Journal of Management Research

Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Subscription Access
Open Access Open Access Open Access  Restricted Access Restricted Access Subscription Access

Control of Business Process Outsourcing Relationships


Affiliations
1 BLS Institute of Management Ghaziabad - 201007, India
2 University School of Management Studies GGS Indraprastha University, Delhi - 110006, India
3 Wipro BPO Philippines Ltd. Inc. Cebu City, Philippines 6000, India
     

   Subscribe/Renew Journal


The better service levels and cost-savings have made business process outsourcing (BPO) one of the fastest-growing business practices. The greatest challenge of BPO is of control. Managers are accustomed to having direct control over the resources to deliver the results for which they are accountable. With BPO, these controls are in the hands of the provider. How the control issue is handled can mean the difference between adequate results and high performing outsourcing that delivers beyond expectations. This paper explores how control modes are implemented during business process outsourcing relationships and investigates why stakeholders implement particular combinations of control modes.
User
Notifications

  • Aron, R., Clemons, E. and Reddi, S. (2005), Just Right Outsourcing: Understanding and Managing Risk, Journal of Management Information Systems, 22(2): 37-55.

  • Boland, R. J., Jr. (1979), Control, Causality and Information Systems Requirements, Accounting, Organizations and Society, 4(4): 259-272.

  • Choudhury and Sabherwal (2003), Portfolios of Control in Outsourced Software Development Projects, Information Systems Research, 14(3): 291314

  • Clark, T. D., Jr., Zmud, R. W. and McCray, G. E. (1995), The Outsourcing of Information Services: Transforming the Nature of Business in the Information Industry, Journal of Information Technology, 10: 221-237.

  • Coase, R. H. (1937), The Nature of the Firm, Economica, 4(November): 386-405.

  • Dataquest Gartner 2004, available at www.gartner.com

  • Dibbern, J., Goles, T., Hirschheim, R. and Jayatilaka, B. (2004), Information Systems Outsourcing: A Survey and Analysis of the Literature, The DATA BASE for Advances in Information Systems, 35(4).

  • Eisenhardt, K. M. (1989c), Building Theories from Case Study Research, Academic Management Review, 14(4).

  • Eisenhardt, K. M. (1985), Control: Organizational and Economic Approaches, Management Science, 31(2): 134-149.

  • Flamholtz, E. G. (1983), Accounting, Budgeting and Control Systems in their Organizational Context: Theoretical and Empirical Perspectives, Accounting, Organizations and Society, 8: 153-169.

  • Gartner (2004), Gartner Says Offshore BPO Industry to Grow 65 Per Cent in 2004, press release dated May 18, 2004, http://www.gartner.com/press release/asset 79327 11.html

  • Gewald, H., Wüllenweber, K. and Weitzel, T. (2006), The Influence of Perceived Risks on Banking Managers Intention to Outsource Business Processes - A Study of the German Banking and finance Industry, Journal of Electronic Commerce Research, 7(2): 78-96.

  • Glaser, B. and Strauss, A. (1967), The Discovery of Grounded Theory, Aldine, Chicago.

  • Green, S. G. and Welsh, M. A. (1988), Cybernetics and Dependence: Re-framing the control concept, Acad. Management Rev., 13(2): 287-301.

  • Heiskanen, A., Newman, M. and Simila, J. (1996), Software Contracting: A Process Modeling Approach, Proc. Internat. Conf. Inform. Systems.

  • Henderson, J. C. and Lee, S. (1992), Managing I/S Design Teams: A Control Theories Perspective, Management Science, 38(6): 757-777.

  • Hyder, Kumar, Mahendra, Seigel, Heston, Gupta, Mahaboob and Subramanium (2002), E-Sourcing Capability Model for IT Enabled Service Providers, School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University.

  • Jaworski, B. J. (1988), Toward a Theory of Marketing Control: Environmental Context, Control Types, and Consequences, J. Marketing, 52: 2339.

  • Jaworski, B. J., Stathakopoulos, V. and Krishnan, H. S. (1993), Control Combinations in Marketing: Conceptual Framework and Empirical Evidence, J. Marketing 57(1): 5769.

  • Kim, J. S. (1984), Effect of Behavior Plus Outcome Goal Setting and Feedback on Employee Satisfaction and Performance. Acad. Management J., 27: 139149.

  • Kirsch, L. J. (1996), The Management of Complex Tasks in Organizations: Controlling the Systems Development Process. Organ. Sci. 7(1): 121.

  • Kirsch, L. J. (1997), Portfolios of control modes and IS Project Management, Inform. Systems Res., 8(3): 215239.

