun
- customers involved in all aspects of the project
Sitting together with offshore team is not always possible. Thereby
- important to include them in mailing list for all kind of news – the good, the bad and the ugly.
- remove all “we-them” feeling
- have an open attitude and understand the cultural differences
- involving offshore team early in the project
- begin by having the offshore team onsite to understand customers process, project needs, cultural differences, language and social events to build up relationship.
- proof of concept
- open communication even if it is constructive criticism
- transparency in project. All problems on the table and communicated as soon as they are discovered.
- lessons learned done together at end of each iteration to learn what went right and what can be improved
- risk management together
- same environment onsite and offshore
It is possible, takes some work but it is doable 
Project management is well established but what about offshoring project management? Project Management institute has defined project as “temporary endeavour undertaken to create a unique product or service” (Project Management Institute, 2004).
Every project revolves around three main objectives:
1. deliver required performance to meet clients expectation,
2. the cost of the project, and thereby finish the project within approved budget and time frame,
3. handle new requirements and customers views as well.
Offshoring project management is also about remote management of projects/endeavours for a client amongst other things. It is more than project management since it involves other processes then mentioned in project management. I stumbled on the term program manager. A description of program management found here.
What are the best practices for offshoring projects located at different geographical locations?
- After the interviews are held and candidates selected, transfer of knowledge can already start offshore. Plan, execute and verify the knowledge transfer as soon as possible. Important that the purpose is communicated to everyone involved and promise of commitment is in place.
- The selected candidates are for a certain period located onsite. This in order to build the relationship and have a common understanding.
If the offshoring team is involved in prototyping, requirement specifications or design, these phases should be as much as possible handled onsite. When the requirements are detailed, the code can then be produced offshore.
- Proof of concept conducted onsite for common understanding of way of working. This should result in a partial delivery. This is an effective way to minimize missunderstandings, have a common understanding, common way of working and a indication of competence.
- Depending on the size of the project and number of resources involved offshore, an offshore project manager or coordinator should coordinate the team offshore.
- Deadline for deliveries a must. A weekly build to check the status and quality keeps the project on track.
- Tools that facilitate work effectively offshore and onsite. For eg. collaboration environment, collaborative tool for communication, documents and diagrams that make then available in real time, access to evironments, version control, VPN, NetOp, defect and change handling tools, etc.
- Common process, documents, routines, terms etc,
- Lessons learned captured continously from all involved and implemented in the next iteration.
- Projects capture risks and eliminate them in time.
- Communication! Communication! Communication
A dynamic list that shall be updated continously.
It has been a great week. Though sad to end SACC Mento program, the result is a huge dose of inspiration and a network of ambitious, successful and strong women.
I met Liselotte Hägertz Engstam, Vice President, Head Nordic Region at HCL Technologies at SACC. She is a warm, genuine and supportive person, a kind of person that everyone should have in their network.
Another inspiring person that I met besides Liselotte is Mats Agervi. Have to mention others such as Vivek Kundra 34 years, First US CIO and Piyush “Bobby” Jindal 37 years, current Governor of the U.S. state of Louisiana and a potential candidate in the 2012 United States presidential election.
As I mentioned earlier, I have a couple of projects. One of my project group finds the project a great learning experience with exciting challenges. It is fun to see the group grow, take on these challenges and have fun.
All in all a great week and looking forward to next
In an offshoring project communication, planning and follow up are vital since distance is a major risk factor.
In my project we have 15-minutes meeting per day. The main questions asked are:
- What did you do yesterday?
- What are you planning to do today?
- Any problems from fulfilling your goal?
To deal with the problems meetings are set up later on to discuss solutions. A status report is sent to eliminate missunderstandings.
A detail planning is a must. I plan activities on a daily basis depending on prioritisation and communicate to everyone involved. Follow up and review is a must to see what activities are performed and which ones are remaining. These activities have to also be planned in.
Since we use RUP in my project a number of activities have to be performed within a phase. Before starting the next phase we have to perform a RUP assessment as well as lessons learned.
The focus of course is the product and not documentation.
Are these practices only used in an offshoring project or ought to be used in every project? Is it Lean RUP or SCRUM that we are using without really being aware about it?
