Quite a lot of businesses have engaged in outsourcing IT talent to finish tasks like cybersecurity and preparing big data in order to save costs on internal salaries and give current employees freedom to complete other assignment in the midst of a tech talent gap.

Statista revealed that the overall outsourcing market was $88.9 billion in the year 2017, and it is set to hold stable in 2018, especially for healthcare, energy, and business services.

Here are six predictions for business and IT outsourcing in 2018.

1. Quest for Soft Skills will Increase

Despite the fact that hard IT skills will keep on to be in demand, the demand for soft skills will also increase in 2018. These consist of leadership, teamwork, and communication, which all add to the achievement of IT projects.

There will be no place to hide in the lean surroundings of upcoming engagements. Developers must be ready to wholly get all the soft and hard skills, required to vie in the future marketplace.

2. The Customary Captive Centers will Reduce

Because disparity in labor costs will start vanishing and global companies are unable to offer salary increases and career development to the employees, which leads to low productivity and high turnover, businesses can expect captive centers to reduce in number.

As a substitute, businesses should engage an outsourcing partnership in form of a joint venture with a current IT offshore company, or a partnership with further control on delivery choices.

3. Companies will pay more attention on value and focus less on cost

Despite the fact that a good number of companies outsource IT talent owing to costs, they are paying more attention on the value of services offered by these businesses. The consumers of nowadays are highly knowledgeable and fully conscious of the failures linked with outsourcing.

This and the need to provide timely IT solutions will boost the need to offer better value to the customers, with intelligibility. Although companies will need to expense more on high-quality service providers, but will see the results and value of doing so.

4. Partnerships will turn out to be more important

Business looking for technical support abroad because of lack of budget or skills need to get a partner who can understand their present needs and look forward to what they might need to meet their business goals in the future.

This will require the partner to engage workforce with technical skills, act in a transparent manner and labor with the company to accomplish the goals of the business—something that was not well thought-out in the past.

5. There will be an increase in the growth of emerging tech

Businesses will engage outsourcing providers to find a scalable key to building development teams with in-demand skill sets, as they look to implement technologies like the Internet of Things (IoT) and blockchain. This will make skilled developers to grow.

6. The IT skill shortage will intensify

Demand for experienced IT workers will keep increasing in 2018 while more businesses become driven by technology—making companies turn to outsourcing IT roles. This will lead to high demand for key skills such as Microsoft software, open source, and mobile development skills from outsourcers.

Daven Michaels is a New York Times Best Selling Author and CEO of premiere global outsourcing company, 123Employee. The company employs hundreds of young bright individuals on three continents. His International event, Beyond Marketing Live! inspires entrepreneurs build & grow their business with revolutionary new theories and systems allowing them to design the business and personal lifestyle of their dreams.