In March 2017, telecommunications giant AT&T Inc. agreed to add about 3,000 jobs to its American call center workforce. Rather than continue with its pattern of offshoring those jobs to Mexico and slimming its workforce at home, AT&T is beginning to bring those jobs back.
It isn’t alone. Verizon Communications Inc., an AT&T competitor, recently ended its contract in the Philippines with roughly 1,500 workers, while the company is adding about 1,000 jobs to the U.S. workforce.
Although companies are reducing their offshoring tendencies overseas, they’re continuing to outsource certain jobs domestically.
Some firms, for instance, may exert caution in which jobs they opt to bring back and the pace at which they do so. When reshoring IT jobs, in particular, there might be challenges in filling those roles because skills shortages in the technology sector have companies in a bind.
“There isn’t enough in the U.S. to absorb all of that work coming back straight away,” said Peter Bendor-Samuel, founder and CEO of Everest Group, a boutique research and management consulting company based in Dallas.
