Offshore Communication

Communication is a critical point for a successful offshore arrangement. Our TCL COMS (Consultancy led Offshore Managed Service) is built around our understanding of this. But beware, communication can be difficult, even amongst people of our own nationality and culture. Speaking from personal experience, there is a huge between speaking to someone with a broad Scottish, Geordie or Wiltshire accent, when compared to someone speaking “The Queens English”. I mean no offence to any of the above, but accents are hard to deal with face to face and even harder when a telephone is used to handle the communication.

When dealing with other nationalities, where English is not the first language, the problems are amplified and whilst there are some foreigners who speak English perfectly the chances of finding such people becomes more difficult.

What we have found is that when people from other countries come and work for extended periods in the UK, their language skills naturally increase. As a result of this TCL India look to deploy resources locally, that have a long exposure to the UK, it’s people, their idiosyncrasies and the colloquialisms they use. These resources become highly useful, because not only can they communicate with us, they can also communicate with those offshore, utilising combinations of their own language and English. This provides an excellent conduit for communication, but it cannot be relied upon as the sole answer to the problem.

Written communication is far easier and less liable to be misunderstood than verbal, if interacting directly with an offshore capability. E-mail can be used and tools such as MSN Messenger if a more conversational approach is required.

Video Conferencing offers an ability to see as well as hear, but whilst it is great to see the faces of those you are talking to, there are inherent problems. Not only are you dealing with accents, but you have a time lapse and perhaps poor image quality, all of which is tending to distract you. There is also the potential lack of visual and audio synchronisation that your brain will be trying to cope with. It is suggested that if video conferencing is to be used, it does not occur at the beginning of the relationship and that time is taken to become accustomed to the experience.

In all offshore communication, look for feedback to demonstrate understanding. Query their understanding of the requests and make sure that theirs is the same as yours. Controversially perhaps, for the offshore element of a relationship, use the same techniques back at the client. Make sure that your grasp is right. Make sure that they have understood your communication. Whilst this is written very much from a UK perspective, the rules apply the world over.

Beware of getting back exactly what you have asked for and not what you wanted. Be careful in your communication. You could be taken literally.