IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/infotm/v18y2017i4d10.1007_s10799-016-0265-5.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Determinants of contract completeness for information technology outsourcing

Author

Listed:
  • Benoit A. Aubert

    (Victoria University of Wellington)

  • Jean Francois Houde

    (University of Pennsylvania)

  • Suzanne Rivard

    (HEC Montreal)

  • Michel Patry

    (HEC Montreal)

Abstract

This study developed and tested a model of the determinants of completeness of IT outsourcing contracts. The model is based on the assumption that the level of contract completeness results from a trade-off between the cost of developing a complete contract and the protection it offers. In contrast with outsourcing in many other sectors, IT outsourcing can be a temporary measure, with the anticipation that activities can be reintegrated in-house. This means that managers have to take into account the time horizon when deciding on the level of completeness of the contract. Results show that firms rely on more complete contracts when outsourcing is seen as a permanent approach. Also, transaction cost theory variables play multiple roles. Uncertainty reduces the level of completeness, while idiosyncrasy reduces partly the use of permanent outsourcing. Demand predictability, representing frequency, plays a dual role, increasing completeness but reducing the likelihood that outsourcing is used as a permanent solution.

Suggested Citation

  • Benoit A. Aubert & Jean Francois Houde & Suzanne Rivard & Michel Patry, 2017. "Determinants of contract completeness for information technology outsourcing," Information Technology and Management, Springer, vol. 18(4), pages 277-292, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:infotm:v:18:y:2017:i:4:d:10.1007_s10799-016-0265-5
    DOI: 10.1007/s10799-016-0265-5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s10799-016-0265-5
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s10799-016-0265-5?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Alchian, Armen A & Demsetz, Harold, 1972. "Production , Information Costs, and Economic Organization," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 62(5), pages 777-795, December.
    2. Shannon W. Anderson & Henri C. Dekker, 2005. "Management Control for Market Transactions: The Relation Between Transaction Characteristics, Incomplete Contract Design, and Subsequent Performance," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 51(12), pages 1734-1752, December.
    3. Deepa Mani & Anitesh Barua & Andrew B. Whinston, 2013. "Outsourcing Contracts and Equity Prices," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 24(4), pages 1028-1049, December.
    4. Anandasivam Gopal & Konduru Sivaramakrishnan & M. S. Krishnan & Tridas Mukhopadhyay, 2003. "Contracts in Offshore Software Development: An Empirical Analysis," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 49(12), pages 1671-1683, December.
    5. Joskow, Paul L, 1985. "Vertical Integration and Long-term Contracts: The Case of Coal-burning Electric Generating Plants," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 33-80, Spring.
    6. Macher, Jeffrey T. & Richman, Barak D., 2008. "Transaction Cost Economics: An Assessment of Empirical Research in the Social Sciences," Business and Politics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 10(1), pages 1-63, April.
    7. Macher Jeffrey T & Richman Barak D, 2008. "Transaction Cost Economics: An Assessment of Empirical Research in the Social Sciences," Business and Politics, De Gruyter, vol. 10(1), pages 1-65, May.
    8. Carol A. Dahl & Thomas K. Matson, 1998. "Evolution of the U.S. Natural Gas Industry in Response to Changes in Transaction Costs," Land Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 74(3), pages 390-408.
    9. Carlton, Dennis W, 1979. "Vertical Integration in Competitive Markets under Uncertainty," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 27(3), pages 189-209, March.
    10. Joskow, Paul L, 1987. "Contract Duration and Relationship-Specific Investments: Empirical Evidence from Coal Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 77(1), pages 168-185, March.
    11. Jérôme Barthélemy & Bertrand V. Quélin, 2006. "Complexity of Outsourcing Contracts and Ex Post Transaction Costs: An Empirical Investigation," Journal of Management Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 43(8), pages 1775-1797, December.
    12. Anjana Susarla & Ramanath Subramanyam & Prasanna Karhade, 2010. "Contractual Provisions to Mitigate Holdup: Evidence from Information Technology Outsourcing," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 21(1), pages 37-55, March.
    13. Shirish C. Srivastava & Thompson S.H. Teo, 2012. "Contract Performance in Offshore Systems Development: Role of Control Mechanisms," Post-Print hal-00731015, HAL.
    14. Michael J. Leiblein & Douglas J. Miller, 2003. "An empirical examination of transaction‐ and firm‐level influences on the vertical boundaries of the firm," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 24(9), pages 839-859, September.
    15. David E. M. Sappington, 1991. "Incentives in Principal-Agent Relationships," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 5(2), pages 45-66, Spring.
    16. Nicholas S. Argyres & Janet Bercovitz & Kyle J. Mayer, 2007. "Complementarity and Evolution of Contractual Provisions: An Empirical Study of IT Services Contracts," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 18(1), pages 3-19, February.
    17. S. Balaji & Carol V. Brown, 2014. "Lateral Coordination Mechanisms and the Moderating Role of Arrangement Characteristics in Information Systems Development Outsourcing," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 25(4), pages 747-760, December.
