Controls as Exit Barriers in Multiperiod Outsourcing Arrangements

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Phua, Yee Shih; Abernethy, Margaret A.; Lillis, Anne M.
• 署名单位: University of New South Wales Sydney; University of Melbourne
• 刊物名称: ACCOUNTING REVIEW
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0001-4826
• DOI: 10.2308/accr-10100
• 发表日期: 2011
• 页码: 1795-1834
• 关键词: TRANSACTION COST ECONOMICS; management control; appropriation concerns; firm boundaries; alliances; trust; COOPERATION; performance; INFORMATION; FUTURE

摘要

This study explores how initial control choice influences the ease with which outsourcing firms switch suppliers. We recognize that firms invest in controls to manage collaborative relationships, and argue that these investments generate switching costs, namely, opportunity and reinvestment costs. We collect data on outsourcing transactions by conducting semi-structured interviews across multiple field sites. Observed patterns across 53 cases show that firms with trust-based controls experience the most difficulty in switching suppliers, whereas firms with market-based controls experience the greatest ease. Firms with bureaucratic-based and hybrid controls generally lie between these extremes. Furthermore, in nearly 50 percent of our sample (25 cases), respondents indicate that the switching costs associated with control choices increase the difficulty of switching suppliers. We also find evidence that the magnitude and nature of switching costs vary with the types of controls chosen.