Rural Sourcing, Inc.: Bringing High Tech Jobs to Rural America (cont.)

Kathy White, right, brought her corporate career in information technology together with her ties to Arkansas State University to start Rural Sourcing, Inc.

How do you choose new areas for centers?

Rural Sourcing has to be profitable to be sustainable. Once it was no longer just an outreach program, the criteria changed.We require a respected regional university in the area with a strong computer science and information systems program. Their curriculum is evaluated to determine if the skills are the ones we have identified as our core capabilities. We also locate in areas that have 35 to 50 percent lower cost of living than major metro areas.We like to choose locations that have a nice quality of life that would attract people back to the area or entice experienced professionals to move to the region.

We have been the most successful when a collaborative team from the region embraces the concept and works diligently with us to open a center and publicize the opportunities.We have been very fortunate to have located in a number of areas that fit this description.

How do you get the business to go into these centers?

We have been very fortunate that the concept of on-shoring has resonated with the national media, especially in a time when many jobs are going off-shore and Americans are losing jobs. We also work very hard to gain visibility, meet with potential customers and seek help from regional leaders. One of our real competitive advantages, I think, is that I’ve worked in the [IT] field for a very long time and know a lot of information technology leaders. All of these things are helping bring work into the centers.

So you’re getting business on two ends…you’re finding the places and the people and you’re also finding the work.

I think of it as supply and demand.We needed talented people able to provide high-quality technology services.We’re a consulting business, so we’ve got to find people that in short order can be productive, and we’ve got to find locations.We have to have a skill set to compete with offshore employees. Those are the two real challenges, matching supply and demand.

If a company is thinking about outsourcing its IT work and they’re looking at Rural Sourcing and they’re look at India, why would they choose Rural Sourcing?

That is a very good question. There are people who feel that their own business model does not work going offshore, so there are a lot of companies that would not go to India. I think for companies that have tried offshoring, there are some that have not had a very positive experience because of the dynamic nature of their own application development. It takes a lot of communication and a lot of interaction to complete complex software development projects.

Some of our employees are able to spend some time on client sites and then work at other times from our centers. That is much easier when you are located in the United States. So the client knows who’s working on their project, and they see the same people when they go back to our center. Our cost structure is fairly competitive with India, and as we expand and as we get a more comprehensive skill set offering I think that’s going to help us be very competitive.

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