  • Levina, N. and Ross, J. (2003), From the Vendors Perspective: Exploring the Value Proposition in IT Outsourcing, MIS Quarterly, 27(3): 331- 364.

  • Linder, J. and Sawyer, J. (2003), Control: Getting it and Keeping it in Business Process Outsourcing, Journal of Applied Corporate Finance, 15(4): 72-80.

  • Merchant, K. A. (1988), Progressing Toward a Theory of Marketing Control: A Comment, J. Marketing, 50(July): 40-44.

  • Michell, V. and Fitzgerald, G. (1997), The IT Outsourcing Market-Place: Vendors and their Selection, Journal of Information Technology, 12: 223-237.

  • Newman, M. and Robey, D. (1992), A Social Process Model of Useranalyst Relationships, MIS Quart. 16(2): 249266.

  • Niranjan, T. T., Saxena, K. B. C. and Bharadwaj, S. (2007), Process-oriented Taxonomy of BPOs: An Exploratory Study, Business Process Management Journal, 13(4).

  • Orlikowski, W. J. (1991), Integrated Information Environment or Matrix of Control? The Contradictory Implications of Information Technology, Accounting, Management and Information Technologies, 1(1): 9-42.

  • Ouchi, W. G. (1979), A Conceptual Framework for the Design of Organizational Control Mechanisms, Management Science, 25(9): 833-848.

  • Ouchi, W. G. (1980), Markets, Bureaucracies and Clans, Admin. Sci. Quarterly, 25(1): 129-141.

  • Rouse, Anne C. and Corbitt, Brian J. (2004), Business Process Outsourcing: Promises, ABIE Source (Annual), pp. 86-87.

  • Schein, E. H. (1987), Organizational Culture and Leadership, Jossy-Bass Publishers, San Fransisco, CA.

  • Simonson, E. (2002), What Is Driving the Growth of BPO? The Emergence of Transaction Engines, BPO Outsourcing Journal, December 2002.

  • http://www.bpo-outsourcing-journal. com/issues/dec2002/everest.html. Accessed on July 07, 2005

  • Snell, S.A. (1992), Control Theory in Strategic Human Resource Management: The Mediating Effect of Administrative Information, Acad. Management Journal, 35(2): 292-327

  • Sovie, D. and Hanson, J. (2001), The xSP Revolution, Round 2: Separating Winners From Losers, Mercer Management Consulting.

  • http://www.mercermc.com/Perspectives/WhitePapers/Commentaries/Comm01ASP.pdf

  • Tannenbaum, A. (Ed) (1968), Control in Organizations, McGraw-Hill, New York.

  • Van Maanen, J. (1988), Tales of the Field: On Writing Ethnography, University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

  • Whitaker, J., Bardhan, I. R. and Mithas, S. (2006), Antecedents of Business Process Outsourcing in Manufacturing Plants, Proceedings of the 39th Annual Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences,Volume 08, 168.1

  • Willcocks, L. P. and Kern, T. (1998), IT Outsourcing as Strategic Partnering: The Case of the UK Inland Revenue, European Journal of Information Systems, 7(1): 29-45.

  • Yin, R. K. (1984), Case Study Research: Design and Methods, p. 160, Sage Publications, Beverly Hills, CA.

  • Zmud, R. and Boynton, A. (1991), Survey Measures and Instruments in MIS: Inventory and Appraisal, in K. L. Kraemer (Ed.),

  • The Information Systems Research Challenge: Survey Research Methods, Vol. 3, Harvard Business School Press, Cambridge, MA. 1991.


Abstract Views: 416

PDF Views: 1




  • Control of Business Process Outsourcing Relationships

Abstract Views: 416  |  PDF Views: 1

Authors

Aparna Daityari
BLS Institute of Management Ghaziabad - 201007, India
A. K. Saini
University School of Management Studies GGS Indraprastha University, Delhi - 110006, India
Romit Gupta
Wipro BPO Philippines Ltd. Inc. Cebu City, Philippines 6000, India

Abstract


The better service levels and cost-savings have made business process outsourcing (BPO) one of the fastest-growing business practices. The greatest challenge of BPO is of control. Managers are accustomed to having direct control over the resources to deliver the results for which they are accountable. With BPO, these controls are in the hands of the provider. How the control issue is handled can mean the difference between adequate results and high performing outsourcing that delivers beyond expectations. This paper explores how control modes are implemented during business process outsourcing relationships and investigates why stakeholders implement particular combinations of control modes.

References