To Co-locate or Not to Co-locate

There has been a second argument pushed forward by IT leaders to the H1B Visa shortage: If you can not increase levels of visas so that we can bring in workers qualified to help move us forward, then we will find ways to distribute the work to the workers’ homelands. From a Homeland Security position, the Bush administration has the champagne (real imported stuff, no domestic trash for them) popping as yet another victory in their triumphant march towards homogeneity. However, what they are missing was the industries conclusion, and indeed their actions. Once we are successful at distributing work, we can do so continuously until no work really resides in the US.

There are many companies that pride themselves for accepting 1 in 100 applicants (or even higher ratios). Most companies no longer will pay for relocation and so they cast local nets. The 1 they hire may be the best of the 100 resumes they got, but consider the difference between that company and the one that casts a global net and picks the 1 best candidate and can actually integrate them productively without moving them. Which company will have a better team?

True in an agile environment (and any other), productivity is significantly better when the team is co-located. However, now is our time to examine as to whether I can, at a lower overall cost, have a better team working in a distributed way with a lower productivity but still be more cost effective than someone else’s team that is collocated in the US.