Anticipating and considering customers ’ flexibility demands in is outsourcing relationships

Information systems (IS) outsourcing relationships are determined by uncertainties and changing business environments for both client and vendor over a long-term outsourcing lifecycle. Although IS outsourcing arrangements have been widely researched, little attention has been paid to how changing business circumstances and resulting customer demands can be systematically assessed, considered, and integrated in adapted service offerings. In this paper we argue that flexibility and agility are the key to handle uncertainty in IS outsourcing and to achieve a continuous fit in the outsourcing relationship. However, the later clients and vendors identify changing requirements the more expensive it generally becomes to provide the necessary flexibility in outsourcing arrangements. This paper proposes an assessment instrument for a systematic identification of changing customer demands on a business level and resulting flexibility requirements on an IT level that clients and vendors can utilize to structure their discussions in an early phase of an outsourcing relationship. Based on a thorough literature review and a requirements analysis with qualitative expert interviews, relevant dimensions and parameters of customers’ flexibility requirements are derived. These dimensions are involved in the design of the assessment instrument. Managerial implications and directions for future research, especially on the applicability and evaluation of the instrument are discussed

A phenomenological study of the impact of knowledge intensity and environmental velocity on in source or hosted contact centres.

Contact centres exist in order to focus the final step of the intra organisational value chain which then delivers optimalcustomer satisfaction. In this paper we analyse a centre with a view to investigating the impact of outsourcing or the inhouselocus of provision. Such centres exhibit agency/principal characteristics, bringing knowledge management into sharp focus, aspects of information intensity which impact on the organisational dynamics, and the learning of the employees. A phenomenological approach to determine the essence of the activities was deployed rather than a methodological initiative based post positivistic strategic analysis. The characteristics of contact centres investigated coalesce into two distinct categories; a framework to depict this is presented

Global Supply-Chain Strategy And Global Competitiveness

The purpose of this study is to provide an analysis of global supply chain in a broader context that encompasses not only the producing company, but suppliers and customers.  The theme of this study is to identify global sourcing and selling options, to enhance customer service and value added, to optimize inventory performance, to reduce total delivered costs and lead times, to achieve lower break-even costs, and to improve operational flexibility, customization and partner relations.   In this context, an integrated management information system will be viewed as the key instrument that captures all relevant data and makes it available to the appropriate decision-maker and that provides an optimizer and decision-support function supporting various phases of the decision-making process, requiring the identification of cost cutting and value adding strategies.  The properly integrated management information systems will help companies to gain the critical global competitive edge to survive in today's markets.  We suggest various strategies in sourcing, manufacturing/operation, and marketing that can provide a competitive global supply chain strategy for a firm to increase value.  We provide case studies where these strategies have been successful as well as case studies where they have failed.

Sustainable outsourcing: a practice survey and research opportunities

This paper addresses the issue of the sustainability imperative and its influence on outsourcing practice. The research initially finds that there is currently little or no work that explores sustainable or green outsourcing, other than in an information technology context. This lack of research on sustainable outsourcing practice in the industrial organisation sector led to the development of this research study. This exploratory study used a qualitative survey tool to investigate current industrial practice. Manufacturing managers in 57 organisations formed the survey sample. The data were analysed by comparison and clustering of responses of survey participants. This study contributes five key findings that demonstrate current industrial practice which includes: 32% of respondents state that sustainability is not a factor in their outsourcing decision making and 65% of small- and medium-sized enterprises had never heard of the 'triple bottom line' concept. Future research needs are identified and proposed highlighting that urgent development of research is required in outsourcing performance measurement and also in considering sustainability as a new manufacturing competitive priority

Forms of organizing: What is new and why?

This paper aims to further our understanding of new forms of organizing by asking and answering two related questions: What is new in forms of organizing? and Why is it so? It starts by examining the main forces that lead to the emergence and diffusion of new organizational arrangements, distinguishing between objective and subjective factors and pointing out the interplay between the two. Elaborating on these two groups of factors, the paper introduces two dimensions ‹flexibility and openness‹ on which a contingency analysis of new forms of organizing and a classification are built. Flexibility is associated with the question «How fast does the organization as a whole have to learn?», while openness is intended to measure the need for knowledge integration and the location of relevant knowledge. Having outlined the main trends in the development of organizational arrangements, the paper looks at some of the implications. The use of information and communication technologies, knowledge management, changes in human resource practices and social contract, and changes in management roles and careers are all seen as consequences of a new quest for openness and flexibility. All these considerations lead to the conclusion that, nowadays, changes in organizational patterns are radical, calling for a paradigm change that will facilitate, in a holistic manner, the adjustments that are needed in order to build and manage these organizations. Like any paradigm change, this requires a change in the mindset of the agents involved, especially the decision-makers.new forms of organizing; new organizational arrangements;

The Strategic Supply Chain Management in the Digital Era, Tactical vs Strategic

The perspective of procurement and supply chain management is changing dramatically; traditionally, it was seen as a support function; however, the procurement function is receiving increased attention and investment as an essential contributor to the strategic success and a business enabler. While an end-to-end digital supply chain is an opportunity as it unleashes the next level of strategic growth and involves minimal investment in infrastructure, it is still a challenge to optimize and transform. Furthermore, the recent pandemics and geopolitical disruptions of Covid-19, the Ukraine-Russian war, Brexit and the US-China trade war; have structurally changed the global economy and revealed a new risk assessment that will result in the re-introduction of buffers, boundaries across industries and a partial return to regionalization with sort of de-globalization in which existing just-in-time getting replaced by just-in-case strategy

Enterprise information technology organizational flexibility : managing uncertainty and change

Chief Information Officers (CIOs) lead enterprise information technology organizations (EITOs) in today\u27s dynamic competitive business environment. CIOs deal with external and internal environmental changes, changing internal customer needs, and rapidly changing technology. New models for the organization include flexibility and suggest that CIOs should create and manage an enterprise IT organization that is more flexible in order to manage change and prepare for uncertainty, but they do not define what is meant by flexibility. The first objective of this exploratory and ethnographic research study was to understand how uncertainty and unexpected change are currently managed by CIOs. The second was to develop a systematic definition of enterprise IT organizational flexibility, The third was to explore the potential value of a proposed \u27enterprise IT organizational flexibility framework\u27 to be used by CIOs to better manage uncertainty and unexpected change. Rich research data was collected in an exploratory ethnographic study from in-depth interviews with twenty CIOs. These participants included a diverse representation from large to small enterprises, different industries, and with a variety of IT education and functional enterprise experiences. The conclusions from this study included a clearer understanding of the CIO\u27s leadership role when managing uncertainty and unexpected change, a definition of enterprise IT organizational flexibility with three aspects: anticipation, agility, and adaptability, and a framework for enterprise IT organizational flexibility assessment and development

Trends in Commercial-Off-The-Shelf vs. Proprietary Applications

This study examines factors valued by IS managers in deciding if COTS software is a viable alternative to proprietary software. The results indicate managers who anticipate increased usage of COTS packages in 5 years used the same top three factors in the formation of their decisions to adopt COTS as their colleagues who anticipated either zero change in COTS usage or an increased usage of proprietary software used in deciding not to adopt COTS software. Managers anticipating increased COTS usage had a statistically significant higher value for each of those items compared to managers not anticipating growth in COTS software