Master-Arbeit Univ. St. Gallen, 2007.

The aim of this research is to examine the extent to which the offshoring and outsourcing practices in Multinational Corporations, when the headquarters are registered and located in either the UK or Germany; are embedded in the institutional contexts of their respective home countries. There are six research questions relating to differences in approach and choice of location, ownership and coordination, employment practice, cultural proximity, trade union influence and finally the extent of re-shoring. These are primarily assessed through the 'varieties of capitalism' perspective. A comparative case study approach has been adopted with a focus on two sectors; airlines and engineering; in each case a major UK and German organisation are compared. Fourteen in-depth, semi-structured interviews took place in both the home countries and overseas locations in Europe, India and Asia. The sample size is small, however, each was with a senior executive and the transcripts revealed 'rich data' for compiling the case studies and answering the research questions. The contribution to original thinking is a conceptual framework posited by proposing a taxonomy to analyse the relationship between coordinated and liberal market economies and the components of the offshoring and / or outsourcing process. Reference is made to theory drawn from the resource based view, global production networks, dynamic capabilities, embeddedness as well as varieties of capitalism to focus on competences, spatial dimensions and power. It is this collective approach that is considered to be novel. Qualitative analysis is deployed to re-construct the actual framework for each industry sector. Constructs (Reichertz, 2004) combining abduction, deduction and induction are used to develop propositions that lead to conclusions. The similarities between the two UK companies and the two German companies confirms the usefulness of the taxonomy and allows for its extension to other firms and sectors. Key findings and conclusions from the two case studies are that German organizations are less inclined to outsource (in both sectors) preferring to reduce costs and retain control through captive offshoring. The UK businesses were less risk adverse and more flexible and agile in their sourcing policies. There was evidence that the UK companies regarded outsourcing and offshoring as options for closer co-operation that may lead to strategic alliances and mergers or acquisition. The relationships with trade unions/works council was also found to be very different, with a reluctance by management in Germany to progress radical initiatives. Other differences in terms of autonomy and division of labour were found. From an institutional perspective the German CME's cases were less able to deploy outsourcing and offshoring strategies with the degrees of freedom that the UK LMEs typically enjoyed. CMEs are constrained by their policies, interconnectedness and style of working. A number of ambiguities are highlighted. The thesis argues that the outsourcing and offshoring practices are embedded to a high degree in the institutional practices of the home countries. Finally, the empirical novelty lies in the 'rich data' generated by valuable insights from the senior executive interviewees to which the researcher was privileged to have access.

The dissertation thesis investigates the most up-to-date subject matter of contemporary business life, both internationally and locally -- Human Resources outsourcing, which appears to have become a new strategic tool for Human Resources Management. The concept means the strategically motivated external execution of some or all HR processes, which would otherwise be performed by internal staff, along with the assignment of the responsibility for those processes to external providers. Effective outsourcing initiatives have the potential to bring about significant benefits for the company, both operational and strategic. The dissertation thesis introduces a comprehensive and objective analysis of the global HR outsourcing model, including its microeconomic implications, the history of outsourcing, its evolution, benefits and possible risks, its different types of delivery models, suppliers'analysis and supply models, the cost aspects, the principles of effective management of the outsourcing project or the relationships of outsourcing with information and communication technologies. Another part of the thesis focuses on the phenomenon of offshoring, which represents one possible way outsourcing can be executed. Employees' outsourcing, its cost efficiency, legislation framework and private agencies' industry impact on the labour market is a subject of another part of the thesis. The consequent section includes empirical research executed with the aim to investigate the principles, models, scope and trends of HR outsourcing activities in the Czech republic. The results of the research are compared with scientific hypotheses that are based on the knowledge of the HR outsourcing global model which results in defining a local model of HR outsourcing. The concluding part of the dissertation thesis summarizes both the theoretical knowledge and practical findings and formulates a number of recommendations and advise for company top management about how to implement effectively HR outsourcing in the company or how to improve its quality if already implemented.

Práce pojednává o pozici ČR jako destinaci pro přesun podnikových procesů. Zaměřuje se na odvětví business process outsourcingu a centra sdílených služeb. Cílem této práce je dokázat hypotézu, že ČR je přednostně využívána pro podporu evropských podnikatelských aktivit, a to konkrétně na příkladu společnosti Accenture, která je vedoucím poskytovatelem služeb outsourcingu ve střední Evropě. Práce definuje základní aspekty pro přesun podnikových procesů do zahraničí, hodnotí konkurenceschopnost ČR v porovnání s ostatními zeměmi regionu a Indií, která je v souhrnném hodnocení pro sdílené služby nejpřitažlivější. Hypotéza je následně ověřena na reálných datech ze společnosti Accenture v Praze.

This diploma thesis deals with selected methods that large companies can use to optimize their business results in the international environment. It focuses namely on methods of outsourcing, offshoring, tax optimization and cash flow management. The first part briefly describes globalization in the world economy and transnational corporations as its major players. The next two chapters are devoted to strategies which lead to cost reductions of enterprises due to outsourcing and offshoring. The fourth part characterizes the way offshoring enters into foreign markets in the form of foreign direct investments. The fifth section deals with tax optimizations for multinational companies. The sixth part mentions the measures taken so far in the area of tax coordination in the world and in particular the European Union and the last chapter briefly defines various options which can be used for cash flow optimization.

