Outsourcing blues . Review on World is Flat, The - Thomas Friedman

I read this book purely for the hype surrounded Thomas Friedman and his lingo. I saw an interview on NDTV and was intrigued by this New York Times columnist’s use of lingo. He uses terms like globalization 1.0 and globalization 2.0 etc to get your attention. The book is basically from the American perspective about the outsourcing phenomenon. As to why it is happening, what is the history behind it, what will be the impact of it, and are the Americans prepared for it. And because outsourcing is in the picture India has to come in the picture. In fact the book starts with quotes from Infosys’s CEO. He starts out with scenes from Indian call centers and software parks, where thousands of young people were working. For us Indians the book was not much of an insight of the Indian software scene, but it was more of peek in the mind of Americans, their fears and the reason for the high alert. It was noted that this is not the first time that the jobs are being shifted from America. It has happened before in the 80s when the Japanese companies started their quality production. The second exodus was when Chinese factories shifted the mass production to their country. But these were not so severely criticized as the current exodus because in each of the earlier cases it was the factory worker’s job that was outsourced. But now with services being able to be outsourced, it was a white collar worker’s job at stake. Now the American middle class, the lifeline of that country is at stake. This caused much anguish and hence was one of the main issues for the US presidential elections. The book basically tries to calm the fears of the public by telling them what exactly is happening there. He also tries to tell them that whenever this has happened before it has been better for the Americans as better jobs have come their way. But he also warns them that they would have to cope with change and increase their skill set to move up the value chain. Well I found nothing new in the book that I hadn’t already read somewhere or already deduced from the scenario, but the book’s lingo was the most striking part of the book. Making it easy and interesting to read it. Otherwise not much for us here.