Boundary spanners and client vendor relationships in IT outsourcing

Abstract

Information technology (IT) outsourcing is one of the key contexts in management in which inter-organizational relationships are studied. Since in an IT outsourcing situation, the client and vendor organizations come together with the stated purpose of creating something new within the dynamics of a business relationship, a social capital perspective of the client-vendor relationship is quite appropriate for the study of the inter-organizational relationship in IT outsourcing. The social capital perspective provides for an examination of the structural, cognitive, and relational aspects of the client-vendor relationship and its effect on the knowledge exchange and outcomes of IT outsourcing. Between the client and vendor organizations, boundary spanners function as exchange agents and are responsible for information exchange and knowledge creation. This study attempts to understand the role of these boundary spanners in creating social capital in client-vendor relationships in IT outsourcing. In this study, the behavioral exchange of the boundary spanner in an organization with their counterparts in the other organization is analyzed from a social capital perspective. Using a case study approach, the roles, the relationship, and the outcomes of IT outsourcing arrangements in ten organizations are being examined to identify the structural, cognitive, and relational aspects of their exchange with their counterparts.