The complementary and substitutional effects of forced and emergent mechanisms in multisourcing

Abstract

This paper examines the effect of forced and emergent competition- and cooperation-enhancing mechanisms on joint multisourcing performance. We draw on research on coopetition in IS multisourcing and the literature on the crowding-out effect to theorise the interplay between these mechanisms. We argue that the key to understanding whether these mechanisms complement or substitute each other lies in the distinction between forced and emergent mechanisms, as these respectively invoke either an economic or a social logic among vendors.We test these ideas through a survey study of 108 multisourcing arrangements. Our results show that while a forced competition and an emergent cooperation mechanism can individually improve joint performance inmultisourcing, the co-existence of economic and social logics results in a substitutional effect.A complementaryeffect is achieved when competition andcooperation mechanisms are of the same logic. Our study extends the existing IS outsourcingliterature by shedding light on the role of forced andemergent mechanisms, either as competition or cooperation-enhancing, in enhancingmultisourcingperformance.