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Does it make sense to outsource your non core processes during a downturn in the economy? Of course it does and its pure economics which is more than I can say for futures markets and the salaries of brokers on the stock market.

The key is to project manage a lot of the work which is outsourced so as to keep a close eye on progress, quality and service. Also just as important is to seek references from the clients of the outsourcing company.

I have found that outsourcing is misunderstood by the SME market and this is going to change over thee next 10 years. As more and more Outsourcing brokers come into play and actually perform the project management side as consultants so the success of such projects will be felt and as such adopted.

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A lot has been said about the economy of Cairns, its reliance on and vulnerability to the tourism market.  Slowly, the mining boom in the rest of Australia is having an effect on employment in Cairns , but we still need to find other industries to employ the thousands of people who are moving up here from down south and the other parts of the world.

Already, there is a small but flourishing digital economy in Cairns, with graphic designers and web design companies servicing mainly the local market, but with the potential to go much further afield. If we want a (reasonably) eco-friendly industry to base up here in the tropics, then this is a great way to go, high value knowledge based business with a small effect on the immediate environment (lots of people, working out of their own homes, electronically connected not commuting).  

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 I had a SaaS prospect recently who had me deal directly with their IT department. It's a financial solutions and IT had very little idea as to where to start. They were hoping for a wizard driven interface apparently to make it simple for non financial people to load the data in a few minutes and test.

As the SaaS solutions become more and more complex requiring greater departmentally aligned input so more and more of the onus will fall on the departments to do a lot more of the evaluation. This is driven further by the fact that the Vendors will have less input in building Pilot models for prospects as the price of software falls and the cost of sales has to drop as a result.  In my view this is not a bad thing in that  the cost of ownership falls closer to the end users as a result.