I hope I’m not overreaching too much to suggest that Darwin might well be proud if, some 200 years after his birth, he were to somehow reappear to examine and dissect the evolution of modern outsourcing from its beginnings in the 1990s to what it is becoming today.

That’s because I think of Vested Outsourcing as a paradigm shift – it is both evolutionary and revolutionary. Charles Darwin’s seminal volumes on The Origin of Species and The Descent of Man turned the scientific world on its head regarding the nature of humanity and how we developed over millennia. That was truly revolutionary and perhaps the greatest paradigm shift in history.

In the first chapter of The Origin of Species, Darwin writes: “As far as I am able to judge, after long attending to the subject, the conditions of life appear to act in two ways, — directly on the whole organization or on certain parts alone, and indirectly by affecting the reproductive system.”

Of course he wasn’t thinking about business, economics or outsourcing when he penned those words, but his statement seems highly applicable to me today, especially as we adapt to a flattened world of high technology and instant communication that’s continuously changing and well, evolving.

Finding the right organization, the right structure and activities both inside and outside of your organization is where the interaction of 3PLs, logistics providers and outsourcing enter the fray. And Vested Outsourcing’s focus on collaborative contracting, flexibility, and mutually beneficial outcomes takes those dynamics major steps further along the evolutionary scale of the business of outsourcing.

The essence of the Vested Outsourcing model derives its name from its performance-based, collaborative approach, through which companies and their service providers foster a vested interest in each other’s success.

The reason I believe Vested Outsourcing is evolutionary and revolutionary is clear: Evolutionary in that what LEAN did for manufacturing, changing the business world in 1990, VESTED will do for outsourcing today. And it’s revolutionary because it requires a fundamental change in the way we think and plan about business models, a shift in the ways in which a company that decides to outsource and its service providers do business.

Much as Darwin forced the scientists of his day to think differently about the world its inhabitants and the way it all works together, Vested Outsourcing is a different way of thinking, a different methodology, about the business world and the way we interact with each other. Instead of trying to gain the upper hand and “winning” in every situation, the parties in a Vested Outsourcing relationship develop a performance-based partnership in which the parties’ interests are aligned, and each become vested in each others’ success. I call it the foundation of win-win and What’s in it for We.

From the days when companies took their first hesitant steps in partial outsourcing, the prevalence of outsourcing has grown exponentially; the practice of outsourcing much of a company functions has become commonplace.

But advancements in sophistication have not accompanied that growth, which has been largely reckless.

I really believe Darwin would be proud of those companies that are challenging conventional wisdom. The more I think about him the more I understand how important it is to remind ourselves that only the most adaptable species survive.