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Outsourcing

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Full-Text Articles in Business

New Silicon Valleys Or A New Species? Commoditization Of Knowledge Work And The Rise Of Knowledge Services Clusters, Stephan Manning Mar 2013

New Silicon Valleys Or A New Species? Commoditization Of Knowledge Work And The Rise Of Knowledge Services Clusters, Stephan Manning

Stephan Manning

This paper explores knowledge services clusters (KSCs) as a distinct and increasingly important form of geographic cluster, in particular in emerging economies: KSCs are defined as geographic concentrations of lower-cost skills serving global demand for increasingly commoditized knowledge services. Based on prior research on clusters and services offshoring, and data from the Offshoring Research Network (ORN), major properties and contingencies of KSC growth are discussed and compared with both high-tech clusters and low-cost manufacturing clusters. Special emphasis is put on the ambivalent effect of commoditization of knowledge work on KSC growth: It is proposed that KSCs attract most projects if …

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The Sidelining Of Top It Executives In The Governance Of Outsourcing: Antecedents, Power Struggles, And Consequences, Subrata Chakrabarty, Dwayne Whitten Dec 2010

The Sidelining Of Top It Executives In The Governance Of Outsourcing: Antecedents, Power Struggles, And Consequences, Subrata Chakrabarty, Dwayne Whitten

Subrata Chakrabarty

This study attempts to highlight the paradoxical aspects of top management power contests within customer firms that outsource information technology (IT) work. Intraorganizational power theory forms the overarching theoretical basis for this study. The focus is on the antecedents and consequences of the relative power of business executives (Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer, and Chief Operating Officer) versus IT executives (Chief Information Officer, Head of IT) in the governance of IT outsourcing. Evidence from a field survey supports the existence of a paradox. When a firm's financial performance has been poor and the firm did not have a sizeable …

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The Strategic Choice To Continue Outsourcing, Switch Vendors, Or Backsource: Do Switching Costs Matter?, Dwayne Whitten, Subrata Chakrabarty, Robin Wakefield Dec 2009

The Strategic Choice To Continue Outsourcing, Switch Vendors, Or Backsource: Do Switching Costs Matter?, Dwayne Whitten, Subrata Chakrabarty, Robin Wakefield

Subrata Chakrabarty

IT outsourcing contracts are often discontinued in favor of other alternatives (returning to in-house development, or switching to another vendor). Switching costs are experienced when terminating a business relationship and securing an alternative. We tried to answer the question: do switching costs matter significantly in the strategic choice to continue outsourcing, switch vendors, or backsource? Switching costs were considered, such as those due to IT operations (sunk investment, lost performance, system upgrades, uncertainty, and induction-retraining-performance), personnel-replacement costs (candidate search, and IT/setup), and in-house learning (cognitive/behavioral learning). A field survey was conducted, and, for each of these cost types, the differences …

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Capital Mobility And Job Loss: Corporate Restructuring, Production Shifts, And Outsourcing, Stephanie Luce, Kate Bronfenbrenner Oct 2009

Capital Mobility And Job Loss: Corporate Restructuring, Production Shifts, And Outsourcing, Stephanie Luce, Kate Bronfenbrenner

Kate Bronfenbrenner

[Excerpt] This chapter examines the impact of corporate restructuring and global outsourcing on employment in the Commonwealth and the shifts in production from workplaces in Massachusetts to other countries. In particular we focus on global outsourcing, the shifting of work from Massachusetts offshore to countries in Europe and Asia, and nearshore to Canada and countries in Latin America. Given the huge media attention that outsourcing and nearshoring have garnered, and the increasing trend they represent toward corporate restructuring and capital mobility with lasting repercussions for workers, families, unions, and communities in the Commonwealth, it is important to assess their relative …

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Understanding Service Quality And Relationship Quality In Is Outsourcing: Client Orientation & Promotion, Project Management Effectiveness, And The Task-Technology-Structure Fit, Subrata Chakrabarty, Dwayne Whitten, Kenneth W. Green Dec 2007

Understanding Service Quality And Relationship Quality In Is Outsourcing: Client Orientation & Promotion, Project Management Effectiveness, And The Task-Technology-Structure Fit, Subrata Chakrabarty, Dwayne Whitten, Kenneth W. Green

Subrata Chakrabarty

A national survey of firms that participated in outsourcing relationships was conducted, and service quality and relationship quality were found to be significantly and positively related to each other and both had a significant impact on user satisfaction. However, the intricacies of the causal effects between the two autonomous constructs, service quality and relationship quality, are a source of interest. In post-analysis theory building, we give a conceptual model that proposes that the positive causal effect of service quality on relationship quality would be positively moderated by the client orientation and promotion effectiveness of the vendor, while the positive causal …

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