No abstract

No abstract

No abstract

Despite the importance of knowledge transfer for the success of offshore information systems (IS) outsourcing, only limited research has been conducted to date. This research investigates knowledge transfer to vendors from their client, in terms of learning from client and learning about client. More specifically, it examines the effects of client support and vendors’ learning mechanisms on knowledge transfer, along with the impact of knowledge transfer on performance. Results show that client support is important for both types of knowledge transfer. In addition, it is the deliberate cognitive learning rather than the relative passive learning of interaction experience that promotes knowledge transfer significantly. Furthermore, whereas learning about client has a positive impact on vendors’ cost control, learning from client contributes to project quality if a vendor maintains a high level of interaction experience with the client.

A buyer-supplier new product development (NPD) project is an ambiguous and complex transaction, making neither formal contracts nor a collaborative relationship sufficient to ensure project success. NPD project performance could also be directly influenced by the transactional psychological contracts (TPCs) of project members due to their strong motivational effect. Adopting a dyadic view, we explore the performance implications of buyer-supplier TPCs (in)congruence using a matched, dyadic survey dataset from 279 NPD projects. We find that levels of congruence (congruent vs. incongruent), types of congruence (high-high vs. low-low), and directions of incongruence (buyer-higher vs. supplier-higher) all affect project performance. Challenging the conventional wisdom that buyer-supplier congruence is generally productive, we find that congruence in TPCs, a generally undesirable type of PC, lowers product quality in NPD projects. This is because congruence in TPCs locks project members in the status quo by creating psychological balance and removing healthy conflicts, which prevents a team from balancing between exploration and exploitation. The combination of buyer-lower, supplier-higher TPCs incongruence is most effective for improving both product quality and development efficiency. These results remind NPD project managers that buyer and supplier TPCs can interact to jointly affect project outcomes beyond individual influences of each party's TPC.