Outsourcing Engineering Activities. Analysis and Improvement of the Process

Diploma Thesis from the year 2012 in the subject Business economics - Industrial Management, grade: 1,0, Technical University of Graz (Industrial Management and Innovation Research), language: English, abstract: Outsourcing is becoming more and more popular. Outsourced activities continue to climb up the value chain. Even the outsourcing of engineering activities has become a common practice. However, literature, which proposes frameworks for outsourcing engineering activities, is still limited. Outsourcing can offer myriad opportunities for firms. Even so, if not well thought through outsourcing can cause considerable damage. Organisations expend a great deal of effort to optimise their production process. Administrative processes however, are often not analysed in detail. This thesis provides the theoretical background for designing an outsourcing process for engineering activities. A case study from the automotive industry shows, how a standardized outsourcing process including a risk analysis can be developed. At the case company there were no process maps outlining the process for outsourcing engineering activities. Process participants had only limited knowledge about tasks outside of their area. Within this thesis flowcharts are used to display the as-is situation and identify frustration and problem areas. Several unnecessary and avoidable process steps are detected. Measures to improve the process are stated and a to-be process is created. In order to generate this to-be process, the as-is process is restructured in an effective and efficient way. Furthermore, tools that assist in the process are proposed. Input, output and responsibilities are clearly set for the to-be process. This thesis helped the case company to reduce the cycle time of the outsourcing process. This allowed the firm to act more flexibly and reduce costs. The findings can help to prevent the failure of engineering outsourcing initiatives.