Hi Roxanne:
What a cool posting!
Much of what you describe is already the reality of a small-firm
consultant. In these sorts of firms, consultants tend to organize
themselves around projects and not into fixed groups with fixed
supervision. These firms also tend to be aggressive at the use of
external resources for specialized, non-core functions. It's my belief
that these firms already know the value of external resourcing, given that
clients see them in the same way.
You might want to have a look at Jeremy Rifkin's "The End of Work" for
another perspective on job shifts, and some interesting recommendations on
changing society's structure.
What I find interesting is that the predictions of 'virtual organizations'
have really not become evident, at least to me. The theory was that we
would see more evidence of groups of people coming together to solve
client needs, or produce products, and then go away. It's been my
experience that clients have still wanted to see a known, established firm
leading an initiative for them -- even if there are contracted specialists
as part of the team. It seems there are still strong, understandable
desires for continuity.
Again, thanks for kicking off an interesting thread.
--"Jason Smith" <jsmith@quantumsolutions.on.ca>
Learning-org -- Hosted by Rick Karash <rkarash@karash.com> Public Dialog on Learning Organizations -- <http://www.learning-org.com>