Outsource Magazine Issue 34 - (Page 113)

THE BACK END INSIDE SOURCE Going where even the boldest won't... A Very Messy Deal WARNING: Those of you of a sensitive disposition, who have an aversion to matters scatological and/or downright repugnant, or who are perhaps eating breakfast whilst devouring your favourite outsourcing publication, may want to skip this page altogether. For the rest of you, prepare yourselves for one of the foulest - yet perhaps most inspirational - tales ever to grace this esteemed (many thanks - Ed.) organ... We lay our scene on the sales floor of a software company, long enough ago that several of those present may well have moved jobs but recently enough for the memory to remain as fresh (perhaps that isn't the most appropriate term) as the morning dew (that DEFINITELY isn't). Said sales floor is of the open-plan variety, and at one end is sitting the eminent CEO of the company in question, lord of all he surveys... While his staff beaver away at bread-and-butter work, our hero is in the midst of an endeavour of an altogether more ambitious nature: to be precise, a deal worth a very tasty $21 million - a transformative amount for a company of this size, and everyone in the room has at least one ear pointed towards the hot seat as the boss picks up the phone for the climactic call. This is it. This. Is. The. Big. One. As soon as the conversation begins it's clear that this is no open-and-shut situation: both sides are playing hardball and any hope of a speedy resolution is extinguished as the leading man gets bogged down in negotiations of the very trickiest type. The tension - already high - begins to mount: at any point the putative buyer at the other end of the line could slam the phone down and multi-milliondollar dreams could be snuffed out, replaced by the flatline tone of a disconnected call. Will he? Won't he? Can he? For the CEO himself, however, there is another problem... For as the seconds turn into minutes, and the minutes turn into quarters of hours, he starts to experience an increasing degree of gastric discomfort. Trying to deploy all his formidable deal-making skills, to focus many years of experience into one all-or-nothing call, he's also wrestling with a different call: that of nature... Despite those years of experience he has allowed himself to go into this make-orbreak call without unburdening himself of several hefty meals. And now, at the moment of crisis, another crisis rears its head. Desperately he struggles against his own body, wild-eyed as he attempts to concentrate on the deal. He simply can't afford to end the call, even for a few minutes. And why did he call from his landline? The gods... Let this one slip through his fingers and he may never recover. And yet, and yet... He really... needs.. to... go... And then he goes. Nearly an hour into the call, and before his entire team, his bowels win the argument. Straight into his pants. And yet the call goes on... Half an hour later: redemption. His opponent breaks. The deal is done. Our CEO replaces the phone. The room is silent, the staff struck dumb. And as they watch, in horrified awe, with infinite majesty our hero stands up. He points to the phone. Says, "That's a $21 million deal. And that" - as he points at the seat of his pants - "is commitment." Sir, we salute you. From a distance. "Why is it that people who can't take advice always insist on giving it?" - James Bond (Daniel Craig) www.outsourcemagazine.co.uk ●●● ● 113 http://www.outsourcemagazine.co.uk

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Outsource Magazine Issue 34

Challenges and Champions
Outsourcing in a Troubled Economic Environment
Richard Jones
High Stakes
In Transition
The Bigger Picture
Numbers, Numbers Everywhere...
NOA Round-Up
Struggling To Get Through?
International Commercial Disputes In Outsourcing Agreements
Is Infrastructure Necessary?
Global Freelance Platforms Grow Up
Trumping Price – Only with Best value
Kerry Hallard
Technology Investment in 2014
Water Will Always Find A Way
The Right Time Is Now
You, Robot?
The Legal View
Top Ten
NelsonHall Round-Up
Online Round-Up
The Deal Doctor
Inside Source
The Last Word

Outsource Magazine Issue 34