: Outsourcing har blivit en mycket vanlig företeelse i det moderna samhället och textilbranschen anses vara den geografiskt mest spridda industrin i världen med produktion oftast belägen i Asien. Outsourcing till trots finns det fortfarande vissa moment i värdekedjan som i stor utsträckning utförs i butik i Sverige trots att i stort sett alla andra tillverkande och sammansättande moment utförs i fabrik i låglöneländer. Ett av dessa moment är larmning av varor. Syftet med studien är att undersöka och beskriva hur larmning av konfektionsplagg går till i svenska A-läge butiker samt analysera om förflyttningen av momentet bakåt i värdekedjan skulle kunna påverka detaljhandelns tidsbudgetering och lönsamhet. Frågeställningarna för studien är: På vilket sätt påverkar larmningsmomentets placering i värdekedjan butikens tidsbudgetering? Samt: Hur påverkas butikers lönsamhet av att larmningsmomentet förflyttas bakåt i värdekedjan? Den empiriska studien är indelad i tre delar; kvantitativa observationer i form av tidsstudier utförd hos tre butiker; kvalitativa intervjuer med sex tillfrågade butikschefer; samt kvalitativa intervjuer med huvudkontor från valda modeföretag. Tidsstudien har visat att larmningsmomentet av ett plagg i genomsnitt tar 7,7 sekunder. I ett presenterat exempel där en butik tar emot 4 000 plagg i veckan blir det totalt 8,6 timmar som i en butik lägger på larmningsmomentet per vecka. Studien har visat att om larmningsmomentet skulle outsourcas från butik till fabrik skulle tidsbudgeteringen i butik kunna omfördelas så att mer tid läggs på varumärkesbyggande åtgärder som integrerad informationsflöde från detaljist till huvudkontor, kundservice, försäljning samt vård av butik och lager. De insparade timmarna skulle också kunna tas bort från budgeten om butiken önskade, vilket inneburit en direkt kostnadsbesparing. I analysen presenteras ett exempel baserat på tidsstudien där de 8,6 timmar som läggs på larmningsmomentet multipliceras med en uppskattad personalkostnad per timma. Kvantifierat till ett år och med 100 butiker i fokus blev besparingen så stor som 8 452 100 kr för en butikskedja, förutsatt att inga oanade kostnader skapades. Studien har därmed kunnat visa att förflyttningen av larmningsmomentet bakåt i värdekedjan kan minska butikers kostnader och därmed påverka företagets Vinstmarginal (VM) och i förlängningen skulle det kunna generera högre Räntabilitet på Totalt Kapital (RTOT), även om det är med en hundradels eller tusendels procentenhet. / Program: Textilekonomutbildningen

Information technology outsourcing (ITO) can be defined as “the commissioning of a third party (or a number of third parties) to manage a client organization’s IT assets, people, and/or activities […] to required results” (Fitzgerald and Willcocks, 1994). It has been a pivotal topic on Chief Information Officers’ (CIO) agendas ever since Eastman Kodak’s decision to hand over their information systems function to IBM, DEC, Anderson Consulting, and Businessland in 1989. Never before had such a wellknown company that considered IT as a strategic asset handed over responsibility for it to an external partner (Applegate, 1992). The deal showed that ITO can constitute an alternative to managing complex Information Technology (IT) systems in-house (Kern and Willcocks, 2000) and subsequently led executives across different industries to follow suit and sign large contracts worth multiple hundred million dollars. The “Kodak effect” served as a starting point to what would become an important strategic matter for IT managers to consider (Caldwell, 1994). 30 years later, ITO has developed into a common practice for organizations of all sizes, industries, and geographies (Qi and Chau, 2013). Over the course of three decades, practitioners have come to appreciate ITO especially for its advantages in terms of cost, flexibility, and the possibility to capitalize on external capabilities (Martins et al., 2015; Schneider and Sunyaev, 2016). Today, virtually every Fortune 500 company2 and many large public institutions outsource a significant portion of their IT services (Patil and Wongsurawat, 2015). As a consequence, an entire global industry has evolved around ITO, with annual growth rates of around 10% and an estimated market size of around 320 billion US dollars in 2015 (Faisal and Raza, 2016). The increasing relevance of ITO in practice has also attracted considerable research that has explored various aspects of outsourcing, including common motivations, outcomes, success factors, benefits, and risks (Dibbern et al., 2004; Gonzalez et al., 2006; Lacity et al., 2009; Lacity et al., 2010; Lacity et al., 2016; Liang et al., 2015). Notwithstanding its three decades of existence, however, ITO remains a dynamic phenomenon that is subject to the ongoing rapid developments in the economic and societal environment in which it is embedded. Major developments in the field of IT, particularly the ever-progressing digitalization and the rise of IT-centered and -enabled business models (Bughin et al., 2019; Harvey Nash/KPMG, 2018; Legner et al., 2017), require adequate consideration in IT sourcing decision-making.