Track: Engineering Management

Abstract

A firm must be willing to consider offshoring engineering labor to reduce costs and accelerate development to compete in the electric vehicle (EV) market. Currently, there is some information available regarding guidance and factors to consider when managing offshored technical services, however the guidance is written at a high-level and is not applied specifically to a design engineering department.  It may be difficult for a firm to discern what guidelines are applicable to their industry, and whether it correlates to their engineering department.

This paper details the creation and implementation of a research instrument used to identify stakeholder needs in new offshoring programs, as well as identify performance gaps in existing offshoring utilization.  The research instrument design is based on the SERVQUAL methodology and leverages existing offshoring guidelines and considerations, which are aligned to the McKinsey 7-S categories. This tool was applied to an existing EV firm’s engineering department and highlights specific offshoring performance gaps that can be addressed by the department.  These gaps were centered around specific facets of organizational strategy, structure, and values.