استفاده از قواعد تصمیم گیری در برون سپاری دولتی

The paper reports research on the nature of use of rules in decision making process by government entities in outsourcing commercial activities. The study used multiple data sources such as in-depth personal interviews of multiple categories of respondents, documentary evidence, and observation. The findings indicated that Government organizations use un-written ground rules as the main means of managing outsourcing processes.

This paper addresses issues related to use of rules in decision making for outsourcing by Government entities in a not for profit context. Kardasis and Loucopoulos (2005) argue “all the rules that are applied consciously or subconsciously within an organization are hidden behind the rationale of the various enterprise structures and ways of working, and behind the decision paths that have been and are being taken at the various enterprise development stages” (p.329). The theoretical framework of the study is primarily derived from industrial marketing and more precisely, the buying center concept (Johnston and Lewin, 1996 and Wind, 1967a). This paper particularly focuses on the subset of organizational buying behavior literature that deals with (a) decision making — use of rules, formal, informal etc., (b) government outsourcing, and (c) outsourcing in a not-for-profit-context. The paper investigates the nature of use of formal and informal rules in the decision making process of Government entities in awarding outsourcing contracts. Within the broad context of Government outsourcing, the particular aspect that is addressed is procurement against foreign aid funded projects. In the organizational buying literature, a buying center is described as an “informal, cross-departmental decision unit” in which the primary objectives are the acquisition, importation, and processing of relevant purchasing related information (Spekman & Stern, 1979, p.56). While buying centers in for-profit organizations usually comprise participants from the buying firms, the buying centers of Government entities include participants from both in and outside the entity. The structure of the remainder of this paper is as follows. First, a brief review of the current literature is presented. This section focuses on role of rules in Government outsourcing, variance in application of rules in Government outsourcing and the consequence of inability to fully specify rules. Thereafter the research design is outlined followed by data analysis and implications of this research. The paper ends with conclusion.

The study identified that the outsourcing decision-making mechanism in Government entities is rule dependent. More emphasis is found to be placed on doing things to “just comply” to rules rather than doing things to achieve an overall satisfactory outcome. The nature of use of these rules, however, varies significantly between decision makers. It has also been found that although formal rules play a vital role in Government entities outsourcing process, the implementation process is heavily influenced by hierarchical downward flow of instructions. Therefore, use of unwritten ground rules (UGR) around the applicable written rules in Government entities' outsourcing process is evident. While the variance of the nature of instructions in different Government entities for similar situations to solve outsourcing related problems are common, varying level of instructions were found to have used by the decision makers even in the same Government entities. This erratic nature of UGRs necessitates a very close look at each of the decision chain by the prospective suppliers in order to address their respective business opportunities. The findings are consistent with other studies such as Jackman (2004) who argues practitioners making decisions make legal compliance interpretation of rules by themselves when answers are not sufficiently clear on situations that they are dealing with. However, using UGR leaves the risk of defeating the spirit of the law (Edwards & Wolfe, 2005). The study indicates a need for industrial marketers that supply goods and services to Government entities to be not only familiar with the rules applicable but also to the UGR's in dealing with respective Government entities.