The past years I have been thinking regularly about the terminology in the offshoring world. The market has come up with a huge list of terms like: 
- Offshoring
- Offshore outsourcing
- Nearshoring
- Nearshore outsourcing
- Captive center
- Outsourcing
At the end of the day, my impression is that they are all describing one general thing: moving work to another country. Maybe we have made the terminology too complex? When I speak to people that have no knowledge or relation to offshoring at all, they generally think of oil platforms. Is that what we want as an industry?
I am more and more comparing our business to employment agencies. In the Netherlands we have many employment agencies and staffing agencies. One of the biggest is Randstad. This company was started by a single entrepreneur who explored the flexibility of the labor market in the Netherlands. (more…)
