Outsourcing Scope Statement
This is a practical guide to building a scope statement for an outsourcing project — a definition of deliverables, boundaries and acceptance criteria, adapted to the realities of outsourcing a function to an external provider.
What a Scope Statement is
A scope statement is a definition of deliverables, boundaries and acceptance criteria. For the full concept and how it works in general, see Scope Statement. On an outsourcing project it plays the same role, tuned to this kind of work.
Why it matters for an Outsourcing project
Outsourcing projects live or die on outsourcing a function to an external provider. A well-built scope statement gives the team a shared, explicit reference for exactly that — reducing ambiguity, aligning stakeholders, and making problems visible early enough to act. Skipping it, or doing it generically, is how outsourcing projects drift into avoidable delay and cost.
What to include
- Deliverables
- In scope
- Explicitly out of scope
- Acceptance criteria
- Constraints and assumptions
Outsourcing-specific considerations
Tailor the scope statement to the risks that most often derail outsourcing projects:
- Knowledge transfer
- Service-level definition
- People impact
Example
On a real outsourcing project, the scope statement would be shaped by outsourcing a function to an external provider. In particular, it should explicitly account for the project’s biggest risks — knowledge transfer, service-level definition, people impact — rather than treating them as afterthoughts.