    18. Shirish C. Srivastava, 2012. "Contract Performance in Offshore Systems Development: Role of Control Mechanisms," Post-Print hal-00714482, HAL.
    19. Saussier, Stephane, 2000. "Transaction costs and contractual incompleteness: the case of Electricite de France," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 42(2), pages 189-206, June.
    20. Robert J. David & Shin‐Kap Han, 2004. "A systematic assessment of the empirical support for transaction cost economics," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(1), pages 39-58, January.
    21. Yuanyuan Chen & Anandhi Bharadwaj, 2009. "An Empirical Analysis of Contract Structures in IT Outsourcing," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 20(4), pages 484-506, December.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mohammed Musa Bayero, 2023. "IT Infrastructure, Knowledge Management and Firm Competitiveness: Exploring Mediating Role of IT Outsourcing in Nigeria," International Journal of Global Business and Competitiveness, Springer, vol. 18(1), pages 43-58, June.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Benoit A. Aubert & Jean Francois Houde & Suzanne Rivard & Michel Patry, 0. "Determinants of contract completeness for information technology outsourcing," Information Technology and Management, Springer, vol. 0, pages 1-16.
    2. Robert Gibbons, 2010. "Transaction‐Cost Economics: Past, Present, and Future?," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 112(2), pages 263-288, June.
    3. Yuanyuan Chen & Anandhi Bharadwaj, 2009. "An Empirical Analysis of Contract Structures in IT Outsourcing," Information Systems Research, INFORMS, vol. 20(4), pages 484-506, December.
    4. Thomas Mellewigt & Glenn Hoetker & Martina Lütkewitte, 2018. "Avoiding High Opportunism Is Easy, Achieving Low Opportunism Is Not: A QCA Study on Curbing Opportunism in Buyer–Supplier Relationships," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 29(6), pages 1208-1208, December.
    5. Cardinale, Roberto, 2019. "The profitability of transnational energy infrastructure: A comparative analysis of the Greenstream and Galsi gas pipelines," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 347-357.
    6. Peter G. Klein, 2010. "Vertical Integration," Chapters, in: Peter G. Klein & Michael E. Sykuta (ed.), The Elgar Companion to Transaction Cost Economics, chapter 17, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    7. Kanishka Kacker, 2016. "Regulation and Contract Design: The Impact of Relationship Specific Investment," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 64(4), pages 656-682, December.
    8. Marco Furlotti, 2007. "There is more to contracts than incompleteness: a review and assessment of empirical research on inter-firm contract design," Journal of Management & Governance, Springer;Accademia Italiana di Economia Aziendale (AIDEA), vol. 11(1), pages 61-99, March.
    9. George Hendrikse & Patrick Hippmann & Josef Windsperger, 2015. "Trust, transaction costs and contractual incompleteness in franchising," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 44(4), pages 867-888, April.
    10. Richard Carter, 2012. "Transaction Cost Empirical Work," Chapters, in: Michael Dietrich & Jackie Krafft (ed.), Handbook on the Economics and Theory of the Firm, chapter 13, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    11. Schneider, Christian O. & Bremen, Philipp & Schönsleben, Paul & Alard, Robert, 2013. "Transaction cost economics in global sourcing: Assessing regional differences and implications for performance," International Journal of Production Economics, Elsevier, vol. 141(1), pages 243-254.
    12. Giorgio Zanarone & Desmond (Ho-Fu) Lo & Tammy L. Madsen, 2016. "The double-edged effect of knowledge acquisition: How contracts safeguard pre-existing resources," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 37(10), pages 2104-2120, October.
    13. Alex Eapen & Rekha Krishnan, 2019. "Transferring Tacit Know-How: Do Opportunism Safeguards Matter for Firm Boundary Decisions?," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 30(4), pages 715-734, July.
    14. Christian Balcells, 2022. "Determinants of firm boundaries and organizational performance: an empirical investigation of the Chilean truck market," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 32(2), pages 423-461, April.
    15. Anjana Susarla & Martin Holzhacker & Ranjani Krishnan, 2020. "Calculative Trust and Interfirm Contracts," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 66(11), pages 5465-5484, November.
    16. Mikko Ketokivi & Joseph T. Mahoney, 2020. "Transaction Cost Economics As a Theory of Supply Chain Efficiency," Production and Operations Management, Production and Operations Management Society, vol. 29(4), pages 1011-1031, April.
    17. Laura Poppo & Kevin Zheng Zhou, 2014. "Managing contracts for fairness in buyer–supplier exchanges," Strategic Management Journal, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 35(10), pages 1508-1527, October.
    18. Aric Rindfleisch, 2020. "Transaction cost theory: past, present and future," AMS Review, Springer;Academy of Marketing Science, vol. 10(1), pages 85-97, June.
    19. Mark Casson & Nigel Wadeson, 2012. "Internationalisation Theory," Chapters, in: Michael Dietrich & Jackie Krafft (ed.), Handbook on the Economics and Theory of the Firm, chapter 15, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    20. Delbufalo, Emanuela, 2021. "Asset specificity and relationship performance: A meta-analysis over three decades," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 134(C), pages 105-121.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:infotm:v:18:y:2017:i:4:d:10.1007_s10799-016-0265-5. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.