Outsourcing: how close to the core can you go?

Argues that increased competition means that organizations face pressure to cut costs and improve efficiency, as customers can now buy in almost any location globally. Defines outsourcing as the handing over of responsibility, for some aspect of service provision, to a third party external to an organization's formal boundaries. Concludes that several factors are perceived as barriers to outsourcing — these are: cultural barriers; human resource issues; monitoring and control issues; confidentiality; and lack of experience.