هماهنگ سازی شیوه های کنترل سازمانی با عملکرد رقابتی برون سپاری

The aim of this article is to present a research model that defines how different outsourcing strategies influence organizational control mechanisms that impact outsourcing outcomes. This research study consists of five case studies, each focusing on a foreign multi-national corporation (MNC) that has outsourcing experience in China. The results of these case studies examine the relationships among outsourcing strategies, organizational control, and outsourcing performance outcomes. In addition, the findings explain how trust competence and in-house knowledge of outsourced tasks have moderating effects between outsourcing strategies and process control. This article provides practical insight into the ways that business executives exercise organizational control in order to achieve effective outsourcing outcomes within China's evolving economic context.

In the current globally networked economy, outsourcing has increasingly become a strategic weapon (Gottfredson et al., 2005 and Kremic et al., 2006). According to Rigby and Bilodeau (2009), the latest trend in outsourcing is clear. These authors have reported that 63% of firms in 2000, 77% of firms in 2006 and 63% of firms in 2008 regarded outsourcing as a primary strategic management tool. On the other hand, the overall level of satisfaction with outsourcing among these firms has remained below 50%. Many firms have adopted outsourcing practices in order to obtain cost efficiencies and strategic competitiveness, yet more than half of the firms are disappointed with their outsourcing outcomes. Such alarming results call for critical examinations of effective outsourcing practices. Previous research has explored the drivers, processes, and outcomes of outsourcing (Hatonen and Eriksson, 2009 and Jiang and Qureshi, 2006), yet this research has provided inconsistent results regarding the effects of outsourcing (Bengtsson et al., 2009 and Leiblein et al., 2002). These results suggest that the contextual differences associated with strategic outsourcing practices, such as “the individual transaction and the contracting environment” (Leiblein et al., 2002, p. 818) as well as firms’ differing specific strategic intentions for outsourcing (Bengtsson et al., 2009), require further investigation. China has undoubtedly become a very attractive FDI destination and the manufacturing center for foreign MNCs. According to the National Bureau of Statistics of China, 63.6% of the total FDI from 1997 to 2007 belonged to the manufacturing sector. Since the mid-1990s, China has successfully attracted foreign direct investment (FDI) from multi-national corporations (MNCs) that focus primarily on offshore manufacturing (Qu & Brocklehurst, 2003). As MNCs continue to locate their manufacturing sites in emerging economies (e.g., China and India), their subsidiaries will naturally continue to engage in extensive outsourcing activities.

The results of this study suggest that different outsourcing strategies require the implementation of different types of organizational control measures in order to obtain desirable outsourcing outcomes. The results of this study also provide useful insight into the ways that MNCs’ subsidiaries may achieve effective outsourcing performance. This study focuses on two types of outsourcing strategies—efficiency-seeking outsourcing and innovation-seeking outsourcing—and emphasizes that different outsourcing strategies necessitate the use of appropriate control mechanisms in view of strategic priority differences. Efficiency-seeking outsourcing primarily adopts formal control, while innovation-seeking outsourcing uses social control and output control in order to achieve desirable outsourcing outcomes. In addition, MNCs’ subsidiaries in China that adopt efficiency-seeking outsourcing use social control to increase their suppliers’ commitment when they perceive potential relational risk. Furthermore, the results of this study suggest that the role of process control tends to diminish over time as outcome-based feedback mechanisms enhance competence trust in suppliers, whereas the in-house knowledge of outsourcers has a positive effect on outsourcing strategies and the use of process control. Thus, effective design of organizational control requires firms to consider carefully Chinese business contexts, the types of outsourcing strategies used, the level of competence trust in suppliers, and their in-house knowledge of outsourcing activities. MNCs’ subsidiaries in China have responded to increasingly dynamic competitive requirements by implementing effective outsourcing strategy practices. Our case studies suggest that MNCs’ subsidiaries in China expect more from their outsourcing suppliers than price competitiveness. Increasingly, the reality of intense competition has required firms to pursue complex outsourcing goals that include efficiency, flexibility, innovativeness, and sustainability. Extending this research framework, future studies may examine diverse outsourcing practices in different industries (e.g., service outsourcing). As firms strive to meet complex product and service requirements in a dynamic global market environment, it is all the more critical to align organizational control practices with competitive outsourcing performance, and thus, future research in this area will be even more valuable.