Lots of news organizations run themselves dizzy in the endless chase to define the latest zeitgeist-making trend — that elusive something-or-other that defines the current moment, the right now. But recently the trend-watchers at CNN have taken the approach one step further with an ongoing series dubbed “Welcome to the future.” In other words, now is the new yesterday. Tomorrow is the new now.
In recent days, CNN’s crystal ball-monitoring reporters have turned their attention to the business world. Yesterday, on CNN’s American Morning, anchor Miles S. O’Brien presented a “Welcome to the Future” dispatch honing in on a developing trend in the global job market.
“Right now, U.S. companies employ somewhere between one million and two million service workers offshore,” reported O’Brien. “Another three-and-a-half million overseas jobs to be added in the next 10 years. But they may be overlooking a homegrown option.”
What homegrown option might the future hold for U.S. companies looking for an inexpensive source of well-educated, tech-savvy employees?
Look no further, reports CNN, than rural America. According to CNN, in the future, U.S. companies may start outsourcing jobs to places like, say, the outskirts of Bangor, Maine.
That’s a somewhat revolutionary vision of the future of industry. And, one that CNN succeeds at backing up with a single source — an expert named Kathy Brittain White.
“White says many companies that employ offshore workers find they don’t save as much as they hoped,” reported O’Brien. “The overhead is high and what’s more their customers are often dissatisfied. … [She] says there is a wealth of untapped IT knowledge right here at home.”
“I think the lure of the big city isn’t quite what it used to be,” said White.
So who is White?
CNN notes only that she is the founder of a company called Rural Sourcing — which apparently locates and hires technology buffs who happen to live outside of American cities. How many pastoral American IT workers does this trend-setting company employ? CNN never reports any details about the company or its size — and for good reason.
According to an article in the September 2005 issue of Southwest Airlines Spirit magazine (in-flight magazine for Southwest Airlines), Rural Sourcing is a North Carolina-based company founded by White in 2003. “White has big plans,” reported the piece. “She hopes to have more than 100 employees in three years.”
To review the math: Sometime around 2008, one U.S. company could have 100 rural tech experts working for American companies. In the meantime, places like India and China will probably have a few million.
All of which, apparently adds up to a newsworthy trend piece about the reversal of overseas outsourcing.
Welcome to CNN’s future. Welcome to fantasyland.
Felix Gillette writes about the media for The New York Observer.