Incumbents Beware: The Impact of Offshoring on Elections

How does globalization affect politics? One of the most controversial aspects of globalization is offshoring, when manufacturing operations and business functions move abroad. Although voters generally dislike offshoring, it remains unclear how moving jobs abroad impacts democratic elections. Using a difference-in-differences estimation strategy, the author finds that incumbent government parties lose more votes in municipalities where a local plant moved production abroad between elections than in municipalities that did not experience such an event. The result holds across various time periods, different incumbent parties and diverse types of elections. In both national and regional elections, voters punish incumbent government parties when a local firm moves production abroad. Incumbent parties' vote shares fall as the number of jobs lost due to offshoring increases. In multiparty governments, voters disproportionately punish the largest coalition party for offshoring. The results of an original survey administered in Spain verify the importance of offshoring for voters' retrospective evaluations of incumbents.

What is Offshoring Management Capability and How Do Organizations Develop It? A Study of Dutch IT Service Providers

This study develops a capability perspective of offshoring. While previous research shows that experience affects future offshoring decisions, we still lack an understanding of what offshoring management capability is and how organizations develop it. Using data on five Dutch IT service providers, we find that offshoring management capability is multidimensional as it comprises four dimensions: coordination competency, relationship development, relationship design, and organizational identification. Furthermore, we uncover the process through which organizations can actively develop an offshoring management capability. We find that there are four elements in this learning loop: an offshoring growth mentality, adaptive monitoring of offshoring performance, offshoring reflexivity, and mechanisms for storing and disseminating offshoring best practice. Therefore, our capability perspective of offshoring provides a comprehensive conceptualization of offshoring management capability as a multidimensional construct and uncovers the process through which organizations develop it.

Knowledge transfer in IS offshoring: a Delphi study of the offshore coordinator role

Purpose This paper aims to investigate the main tasks, necessary skills, and the implementation of the offshore coordinator’s role to facilitate knowledge transfer in information systems (IS) offshoring. Design/methodology/approach This empirical exploratory study uses the classical Delphi method that includes one qualitative and two quantitative rounds to collect data on IS experts’ perceptions to seek a consensus among them. Findings The participants agreed, with strong consensus, for a set of 16 tasks and 15 skills. The tasks focused primarily on relationship management and facilitating knowledge transfer on different levels. The set of skills consists of approximately 25 per cent “hard” skills, e.g. professional language skills and project management skills, and approximately 75 per cent “soft” skills, e.g. interpersonal and communication skills and the ability to deal with conflict. Two factors mainly influence implementing the offshore coordinator role: project size and the number of projects to be supported simultaneously. Practical implications The findings provide indications of how to define and fulfill this crucial role in practice to facilitate the knowledge transfer process in a positive way. Originality/value Similarities in previous research findings are aggregated to examine the intermediate role in detail from a consolidated perspective. This results in the first comprehensive set of critical tasks and skills assigned to the competency dimensions of the universal competency framework, demonstrating which and how many competency dimensions are critical.

Children are the future? Power, generation and environmental practices

This chapter talks about how children are often responsibilised in environmental policy and media discourses in both India and the UK. Abstract evocations of future generations materialise in many areas of climate change policy, based on the ethical argument that, as those imagined to outlive current generations of adults, children have the most to gain from activities and policies seeking to sustain the environments of which they are a part. Yet the centring of children in discourses of climate change impact and response is not without practical and ethical problems. Positioning children as ‘undercover agents of change’ for the environmental movement is as much an abrogation of responsibility for what are essentially the damaging environmental practices of adults, as is offshoring environmental responsibility to the next generation of stewards of the earth.

Stakeholder Challenges in Information Systems Project Offshoring

This study of international information systems (IS) offshoring highlights the idea that project success or failure is often in the eye of the beholder and that proper attention needs to be provided to both client and vendor perspectives. This research contributes by identifying noteworthy IS offshoring challenges faced by client and vendor stakeholders. This research synthesizes key findings from eight dyadic case studies consisting of 56 interviews in total from both client and vendor firms detailing their offshore experiences. The case investigations lead to the discovery of nine unique challenges encountered by client and vendor stakeholders. The challenges include a wide assortment of economic, personal responsibilities/expectations, and organizational offshore project management issues. The reported challenges can suitably guide client and vendor project managers in managing international IS offshore projects as well guide academic researchers to better understand techniques for managing offshore IS projects.

Stakeholder Challenges in Information Systems Project Offshoring

This study of international information systems (IS) offshoring highlights the idea that project success or failure is often in the eye of the beholder and that proper attention needs to be provided to both client and vendor perspectives. This research contributes by identifying noteworthy IS offshoring challenges faced by client and vendor stakeholders. This research synthesizes key findings from eight dyadic case studies consisting of 56 interviews in total from both client and vendor firms detailing their offshore experiences. The case investigations lead to the discovery of nine unique challenges encountered by client and vendor stakeholders. The challenges include a wide assortment of economic, personal responsibilities/expectations, and organizational offshore project management issues. The reported challenges can suitably guide client and vendor project managers in managing international IS offshore projects as well guide academic researchers to better understand techniques for managing offshore IS projects.