While it proved to be a challenging period for most companies, it also offered some opportunities for a fortunate few.

“What we saw [during recession] is that companies move away from transformational work and more into outsourcing, recognizing that they could outsource their activities and offshore them in places like Manila to save money,” Jeffrey S. Wilkinson, Accenture global head for test services, said in an interview last week.

Some of the global officials of consulting and outsourcing company Accenture were in Manila last week to speak before the company’s forum for its CIO (chief information officer) clients.

Mr. Wilkinson said Accenture was able to reap a windfall from the move of other companies to outsource more of their services to offshore providers.

“Over the last two years, we have grown from 1,200 people to 1,500 people who do testing and quality assurance for us here in Manila. The growth is probably on pace with our other Asian locations. It’s interesting to see as we come out of recession if companies will work on the transformational phase and not so much on outsourcing,” Mr. Wilkinson said.

Aside from the Philippines, Accenture has large testing and quality assurance facilities in India, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Argentina, Mexico, Canada and the US.

With the global economy starting to emerge from the economic doldrums, it seems that the battle is not yet over for CIOs.

After the downturn, senior technology executives, whose jobs include setting the technology directions of companies to support their business, are now facing a tougher challenge to rise up to the competitive game.

“When you outgrow the survival hump, that’s when you see growth with competitiveness. While you are recovering with everyone else, it’s a race to see who can exploit the [economic] rebound the fastest, who can gain the most and who can protect market share,” Michael J. Redding, global managing director for Accenture Technology Labs, said. The division is the dedicated technology research and development (R&D) organization within Accenture.

Source: BusinessWorld Online